Meat Free May

I'm not attacking vegetarians but what would the response be if meat eaters suggested vegetarians eat meat for a month?

Each to their own.

Why do meat eaters always feel the need to attack vegetarians?
I am not a member of Friends of the Earth because they are not espousing vegetarianism, just asking people to eat less meat. The same with Greenpeace.
It's strange talking about eating fruit and veg will mean importing more. Where do you think most of the animal feed comes from to feed all those cows that you all like to eat? Soya grown in North and South America does not arrive here by pipeline.

granjura that is exactly what we have been doing. Fortunately we have a preference for casseroles and stews over steaks and large pieces of meat, which means increasing the amount of vegetables and making a pound of meat feed six or eight instead of four is very easy to do.

That has been our measured response to concerns about the extent that good arable land is being used to grow cattle food rather than food, but I have not felt any need to make a song and dance about it or climb on any high moral pinnacle.

The problem nigtowl is that so often being passionate drifts into feeling superior, in any thing, not just being vegetarian or even having anything to do with food.

We really eat less and less meat, and less but better quality, now. Meat is used mostly to flavour, with vegetable added, about 1/3 meat and 2/3 veg. Yesterday I made chicken curry with 2 small chicken breasts- and added a whole large fennel, onions, garlic, 2 peppers, a small tin of corn, and some lentils and some frozen peas for added colour. So a small amount of poultry gave us 3 good meals. Same with bolognese or any kind of stew. Better for our health, and better for the environment too.

Moral high ground though??? No.

Don't mistake 'passionate about' for 'superior'.

I don't eat meat but do eat fish. Just a personal preference and I certainly don't feel superior to the carnivores in my family; nor do I feel inferior to my neither fish nor meat-eating son who calls me a hypocrite!

I eat more vegetables and fish than meat, but have to have ; steak, bacon, sausages, roast beef, and chicken [not all on the same day.]

Off now to prepare my Apricot and feta cous cous. Honest!

When I go on my farm search next week will take a tape measure Ana. (pretty please with a cherry on top let it be raining next Thursday)

As Mr n remarked , give fish a bloody chance , they have been overfished !

Was it a monster piglet?

Me too, flick. It's the superior airs that get one's goat, so to speak. Meat is good food (packed with easily digested nutrients) and it's not a sin to eat it. This is why our close cousins, chimpanzees, like it when they can get it too, and it's why people in developing countries eat more of it as their living standards rise.

I thought pigs and sheep were roughly the same height, fully grown...

With you there flickety . A lot of poly tunnels in Hereford Aka which I find sad to see when on holiday. I agree though, nothing to beat a Somerset Strawberry with a dob of Devonshire... obviously .

We used to be surrounded by cattle farms, sheep farms, etc but following the various scares and crises they have become noticeably less and business parks have been built in their place .

yesterday I took my littlest GS to the local garden centre where they had a selection of almost lifesize animals all of which he could name. Will he, as he grows older, believe all animals are made of plastic? He may even wonder if they could be the size of the animals in his toy farm. The centre had mix and matched the various sizes and in one display there was a pig the same height as a sheep; most disconcerting!

Off now to plan a visit to real cows, sheep, chickens for next week before it is too late.

I could do it without a problem but cannot see the point.

I can never understand why vegetarians try and send up their diet as being freaky and abnormal as if any one not sharing it spent every meal eating nothing but huge chunks of meat. Most people eating a normal varied diet will have meals that are entirely vegetable or based on cheese or eggs, or beans and lentils. Many people, when they eat meat are unlikely to eat it more than once a day and not in huge quantities.

I know I am just being perverse, because I have been reducing the amount of meat I eat in recent years, for a number of ecological reasons but when I see campaigns like this by those claiming the dietary moral high ground my immediate inclination is to eat more meat.

If everyone live on lots of fresh fruit and vegetables in winter, there would have to be more polytunnels unless they just eat cabbages and stored root vegetables, or import it all from sunnier climes, adding up the airmiles. They would need more cereals too, so there would be more enormous fields of grain.

Strawberries are grown outside...at least round here they are.

Most crops are grown in open air, not poly tunnels.

Wouldn't we need the green spaces to grow all the extra vegetables Deb

We Always have at least two meat free meals each week through choice not because I have been 'told' to. I do wonder if 'Friends of the Earth' would be too happy if the situation arose whereby: no meat eaters; no cows, sheep, pigs, chickens, etc.; farms vastly reduced in size as only milking cows; wool bearing sheep; egg laying hens required.

More greenfield sights would become available for the house building we are continually told is required. Ultimately 'Great' Britain will become a nation of homes, factories and plastic tunnels for all-year round tomatoes; strawberries; veg.

Where will we take the grandchildren to see our farm animals - zoos as endangered species?

Nearly a bullseye with the Bull's Blood, merlotgran. Actually it was Brouilly following Ricard as an aperitif, confit (not terrine) de canard, tarte tatin and finally calvados.

Anybody would think I was in France.....

TMI !!

anno! Just think how bad it might smell if he weren't a veggie!

Nightowl, you clearly haven't met my veggie younger son...

What a fuss over merely suggesting that for 31 days we stop eating dead animals! If you don't want to do it then fine!