Meathead Goldwyn, Famous “Barbecue Whisperer and Hedonism Evangelist” to Try Vegetarianism for 30 Days: I Say Thanks for Being Open-Minded

I wanted to bring this article to your attention as it gives me hope and also gives reason to remember that not all of those who are not vegetarian are non-thoughtful people. He’s a great example of a guy who probably will never give up meat, but that at least wants to consume meat in a more responsible manner. Yes, I agree, an argument can be made that a slight change is not much, but let’s be real here – meet people where they are.

In fact, I give him a great amount of respect for the following quote:

“I want to use my prominence in the food community and as a man whose reputation was built on cooking meat, to send a message to the factory farms that I think they can do better and that I am willing to pay more for my meat if it is grown better.”

Just prior to that he stated that he is aware of the horrible conditions in factory farms:

“The way most of our beef, pork, fowl, and fish are grown nowadays, in huge factory farms, can be inhumane.

These methods may be harmful to humans.”

For these reasons he’s giving vegetarianism a chance. I say thanks Meathead Goldwyn for being open-minded and for attempting to bring changes to an industry that yes, as you say, can do much better.

Article:

Meathead To Go Meatless: Call Me Potatohead

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/craig-goldwyn/meathead-to-go-meatless-c_b_674962.html

Why on earth would a cook nicknamed Meathead decide to become Potatohead for 30 days?

Why would I violate my well publicized motto "No rules in the bedroom or dining room"?

I have decided I will not bore you with a blow by blow diary of everything I eat. Instead I have posted some notes about what I am eating and cooking, and the problems I encounter here, on my website.

I'll stick to the core concepts, events, and thoughts there. So far this has been easy. My standard breakfast is high fiber cereal with 2% milk and fresh fruit. My standard lunch is a sandwich, this month there will be a lot of tomato sammies with thick slices of homegrown tomatoes, fresh basil, on whole wheat bread. My standard afternoon snack is almonds or carrots. Fact is this is my usual diet, although often lunch has leftover meat from dinner the night before. No longer. Dinner is the only real challenge.

It is fascinating how so many of the commenters below think my mission is to further the vegetarian cause when I say plainly that my mission is to tell meat producers that a prominent meat lover is on strike for 30 days over their methods. This article is NOT about the merits about eating meat. It is about how meat is grown. If you would like to debate the merits of eating meat or not, Huffington Post has a lively ongoing discussion on the subject with an in depth discussion on the subject. Just click here.

8/12 Day 4

This just in: In today's New York Times there is a report from the front lines titled "Farmers Lean to Truce on Animals' Close Quarters". The dateline is West Mansfield, OH, in the heart of Ohio farm country.Here's the lead paragraph "Concessions by farmers in this state to sharply restrict the close confinement of hens, hogs and veal calves are the latest sign that so-called factory farming -- a staple of modern agriculture that is seen by critics as inhumane and a threat to the environment and health -- is on the verge of significant change."

The article goes on to state that the agreement in Ohio is expected to be a model for other states, but it directly addresses the concerns in my article. Some farms will be grandfatehred and will not be forced to change, but new ones will need to meet new regulations that require more physical space for animals in which to live, and reduction of antibiotics. Farmers say "they sense that they must bend with the political and cultural winds."Let's keep the wind up!

In June, in order to better understand the issues surrounding our dietary choices, I wrote an article on Huffington Post called "Meat or No Meat". It attempted to explain the pros and cons of eating meat and divided the arguments into six categories. I continue to edit it based on reader comments.

There have been more than 8,000 passionate comments from everyone from cattle ranchers to PETA members. People feel religiously about this subject. I invite you to go there, read it, and join the debate.

Some of the arguments against meat do not impress me. But two give me pause every time I reach for my tongs:

The way most of our beef, pork, fowl, and fish are grown nowadays, in huge factory farms, can be inhumane.

These methods may be harmful to humans.

I want to use my prominence in the food community and as a man whose reputation was built on cooking meat, to send a message to the factory farms that I think they can do better and that I am willing to pay more for my meat if it is grown better.

Notice that I did not say all of our meat concerns me. A growing number of farmers have proven that they can bring high quality meat to market at competitive prices, in a humane way, without use of hormones and preventive antibiotics, and that they can do so with far less an environmental impact than factory farms.

My readings tell me that:

The overuse of preventive antibiotics is probably fostering antibiotic resistant bacteria that can infect humans. Antibiotics are needed to treat sick animals so they cannot be banned. But they should not be used on all animals as prevention because they are kept in too close quarters.

