Brain Dump Monday: Vegan Until Dinner
I was reading an interesting article about how the Times food writer Mark Bittman has started eating vegan until 6pm. After which he can eat whatever he wants. After being diagnosed with high cholesterol and high blood sugar, his doctor suggested he go vegan. This was his compromise since he figured that going full on vegan was unrealistic! As a total carnivore, I completely agree.
Mark explains how increasing fruit and vegetable consumption and reducing dependence on processed foods will lead to better health not only for your body, but also for the planet.
I know Hakushaku is probably scoffing at this one :) But I’m inspired and totally going to try this! I eat the most unhealthiest foods at lunch…mostly fast food actually. So no more fried chicken or chicken mcnuggets for me! Well at least until 6pm. Oh, I also came up with a few more exceptions haha but it’s a start!
– Instead of going full on vegan, I will just be going vegetarian + no processed foods + high fructose corn syrup.
– I can eat fish. I think fish is healthy and I think I could last longer if I could at least eat fish!
– I get weekends off. ha ha…I know this last one is such a cheat! But I think it would be too hard for me to keep this up on the weekends since I have less control over what I’m eating.
I think this is a good way of forcing myself to somewhat eat healthier. At least it’s a good first baby step :) Anyone want to join me? I will make it a goal to do this til the end of March. And if it’s not too bad, maybe til my wedding!
Posted: 9 March, 2009 in Health/Diet/Recipes, Personal.
Comments
Comment from Hakushaku
Posted: March 9, 2009 at 9:25 am
Haha, you misunderstand me, my dear. I have nothing against eating healthy. Hell, most Americans are disgusting fat bodies because all they do is shovel filth into their pieholes day-in day-out.
I think fast food is pretty damn gross, but I might perchance have a quarter pounder every now and again. But if you’re eating it everyday for lunch, then I would advocate anything to break that habit, even an all gravel-diet.
And basically, with all your exceptions to the vegan rule, you seem just to be promising to not eat garbage for lunch everyday. Sounds like a plan to me!
The people I have problems with (besides aforementioned chicken-bucket eating human corpuscles) are the super health freaks that carry around dried pimento beans in a (recycled!) plastic baggie all day to “snack on”, and for dinner eat a bowl of dry wheat stalks and sand, and have to spend all their time convincing everyone how “great” they feel now that they’ve cleansed the “toxins” our of their “crystals” or some drivel. Yeah, enjoy your pimento bean high, my friend, while I tuck into this bowl of Penne al Arrabiata with sliced proscuitto on the side.
And for the record, I have a Japanese wife, so I eat very healthy lunches and dinners on most days. Bamboo and grilled fish and all sorts of shit that Koalas would eat. But I also like me some Entenmann’s Raspberry Danish Twist or Frosted Flakes. The two can go hand in hand, people! I am living proof.
The only two options in life are not walking trans-fat grease-nugget or granola branch eating hippie!
So you go girl. Eat them fishes.
Comment from Louise
Posted: March 9, 2009 at 12:52 pm
Congrats on your decision to eat healthy. I guess I’m the opposite of Bittman — I’m omnivore until 6pm. Because the BF is vegan and we eat dinner together at home, we usually cook a vegan dinner. It’s just easier to do that than to make separate foods and I’m kinda a newb at cooking meat anyway.
Let me know if you have any questions about what to cook, how to get enough protein, etc. There are a couple of loose recipes (more like ingredient lists) for vegan dinners on my site to get you going.
Comment from Drew
Posted: March 9, 2009 at 8:22 pm
Hey, compliments on your decision!
As a full-time vegetarian I can tell you that I completely understand not going full time vegan or vegetarian. It’s quite a lifestyle change & sometimes it’d be nice not to be a vegetarian because fish and steaks are always tempting me – which are good in moderation, right? I’m sure someday I’ll cave, but keeping a stricter diet for most the day and eating a normal meal at night sounds like pretty good idea! Let us know how it works out for you.
Some of my best friends are vegan though, and they turned me onto the blog, “What The Hell Does A Vegan Eat Anyway?” a great place to start for some food ideas. http://veganmenu.blogspot.com/
Comment from che
Posted: March 15, 2009 at 9:40 pm
i forgot that there is this vegan site that i follow (i forgot until they updated recently, lol). i started to follow it cuz i wanted ideas for healthy recipes. maybe you will find it useful! the most recent post is ‘”Chocolate Dipped Strawberries” Pie’… yum… :) http://vivelevegan.blogspot.com/
Comment from che
Posted: March 9, 2009 at 9:22 am
i wish i had as much will-power as you. its more the processed food thing that i would have a hard time with… even though i know how bad it is for me and how much of a difference it would probably make for my health.