As someone who tweets a LOT about climate change, I get
snarky questions about whether or not I've put my money where my mouth is, and
eat vegan.
Well... I have a confession to make. I am not 100% vegan. I was
once, and I continue to have great respect for folks who are able to live and
eat as full-on vegans. But I am also convinced that, for most people, 90 %
vegan is enough to accrue a wealth of amazing benefits, not only for your
health and pocketbook, but for the climate of this beautiful planet we share.
My full on, hard core vegan years were 2000 until late 2007.
I looked great. I felt great. I was active and happy and had clear skin. Then
one day in late November of 2007 I was
at a holiday party, having “the conversation” with someone about what I “could”
and “could not” eat, and I just snapped. I’d had it with incredulous, intrusive
questions about my diet. I'd had it with people exclaiming, "You'd never
get ME to eat tofu!" as if I'd put them in a chokehold and was forcing a
slice down their throat. I'd had enough
of answering questions like, "But you can eat chicken, right? Chicken
isn't meat!" I'd had enough of
incredulity and semi-polite revulsion and people behaving as if I were trying
to foist MY dietary choices off on them, when in fact the opposite was usually
what was going on.
I'd had it. Enough
was enough.
And so, with no further ado, I ate a piece of Brie. And
another. And then I had a sliver of ham. And by the time I got home, I realized
that I had just fallen off the vegan wagon with a THUD.
While it hadn’t been particularly challenging to stay vegan
while married to my dedicated carnivore husband, living with a meat eater did
make it ridiculously easy to go back to eating meat once I’d given up on the
vegan lifestyle. After all, I was already buying meat for R – why not just pick
up two T-bones at Safeway instead of one? And why not both of us have meatloaf,
rather than me make a meatloaf for him and a veggie patty for myself?
So for eight long years I ate meat, and cheese, and enjoyed
myself. I spent more money than I needed to on roast beef and chicken and
seafood. I horked down gallons of yogurt and cottage cheese. I slathered Brie
on my baguettes. You’ll already have guessed what happened.
Yes – I gained weight. A lot of weight. Slowly but steadily
I grew from a size 12/14 to a size 16 – to a size 18 – and finally, to almost a
size 22. I topped 264 pounds. It was a disaster. I'm convinced that, for me, meat wasn't as
much the culprit as all the bread and sugar I was eating - but it didn't
help. And I knew all along that eating
meat was horrendous for the climate. I
just didn't go back to being vegan because those steaks and slabs of Welsh
cheddar just tasted too darned divine!
Then last year, I’d once again had enough again – this time,
enough of being fat and uncomfortable and a hypocrite. I'd had enough of tweeting about CO2
emissions while being such an irresponsible citizen of Earth. I knew full well the implications of eating a
meat-rich diet. I knew about the tons
and tons of emissions being released into the atmosphere from the beef and pork
industries.
It was time. If I was
going to be a climate change activist
I needed to practice what I was preaching. I needed to make a change.
And so I made another, hopefully final, drastic change to
my diet. I started eating 90% vegan.
Full disclosure - I have also switched over to a regime that
eschews sugar entirely and limits grain.
That's me. What I am explicitly
advocating for on the grounds that it's better for the climate is just the 90%
vegan part. For lots of folks, 90 %
vegan is much easier if you includes lots of whole grains, and I intend to do
that in the recipes I post here. My
grain-aversion is my craziness, not yours.
So.
The immediate effect was amazing. My midriff, which had
bulged and billowed for years, started to pull in. I went from having a bulbous
tummy to having a moderate hour glass! I almost immediately lost over 20
pounds. And I felt great – lighter and leaner, with much, much more energy.
It’s been a year since I started, and I can honestly say
that eating this way just feels RIGHT for me. It’s a little bit paleo, a lot
vegan, and it’s easy, tasty, and pretty cheap.
In a nutshell, this way of eating is just what it sounds
like. Get 90% of your daily calories from plants, and 10% (or fewer - fewer is
good, too!) from local, organic, free-range, sustainable animal sources.
Okay, you may be thinking – great. Some yappy, liberal,
self-satisfied broad in Seattle lost a little weight and feels better because
she eats a ton of kale and arugula. How
does that affect the planet, exactly?
The answer is simple.
It doesn't affect the planet. But it might - if enough of us do it -
help reduce emissions and aid the fight against global climate change!
I got this list from Mikko Alanne, who blogged about it over
at Huffington Post. You can read it
here: http://tinyurl.com/yfzh3vf
If all Americans did not eat meat for one day a week, they
would save 99.6 megatons of greenhouse gas emissions, or the equivalent of
removing 46 million round trip flights between Los Angeles and New York, or
taking 19.2 million cars off the road for a full year.
If everyone in the US did not eat meat for two days a week,
they would save 199 megatons of greenhouse gas emissions. This would have the
same effect as replacing ALL household appliances in the US with energy
efficient ones.
If all Americans did not eat meat for three days a week,
they would save almost 300 megatons of greenhouse gas emissions. This would
have a greater impact on the climate than replacing all US cars with Toyota
Priuses.
If everyone in the US did not eat meat for four days a week,
they would save 398 megatons of greenhouse gas emissions. This would be the
carbon savings equivalent of cutting the use of all electricity, gas, oil,
petroleum, and kerosene in the United States in half.
If all Americans abstained from eating meat for five days a
week, they would save 498 megatons of greenhouse gas emissions. This would
result in the carbon savings equivalent of planting 13 billion trees and
letting them grow for ten years.
If all Americans did not eat meat for six days a week, they
would save nearly 600 megatons of greenhouse gas emissions. This would be the
equivalent of eliminating the total electricity use of all households in the
United States.
And finally: If everyone in the United States ate a
vegetarian diet for seven days, they would save around 700 megatons of
greenhouse gas emissions. That would be the same as removing all the cars off
the roads in the US.
Those numbers are stunning. But they’re also very hopeful!
They mean that we as individual consumers have incredible power over what’s
happening to the climate – that we can make a huge impact just by eating tasty,
tempting, clean, healthful foods!
Stay tuned for upcoming posts about all three aspects of the
90 percent vegan lifestyle – featuring shopping lists and tips, recipes, and
more.
First, the skinny on nutrition. A cup of baked
butternut squash has 82 calories, contains almost 60% of your daily Vitamin A,
over 40% of daily Vitamin C, 13% of your thiamine, 14% of the niacin you need,
and almost 9% of your daily calcium requirement! 
.JPG)