There is a small but significant quantity of valid, scientific, peer-reviewed research that calls into question the meat industry's claim that growth hormones are harmless. Even if there was no contradictory research, the levels that the US Government sets for some meats as "GRAS" (generally regarded as safe) are not thoroughly tested and are unacceptably high to many other countries, including the European Union.

The use of CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations) create major waste disposal problems for soil and water that are significantly lessened by distributed farming.

There are many good books on the subject, but here is a free document from the Union of Concerned Scientists "CAFOs Uncovered". If you are busy, at least read the executive summary at the beginning.

I understand that we are addicted to cheap protein as much as we are addicted to cheap oil. I understand that cheap protein has helped the poor feed their families and kept school lunch prices down. I understand that improved animal husbandry will likely mean higher meat prices. If so, I think that we can absorb them. I think that we have alternatives. Those of us who can afford it will buy slightly more expensive meats. Or maybe we will buy less. Maybe some of us will buy other forms of protein and more fruits, vegetables, and grains. And this might not be bad.

In addition to my desire to send a message, I have two other motives:

I have read scores of testimonials from vegetarians about how going meatless made them feel great. I want to see how it makes me feel.

I love veggies and carbs almost as much as meat. I want to challenge my outdoor cooking skills and see if I can discover and create new dishes that will satisfy my meat loving readers. I will also use this as an opportunity to overcome my fear of flour. I will try to learn to bake on the grill.

So beginning August 9, for 30 days I will become an ovo-lacto vegetarian. That means I will forswear all animal flesh, but I will allow myself eggs and dairy. Why not go all the way and leave out the dairy and eggs?

Because I'm chicken. Ummm, I mean, I'm afraid. I'm afraid that my cooking skills will let me down, that the temptation to stray will be too great, and that nutritionally there are some pitfalls to the strict vegan diet and I am not knowledgeable enough to implement. I have learned that one must really understand nutrition to be a strict vegan.

How will this change me? Who knows? It is not likely that I will give up meat forever. I am already looking forward to my famous smoked turkey for Thanksgiving. But I may discover that I need much less meat than I thought. Meatless Mondays might become a habit (fact is there are usually two or three days a week that I don't eat meat already). Then again, after 30 days, I may need it more than ever. The scent of roasting ribs and sizzling steaks are as important to me as music or art.

Will I change the world? No chance. But this meatlover's voice is one more in a growing chorus and perhaps together we can change farming in the US. Perhaps you will join me this next 30 days and just say "no" as you walk past the meat case. After all, August is the easiest month to go vegetarian...

During the next month I plan to find sources for meat grown properly and hopefully locally for when I return to normal. I will share what I learn. I will blog about my experiences on this page and publish my best recipes on Huffington Post and on my website AmazingRibs.com.

I have already encountered a problem. A friend emailed me that he had found the most amazing artisan bacon and he want to bring me some. I told him it would have to wait. And I am also trying to figure out how I'm going to do a chicken grilling demo in late August without tasting what I'm cooking.

I invite you to share your ideas for how I can get through the next 30 days in the comments below. If you want to argue about why you think your dietary choices are superior, please go to my other article, "Meat or No Meat" and join the debate there.

HuffPost readers are pretty sharp. Share with me links to peer reviewed quality research that supports or contradicts my position.

I await your advice and brickbats.

In Relation to World Vegetarian Week: Top Ten Reasons To Go Vegetarian

A great article that really quickly sums up the benefits of vegetarianism.

I like this quote from Sir Paul McCartney found in the article: "If anyone wants to save the planet, all they have to do is just stop eating meat. That's the single most important thing you could do. It's staggering when you think about it. Vegetarianism takes care of so many things in one shot: ecology, famine, cruelty."

Article:

Top Ten Reasons To Go Vegetarian

http://www.alternet.org/environment/85828/?page=entire

By Bruce Friedrich, AlterNet. Posted May 19, 2008.

It's World Vegetarian Week and here's a few reasons to kick the meat habit.

Gone are the days when vegetarians were served up a plate of iceberg lettuce and a dull-as-dishwater baked potato. With the growing variety of vegetarian faux-meats like bacon and sausages and an ever-expanding variety of vegetarian cookbooks and restaurants, vegetarianism has taken the world by storm.

With World Vegetarian Week here, without further ado, are the Top 10 reasons to give vegetarian eating a try, starting now!

