Vegetarian Star

Moby has questions, Mark Bittman has answers.

When Moby asked the author of Food Matters what he thought about veganism, Bittman answered:

“I think veganism is the most principled position one can take when it comes to eating; there is no need to eat animal products at all, and – aside from processed food – they are the most damaging foods produced, both from a personal and a global perspective.”

“Having said that, I think veganism is a very tough sell. And I would rather see millions, tens of millions of people significantly reduce their consumption of animal products than see tens of thousands eliminate them.”

“As an aside, let’s also remember that one can be a vegan and still eat junk. So my advice remains – eat plants above all else, eat unprocessed or minimally processed plants whenever possible, and eat these foods at the expense of everything else, particularly animal products and junk.”

And if you can’t go veg all the way, you can still use Bittman’s “vegan until six,” approach.

Learn more about what Bittman has to say about topics such as  factory farming and buying organic vs. local

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Mark Bittman, the vegan until dinner flexitarian advocate, recently discovered joy in creating Ma Po Tofu without the pork.

He described his experience in the New York Times:

“First I started a batch of the mixed grains. Then I slow-cooked about 20 of the peppercorns in oil (I was too lazy to grind them, another alternative), with three dried chiles. I removed them when the oil was fragrant (no one wants to bite on a peppercorn). Into that oil, I stirred about a quarter cup of the bean paste, which I realized for the first time is a cousin of miso.”

“I tasted the tofu thing, and added both soy sauce and salt. I scooped some grains in the dish – thanks to the black and brown rice and black sesame seeds they looked vaguely like pork (as it happened; no planning there, but I’m not lying either) – and topped it with the tofu mix. And the thing was so good I made it again two days later.”

Sounds like Mark learned being vegan at dinner’s not so bad either.

If you’re looking to attempt vegan ma po tofu, try this recipe any time of day.

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Hey you flexitarians out there!

Congratulations for the making the choice to improve your health, save animals, and lessen the environmental impact of the livestock industry on planet Earth.

New York Times columnist and food writer Mark Bittman, who’s been advocating a vegan until dinner type approach, has given the UK Times online some tips for those who want to cut the meat from their diet.

“My ‘vegan before 6pm’ approach is just one way of doing it. Indeed, the opposite schedule — eating your heaviest meal of the day for lunch or breakfast — may make more sense to you,” Bittman said. “You can opt out of two servings of meat a week. You can start the day with oatmeal instead of bacon and eggs. My guess is that 70% of my calories now come from non-animal sources. A shift of 50% would be significant for anyone.”

“The basic line is this: no matter how you do it, you [and the planet] will benefit if you eat a higher proportion of plants and a lower proportion of everything else.”

Visit the Times online to read an excerpt from Mark’s book, Food Matters, where Mark recommends taking a B vitamin supplement and gives sample meal plans.

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The self-proclaimed “lessmeatarian” food writer Mark Bittman recently appeared on the Stephen Colbert show to discuss his latest book, Food Matters: A Guide To Conscious Eating.

Although Bittman is not a complete vegetarian, he has drastically cut back on meat in the past years and is advocating more people do the same, for the sake of their health and the planet’s.

Taking a cue from Bittman’s book title, Colbert’s ever so sarcastic persona jumps in immediately and he mentions that he likes to eat food that was once conscious. Hahaaaa, Colbert.

Bittman says he is a vegan until 6pm, and thinks everyone should think harder about the portions of meat and processed foods they’re eating, versus the amounts of plant based foods they should be eating.

Vocab lesson from Colbert: Industrialized Livestock=robot cow (factory raised meat).

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Food writer and New York Times columnist Mark Bittman once said that “if pigs were raised in prison”, he “wouldn’t care as long as they tasted good.”

Ten years later, he tells what is seemingly a more caring storing about animal welfare.

“I don’t know if that means they’re subhuman or just different than humans, but there’s certainly no reason to mistreat them as badly as we do,” he told Josh Hardow and Michael Rau at the Library Journal.

“I guess if you’re going to kill them and eat them, you’re mistreating them to some extent anyway, but there are degrees of that.”

One has to question some of his motives for better animal welfare, as he added that if anything would affect the taste of meat, it would be the industry’s disregard for both animals and the environment through their mass production methods of bringing it to the supermarket.

But you must give him credit, as he’s including fewer and fewer meat meals in both his personal diet and his cookbooks.

While by no means a vegetarian (yet), in his newest book, Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating with More Than 75 Recipes, he’s advocated switching to a more plant based diet.

It all started while he was revising one of his How To Cook Everything books (one of which is vegetarian) in 2005-2006. “If I’m eating less meat, and I think everybody should be eating less meat, maybe I don’t need 600 or 700 recipes including meat,” he said of his revisions.

While going all the way is ideal, part time vegetarians or flexitarians still have much to gain in terms of reducing food costs and improving health, not to mention lessening environmental impact and animal suffering.

And Bittman seems to agree.

“It was going to be called The Food Matters Cookbook, but if I could get people using the word “lessmeatarian,” I’d be ecstatic.

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Forget the horse, forget the cowboy. Save a pig, eat a turkey!

Gwyneth Paltrow has no doubt taken a beating from the vegetarian community these days and for good reason, including her fur wearing ways in a Tod’s clothing ad.

Her “Spain…On The Road Again” series on PBS, which UKTV has now obtained the rights, features Gwynnie, celebrity chef Mario Batali, New York Times food writer Mark Bittman and Spanish actress Claudia Bassols and their culinary experiences while traveling through the country.

While filming the series, Gwyneth said she did not eat jamon, a cured ham product only found in Spain and Portugal, because she’s a vegetarian, according to UK’s Digital TV blog.

When she apologized to PETA for wearing fur for Tod’s, she did say that her and husband Chris Martin, Coldplay frontman, are “pretty much vegetarian.”

However, in the Huffington Post she wrote about how turkey always has a place (dead, not a seat at the table, that is) at her Thanksgiving table with recipe instructions for how to make turkey burgers!

Hollywood divas can be ever so confusing! For now, it’s assumed Gwyneth follows the “Save a pig, eat a turkey!” vegetarian plan.

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