The Daily Tannenbaum The stigmata of the single life.*

For 12 years and five months I’ve been a vegetarian.  I was studying abroad in England, and declared myself so for a bevy of reasons including:

• Right before I left for the trip, I attempted to cook chicken for the family, and undercooked it on the inside while burning it on the outside.  I deemed chicken too scary to cook on my own.
• I’ve never had huge cravings for meat.  Growing up, steak night was always “chewing night,” and the blood grossed me out, and pork chop night was “dry meat night” and I liked the side dishes better, anyway.
• When you go to a new country where you don’t know anyone, there’s no precedent about who you used to be, and easy to make a fresh start.  If you say “I’m a vegetarian” no one’s going to coerce you to eat a hamburger by reminding you that you just did that very thing on Thursday.
• I was a student buying my food, and veggies are generally cheaper than meat.
• England is not known for its cuisine, unless you’re talking about all the yum-tastic Indian places.  And the people of India know how to make vegetarian dishes so tasty, you’d never miss meat.
• Also, there was that whole “mad cow” scare about a month before I went.
• English grocery stores and restaurants diligently label items vegetarian or not, so it’s easy to choose.
• There is no meat in Cadbury’s chocolate.

After my six months abroad, I came home and kept up my vegetarian ways, thanks to having roommates who were also vegetarians, and a dining hall that provided awesome salads.  And pizza.

I kept up the vegetarian thing, learned more about it, and defined rules for myself.  Nowadays, I eat vegetarian because it’s better for the environment and my health, and on top of that, it seems odd to eat animals that I know have personalities like my cats.  Moreover, it’s become a habit.

Every vegetarian defines him or herself differently.  There’s no absolute rules to what you “can” and “can’t” eat, and you don’t have to go far on the internet to find vicious debates about who’s a “real” vegetarian.   I’m technically a ”pescatarian,” I still partake of fish.  I simply like it too much, especially in the form of sushi, lobster, fillet, clam chowder… basically, if it swims, I’ll eat it. 

I have trouble with the vegan extremes of not eating anything that comes from an animal, including honey, casein, or cheese.  It’s too difficult and time-consuming to narrow down all the ingredients of foods, especially when eating out, although I appreciate the idea of eating things that are as close to their natural state as possible so nothing sneaks in there that you don’t want.  As loyal DT readers know,in the past few years I observed “vegan March,” challenging myself to cut all animal products out of my diet for a month.  I’ve enjoyed it as a way to experiment with new recipes, but it’s not a full-time diet for me.

Once a year, I have allowed myself to eat meat, which is a personal ritual.  The first year it was because I broke down and got a hamburger from MacDonald’s when I was so hungry and only had two bucks on me.  Instead of beating myself up and giving up vegetarianism entirely because of one slip, I forgave myself and gained some flexibility.  After that, there was always one occasion or another once a year when I either couldn’t avoid eating meat because I purchased it by accident, or was deeply curious about how something tasted (like my friend’s pulled pork that he raved about for months), or like when was in France and knew there was no way I would be sure of what I was eating.  Oh, and every once and a while, you’ll catch me chomping on a marshmallow at a cookout or slurping a cup of soup with unknown stock origins.  The little exceptions…

The bottom line is that I’m flexible and laid back with my diet, while generally avoiding things that look like dead animals.

That was wordy.  But I needed that preface to get to this:

The other night, a friend of mine from the swim team made an off-hand comment as we were talking about ways to go faster.  He said that I might do better, have more energy and endurance, if I ate meat.  His wife pshawed him, which lead to a discussion about blood type.  She said that type A’s (like me) fare well with vegetarian diets.  That ended the discussion, but didn’t stop me from thinking: I’ve been a vegetarian for so long now, how do I know if it’s really the best for me?  The night after that, I attended a fundraising event listening to many people speechify about National Heart month while standing next to a platter of chicken tenders and thinking about the next day’s swim practice.  And you know what I did? 

I. Ate. A. Piece. Of. Chicken.

And then I ate another one. 

And then I missed swim practice the next day because it snowed, and lost out on the opportunity to see if poultry, after 12 years, gave me super-human powers and red bullish energy. 

But the next night, I went out for sushi, and the swim practice the morning after that was pretty good.  Walking out from practice, I divulged to my friend that I’m thinking about experimenting with putting meat in my diet for a few weeks, and together we came up with a plan.

We determined I must be scientific.  The great meat experiment is not about going out to White Castle and then seeing how many yards I can get in the next day.  I’m going to add foods slowly, and try keeping to healthy, lean meats, locally grown when available.  The next step is to record how my energy levels feels each day, and keep it on a spreadsheet.  Or a blog… Like this blog!  It’s incentive to keep writing AND a log of my progress!  Two birds with one stone!  Delicious, tasty, tender birds…

I told my friend I was most excited about trying bacon, since no one seems to stop talking about it, or wrapping things in it.   But that’s gotta be one of the last things I do, because bacon is seriously taboo: both meat and non-Kosher.  Also, pigs are wicked smart, which is why my meat-eating friend doesn’t partake of the bacon.  And like a sign from above, this link was in my RSS feed this morning:  5 Reasons Pigs are More Awesome Than You.  I’m not entirely convinced I should eat pork.  I’ve always loved “Charlotte’s Web.” 

But still.  I’m curious about this bacon phenomenon.   I’m also a little competitive.  In order to get over the ethical bacon hurdle, I decided I’m only eating the pig because that link above makes me want to prove that I’m more awesome.  I swam 3,400 yards this morning, and the pig did not.  Therefore, sausage.   I guess.

Damn, I’m on shaky moral ground here.  But that’s O.K., bacon’s going to wait a little.  This week it’s about poultry, because turkeys are mean.  I’ll keep you posted.  And in the meantime, does anyone have some good recipies or suggestions of how I should venture into this brave new world? 

One note:  In order to have a control, I’m going to offset this meat festival with “Vegan April,” and compare the two.  Why not “Vegan March?”  Because at work, our biggest fundraiser of the year, which I am planning, is on March 28.  I am anticipating long days and crazy hours and stress, all of which will require pizza.