1. Helping Animals Also Helps the Global Poor While there is ample and justified moral indignation about the diversion of 100 million tons of grain for biofuels, more than seven times as much (760 million tons) is fed to farmed animals so that people can eat meat. Is the diversion of crops to our cars a moral issue? Yes, but it's about one-eighth the issue that meat-eating is. Care about global poverty? Try vegetarianism.

2. Eating Meat Supports Cruelty to Animals The green pastures and idyllic barnyard scenes of years past are now distant memories. On today's factory farms, animals are crammed by the thousands into filthy windowless sheds, wire cages, gestation crates, and other confinement systems. These animals will never raise families, root in the soil, build nests, or do anything else that is natural and important to them. They won't even get to feel the warmth of the sun on their backs or breathe fresh air until the day they are loaded onto trucks bound for slaughter.

3. Eating Meat Is Bad for the Environment A recent United Nations report entitled Livestock's Long Shadow concludes that eating meat is "one of the ... most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global." In just one example, eating meat causes almost 40 percent more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, and planes in the world combined. The report concludes that the meat industry "should be a major policy focus when dealing with problems of land degradation, climate change and air pollution, water shortage and water pollution, and loss of biodiversity."

4. Avoid Bird Flu

The World Health Organization says that if the avian flu virus mutates, it could be caught simply by eating undercooked chicken flesh or eggs, eating food prepared on the same cutting board as infected meat or eggs, or even touching eggshells contaminated with the disease. Other problems with factory farming -- from foot-and-mouth to SARS -- can be avoided with a general shift to a vegetarian diet.

5. If You Wouldn't Eat a Dog, You Shouldn't Eat a Chicken Several recent studies have shown that chickens are bright animals who are able to solve complex problems, demonstrate self-control, and worry about the future. Chickens are smarter than cats and dogs and even do some things that have not yet been seen in mammals other than primates. Dr. Chris Evans, who studies animal behavior and communication at Macquarie University in Australia, says, "As a trick at conferences, I sometimes list these attributes, without mentioning chickens and people think I'm talking about monkeys."

6. Heart Disease: Our Number One Killer Healthy vegetarian diets support a lifetime of good health and provide protection against numerous diseases, including the United States' three biggest killers: heart disease, cancer, and strokes. Drs. Dean Ornish and Caldwell Esselstyn -- two doctors with 100 percent success in preventing and reversing heart disease -- have used a vegan diet to accomplish it, as chronicled most recently in Dr. Esselstyn's Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, which documents his 100 percent success rate for unclogging people's arteries and reversing heart disease.

7. Cancer: Our Number Two Killer Dr. T. Colin Campbell is one of the world's foremost epidemiological scientists and the director of what The New York Times called "the most comprehensive large study ever undertaken of the relationship between diet and the risk of developing disease." Dr. Campbell's best-selling book, The China Study, is a must-read for anyone who is concerned about cancer. To summarize it, Dr. Campbell states, "No chemical carcinogen is nearly so important in causing human cancer as animal protein."

8. Fitting Into That Itty-Bitty Bikini Vegetarianism is also the ultimate weight-loss diet, since vegetarians are one-third as likely to be obese as meat-eaters are, and vegans are about one-tenth as likely to be obese. Of course, there are overweight vegans, just as there are skinny meat-eaters. But on average, vegans are 10 to 20 percent lighter than meat-eaters. A vegetarian diet is the only diet that has passed peer review and taken weight off and kept it off.

9. Global Peace

Leo Tolstoy claimed that "vegetarianism is the taproot of humanitarianism." His point? For people who wish to sow the seeds of peace, we should be eating as peaceful a diet as possible. Eating meat supports killing animals, for no reason other than humans' acquired taste for animals' flesh. Great humanitarians from Leo Tolstoy and Mahatma Gandhi to Thich Nhat Hanh have argued that a vegetarian diet is the only diet for people who want to make the world a kinder place.

10. The Joy of Veggies

As the growing range of vegetarian cookbooks and restaurants shows, vegetarian foods rock. People report that when they adopt a vegetarian diet, their range of foods explodes from a center-of-the-plate meat item to a range of grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables that they didn't even know existed.

Sir Paul McCartney sums it all up, "If anyone wants to save the planet, all they have to do is just stop eating meat. That's the single most important thing you could do. It's staggering when you think about it. Vegetarianism takes care of so many things in one shot: ecology, famine, cruelty."

So are you ready to give it a try?