Herbivore Joe

As you may, or may not, have heard this last October I have been participating in LIHATON LOKAKUU! (For the non-Finnish speakers that means Meatless October. It doesn't sound as catchy in English...). This post is all about it. Enjoy!

(By the way don't you think Herbivore Joe should be the name of a new cartoon series about a wise-cracking dinosaur that gets up to all sorts of prehistoric mischief? I do.)

I was told about this meat-free month (saying it like that sounds a lot catchier) and I thought "That sounds like a great idea!" The main reason I thought it would be a great idea is that since I've come to Finland I've been eating meat pretty much every day. Well, actually yeah EVERY day. At least twice, every day. Three times a day. I've been eating a lot of meat. Now as I am interested in health (What with the whole NURSE thing going on...) I am very aware that too much meat means that you go to sleep in a hole in the ground forever a lot sooner than you should, it did help however that I saw a documentary (hosted by the ever entertaining Michael Mosley) that really spelled out the dangers of a diet high in meat, particularly processed meat like the delicious ham and salami I was having on my sandwich for breakfast. Every day. To save space (and save you lovely readers some time) I'll condense down what the documentary said:

If you like polyps on your colon and heart attacks, tuck into those sausages!

Now I'm not a fan of colon cancer (personally never had it but the reviews are terrible) so I thought I should probably cut back a bit and what better way to ease myself into this than to entirely cut out all forms of meat in one fell swoop? Now at this point I feel I should make a "Going cold turkey" joke but I only eat turkey at Christmas so the joke doesn't really seem valid...

The other reason that that joke doesn't seem valid is that this past month hasn't been like going cold turkey at all. It's frankly been a piece of vegetarian cake. The biggest change to my diet is that I've been eating a lot more cottage cheese than I used to, mostly because I didn't eat cottage cheese until this month. Really that's it. At restaurants I'm perhaps slightly slower at ordering due to the fact it can take a while to find the vegetarian dishes on a menu stocked entirely with meat. Apart from that basically no change.

The question I know everyone is asking is "Have you missed meat?"
No. At no point have I really truly craved any meat. It just hasn't happened and why should it? Whenever anyone talks about not eating as much meat or becoming vegetarian people turn around and say stuff like

"Oh no I couldn't do it, I love sausages too much!"

My answer to that would be: "No you don't." Meat is not an addictive substance and to suggest it is is just silly. Being vegetarian isn't like coming off crack. It's like not eating animals.

I'm sure you are all thinking now "Here comes the announcement that Joe is now a card-carrying veggie" but in a shocking twist I am not going to make this Lihaton Lokakuu permanent!

DUN DUN DUUUUUUUNNNNN!!!!!

Why? Well for a the same reason I'm not eating LOTS of meat, for my health.

There are lots of vegetarians that will say that it's perfectly possible to eat a diet that fulfills all the body's needs without eating meat but frankly that takes a lot of organisation. You have to be absolutely sure that you are getting enough protein, vitamins and particularly iron and quite frankly I cannot be bothered to work that out. Choosing between organising my diet around eating the right amount of beans and pulses and just having a steak, the steak will win every time.

Now you are all looking very confused and think this lack of meat has driven me insane but I'm not crazy yet. What this month has shown me is that I do not need to eat meat at every meal. I don't need to eat it every day. I don't actually have to eat it every single week.

The description of the Michael Mosley program above was perhaps a little too condensed. What the program really was saying is that eating too much processed meat will increase your chances of developing various cancers and other health problems. It never actually stated that vegetarianism is the way to go. What it did suggest though is limiting the amount of meat you eat and ensuring the meat you DO eat is of a good quality and has not been heavily processed.

To condense the expanded condensed summary of the program: Lots of sausages and ham = bad. Steaks and good quality cuts of meat = ok if not excessive.

So that is how I am planning to live my life. Eating the occasional steak will ensure my body is getting enough of the vital nutrients I need (most notably iron) and not eating ham every day will reduce my risk of cancer. Everybody wins. Except the animals...

Just when you thought I was wrapping up...

The other main reason I decided to do this Lihaton Lokakuu is because of ethics. We've all seen the videos of animals being horrifically treated and kept in horrible conditions and as soon as we've posted a comment about how terrible and cruel it all is we go to the kitchen and start making a bacon buttie. I admit I have done this too multiple times. It's very easy to forget that what we are eating is a dead animal when it doesn't have a cute little face staring back at you, but is animal welfare really a valid reason not to eat animals?

Personally I think it can be. It depends very much what is considered animal welfare. Some people might say the killing of an animal for consumption is ethically wrong but personally I don't believe this to be the case. Humans are designed to eat meat. Not just meat of course but our physiology is built in such a way that it can take in and process meat for energy, as stated above it can be very hard to find alternatives that fill the gaps that a vegetarian diet creates. We don't have canines and incisors for nothing. Now so far it's not possible to eat meat without killing an animal. So far. Scientists have managed to grow a steak from animal stem cells so it won't be too long until entirely bloodless meat will be a reality but it is still currently in the future so for now animals will still have to die if you insist on that bacon buttie.

Right now it's possible to buy meat that is grown and slaughtered ethically so in some ways as long as you are careful and informed in what you buy it's possible (in my opinion) to eat meat ethically.

I can't wait for lab-grown meat because not only will it side step the ethical issues (at least animal welfare ones) it will also remove the other downside of industrialized meat eating. The environmental impact. A vast amount of methane is produced getting a calf from womb to plate and the amount of space needed is simply incredible. By reducing the amount of meat I'm eating I can reduce my contribution to a global problem. Pretty neat. Especially as it's so easy.

Of course there is an alternative source of protein that uses very little space, and has a minimal effect on the environment... The meat that dare not be spoken of. In cultures around the world it's been eaten for thousands of years. In desperate situations people have been forced to it...

No not humans, insects. Insects are a great source of protein and can literally be grown at home. Before you say "Eeeeewww!" Please remember that people have and still do eat insects around the world and to say you won't eat an insect but are perfectly happy to stuff your face with mashed up pig-bits in intestine is a position that in my opinion is a tad untenable.

Take the humble Dubia cockroach. Blaptica dubia to give it it's fancy name. They are a species of cockroach from Central and South America. They grow 4-4.5 cm's long and are absolutely full of protein with very little hard exoskeleton which makes them a perfect feeder insect for reptiles, carnivorous insects and... humans? In my opinion why not. They can be grown in a plastic container you can get from a supermarket for a fiver. They can't climb out of said container or fly out. They require a temperature of between 25 and 30 degrees to breed so if they do escape they won't infest your house. All they need is some fruit and veg and some time. If the conditions are right they reproduce like rabbits and you can go from 50 to 1000 in no time at all.

So this perfect, ethical, low environmental impact, quick to breed food source is being ignored. Why? Everyone (well most people in the West) are too squeamish. Which is silly.

If I was allowed I would have boxes of cockroaches all over the place as well as boxes of mealworms, grubs and crickets. Sadly I can't... yet. As soon as I can I'll be frying them up in a tasty stir fry before you can say "EEEEEWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!".

Fight insect prejudice! Save the world! Make a tasty meal! Breed cockroaches!

Oh yeah and lay off the ham.

(Who here guessed this post would start of with "I didn't eat meat for a month!" and end with "Devour cockroaches!"? Anyone?)