Choosing to eat meat/poultry, dairy foods, eggs and fish.

Contrary to popular belief we do not need to eat these foods to get our full whack of protein, it does take a little more thought to put your food together but you really don’t need that slab of flesh on your plate or in that bun with onions and fries.

So what about our history of meat eating and why do we have teeth that can chew. There is many a debate as to whether or not our teeth were designed to chew meat or perhaps chew the tougher vegetables and perhaps eat more raw vegetation.

The digestive system, in my view, gives us a bit of a clue. Digestion begins in the mouth when you are chewing, the enzymes that are present are those which start to process carbohydrates, (not protein or meat), our digestive system is a very long tube with compartments doing specific jobs. (see digestive system for more explanation on this) not like that of a typical carnivore such as say a dog who has no enzymes in its saliva, and does not chew food, merely tears it into pieces big enough to swallow, the food then hits the stomach where a highly acidic environment breaks down the protein.

It is a certainty that even if early man ate meat he would have been in a contest with the animal kingdom to get his share on the day. Humans have evolved and become meat eaters but was that choice or greed? It was considered that man who ate grains was a peasant whilst he who ate flesh was a king.

There are far more important reasons not to choose meat, the overuse of growth hormones in the food chain. Antibiotics are used extensively to not only help to prevent disease but because of poor husbandry and overcrowding in cattle pens. Feeding lower but regular doses of disease fighting antibiotics has been found to increase the growth of the animal Have you ever noticed how cattle seem to be bigger than they used to be.

And of course we could look at the way animals are slaughtered it is appalling. See below for some extracts from a couple of websites. I say, don’t eat anything with a face on it !

So, what have you got besides a piece of flesh on your plate ?

Growth Hormones

rBGH bovine growth hormones are injected into cattle to make them grow faster and bigger.

Antibiotics

These are being used to combat the higher incidence of mastitis in cows which is a severe infection of the udder due to massive milk production caused by the use of rBGH.

Antibiotics are used in a milder form in cattle feed regularly to promote growth and with overstocking it helps to reduce disease.

Other vaccines that are being used, considered or trialled are those for foot and mouth disease, bovine TB and mad cow disease.

What a choice of cocktails – what’s for dinner tonight, a “mad cow scmozzle”, shaken or stirred !.

All of this is occuring because there is a massive market for meat production which means that cattle are reared on grain, which does not suit their digestive system as they are designed to eat and digest grass, but, it does mean they can all be crowded in pens and fed easily without the need for grass, of course where they would normally be grazing, the grain is being grown as there will be more yield per hectare than grazing would give to the animal. And of course it is far easier to add chemicals and antibiotics to grain fodder.

Chickens which are reared for their flesh are packed by the thousands into sheds where they are fed masses of antibiotics and drugs to keep them alive in such appalling conditions that otherwise they would not survive. The antibiotics, as well as preventing disease, encourage chickens to grow very quickly and to such a large size they cannot even stand up. Notice the difference in size between and organic chicken and a mass reared one. And what about the eggs ! if you are going to eat any of this, choose organic.

If you ate less flesh, no processed meat such as burgers, luncheon meat, ready meat meals, then the whole environment would change as there would be less forced farming methods.

I am not saying don’t eat meat but hopefully you will, but after reading my books and all the content on the website, I hope you will choose wisely.

This of course leads on to why not have dairy. Milk, cream, yoghurt, cheese and any other derivative of cows milk, because they are from cows reared intensively, full of chemicals and antibiotics and then processed so highly by pasteurisation and other manufacturing methods.

Changing to organic sheeps or goats produce can be more healthy because of the less intensive farming methods (possibly) or just make it easy and choose rice, soya or nut milks, coconut, creams, milks, nut cheeze (see my recipe book)

Here are a few shocking truth’s ! – these are taken from the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA)

Check out their website www.handlewithcare.tv/uk

In March 2007, undercover investigators documented startling video evidence of a cruel trade in live pigs to Hawaii. During the past four years 10-15,000 Canadian and US pigs a year have endured long, gruelling journeys by road and by ship — only to be slaughtered and marketed in Hawaii as “Island Produced Pork“.

Hundreds of pigs were forced together in dark, cramped conditions, first on a truck, then a ship. They were hungry and exhausted and waited long periods for food. Motion sickness caused vomiting. The pigs stood in their own waste and endured searing temperatures, often over 38 degrees Celsius. Some even died. Those that lived – scrambled over each other as they were roughly unloaded into cramped and filthy concrete pens at the slaughterhouse.

News Update: The Handle with Care coalition welcomes the statement from the Hawaii Department of Agriculture that pigs are no longer being shipped from Canada to Hawaii. Unfortunately thousands of American pigs are still being subjected to a 4,000 km journey over five or more days from California and other US states to Hawaii, and thousands of farm animals still suffer journeys from Canada into the US. We also cannot confirm that the shipping of Canadian pigs have ceased permanently, as the fact remains that this cruel transport is perfectly legal under Canadian and US law. Please help us stop the cruel and unnecessary long distance transport of animals for slaughter today.

Every week, hundreds of millions of farm animals endure journeys, sometimes lasting days, weeks or months, in cramped conditions on their way to slaughter.

They experience stress and exhaustion, rough handling, hunger and thirst, extreme temperatures and unsanitary conditions as they are transported live across the world. As a result, the animals suffer horrific injuries, diseases are spread and many die before reaching their destination.

We already have the technology to transport fresh chilled and frozen meat, and the science to prove the welfare benefits of local, humane slaughter. For these reasons, long distance transport is not only cruel, it is unnecessary.

There is plenty more to see on their website ! it is horrific.

Here is an another horror story an extract from a report by The Humane Society – January 2008

The HSUS shared video footage with a Temple Grandin PhD, who is among the world’s foremost farm animal handling and slaughter experts. A professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University and operator of Grandin Livestock Systems. She has designed animal handling systems in many countries and written 300 articles in both scientific journals and trade periodicals and has a New York Times bestselling book, Animals in Translation. Obviously a woman with a very high degree of intelligence, integrity and knowledge of the industry. She consults with corporate’s including McDonalds and the animal agriculture industry.

Sounds like she knows what she is talking about.

For the full two page document go to www.hsus.org/web-files/PDF/farm/dairy-cattle-slaughter-expert-statements.pdf

Temple said “This is one of the worst animal abuse videos I have ever viewed”. The abuse of downer dairy cows is ATROCIOUS animal cruelty.

She noted “downed” cows (those which had fallen because they were to sick to walk to slaughter !) being dragged along concrete floors with chains on and pushed with “naked” fork lift trucks. This horrendous handling practice violates both the USDA regulations for handling non-ambulatory animals and AMI (American Meat Institute) Industry guidelines.

So, before you tuck into a chargrilled steak, think about what might have happened to the poor cow who is now providing you with its flesh. Having lived in squalor, driven miles to the slaughter house where it was too sick to walk to be killed, probably inhumanely !!!

There is more, just check the internet – if you can bear to watch the video clips, it’s heartbreaking.

You could also argue that you have bought yours from an organic source, that still does not mean its arrival on your plate was any less abusive !

Go to your local farmer and see what he does, I am sure he will be pleased to show you around. You will at least know how that slab of flesh arrived on your dining table.

As always, I like you to choose wisely …… beans and rice are great !