Why I'll never be a vegetarian

I like steak but I could give it up
I like Chicken but I could survive without it
I like Burgers, but I can find a replacement
I like Pork, but there are other choices

But damnit - there is nothing out there that can replace my absolutely great love for seafood.

Fresh fish from the sea, blacked and stuffed, All you can eat Hard-Shell Crabs, pan-seared Scallops, Rawbar stocked with Oysters & Clams, Shrimped sauted in garlic over a bed of pasta.

You tell me they have tofu versions of this and I saw bullpucky.

I just had a Soft-Shell crab for lunch and my coworker had this awesome looking crabcake. I will cling to my meat eating aways simply to satisfy my lust for seafood!!!!

I used to be one. Life was easy.

I justify shrimp because they're really bugs...

And, well, I just have to have good ocean fish once in a while.

:-)

:D

So I don't miss what I don't know.

Now, I also didn't know about Jamaican Jerk Seitan from Whole Foods either, and am not sure how I lived without that!!

Just had salmon in jalapeno butter last nite--seafood (and love) make it all worthwhile

He went bike riding and stopped to buy a 'basket of shrimp' (his favorite food) and on his ride home he had a horrible reaction...by the time he walked into the door I thought he had been jumped and beaten in the face...but it was just a reaction of the seafood. One eye was completely swolen shut, his whole face had bumps and swollen places and he could barely see out of the other eye..just enough to get home. He has a similar but less severe reaction before eating shrimp. The poor man now even refuses to eat fish..his favorite food forever!!!

I just eat lots of vegetable and grain foods, and I like what I eat. Bon appetit'

When you're not trying to treat it as a meat substitute...but instead eating it as tofu (I particularly like the "shaggy" consistency of extra-firm tofu)...in stir fries, dessert toppings, stews, etc.

Water chestnuts, carrots, bean sprouts, nuts, onions and peppers.

What sort of "stew" would you make with tofu? I quit beef in 1997 and have not cooked a stew since.

I should have been more clear, I realized - for a stew I'm more likely to use seitan.

on it's own terms, tofu is a fine food. I like it in hot 'n sour soup. But I would never use it as a meat substitute. If God hadn't intended us to eat animals, She wouldn't have made them out of meat.

Salad's got nuttin on mutton - Seinfeld

PETA= People for Eating Tasty Animals

not.

You'd call the exterminator when you saw one or you would gag while watching fear factor contestants by forced to eat one of those giant bugs.

yuck.

Giant bugs? yummy!

Although i'm not a big fan of Lobster meat - give me all the crabs!!!!

My land lord tells stories of eating fire troasted tarantulas with the natives in Guatamala. Says they tase about like blue crab.

PS, the only crab woith eating is a Cheapeake Blue.

I eat mine with my bare hands! Nut crackers and mallots are for pussies!

Well, that and I don't mind the old bay and salt getting jabbed into my flesh with the spikes all over the damn little sea bugs.

...and I have no problem eating them. Once a crawfish marched into our garage and put up a claw to try to scare me off when I came to get it. It was so cute that I let it go. But mostly they get eaten.

Have been for almost four years and I still miss shrimp poboys. My cravings for other meats are really few and far between. But, should I ever cave in, it'll be for fried shrimp.

Types what types?

Lacto-Ovo Vegetarian.
Does not eat any kind of flesh. No fish, no crabs, no chicken no caviar etc. Not even cod liver oil! Generally prefers to keep these creatures alive than kill them. But a lacto ovo vegetarian can eat other animal products that do not cause aimals to die in the process of creating them like milk, cheese and eggs.

Pesce Vegetarian.
Just like lacto-ovo but allow the eating of fish on the basis that fish do not feel pain like other animals because their nerve endings are not very 'fine tuned'. (contributed by nora wafaai)

Lacto Vegetarian.
Same as lacto-ovo above but does not eat eggs.

Ovo Vegetarian.
Eats eggs but no dairy products and milk.

Vegan.
No eggs, no dairy products. Generally believe that the suffering that animals in modern and not so modern animal farms cause suffering and that we should not enjoy that in any way.

Fruitarian-Vagan.
I only know of one religion ( Jainism ) that does not only forbid the eating of animals but also of vegetables that have to be killed in order to eat them. So fruits are ok but mushrooms are not.

http://www.vegetarianegypt.com/index.pl/types_of_vegetarians

As you see, you could be a vegetarian and still include seafood in your diet. I'm lacto-ovo, but I limit my consumption of eggs and dairy to two or three meal per week or as a small portion of the ingredients in a dish.

But 95% of the time, I am lacto-ovo. Just slip with seafood and once in a while Chinese (w/ chicken)...but since I've discovered more and more Thai, the Chinese weakness is falling by the wayside.

but not fish. (I'm afraid I'm drooling over your lunch.)

Strangely enough I could never live without cheese either. I love pretty much every type and put it on everything instead of butter. Without it, everything seems bland and life begins to lose it's meaning...

I pretty much never eat red meat or butter and am down to maybe two servings of chicken a week but I compensate with fish and cheese.

...then why did He make them out of meat!?!

At least for me.

Since I became 95% vegetarian, my health has been better, and I can oppose all factory farming with no concern that I'm contributing.

Once in a great while I buy standard eggs (if there is no alternative)...but it's organic free-range for me whenever possible!

Last time I looked, they were made out of meat too!

especially FRIED seafood, is the only thing I really miss as a vegetarian. I don't miss beef or chicken or pork at all, but I do get cravings for a big ol' fried seafood platter once in a while. But then all I have to do is think about the smell of raw seafood, or that black vein that runs through shrimp, or the yellow muck that runs out when you bust open a crawfish or a crab, and my cravings go away immediately. Works for me.

in a raw oyster. Yummy! That's where all the flavor comes from. Not. It's the cocktail sauce.

I'm considering the options this year...

Just keep the NPR cranberry relish away from me!

I like the cranberry sauce "straight up"

I thought it was OK. Certainly not turkey, but a decent substitute.

But after reviewing SpikeTree's vegetarian holiday dinner thread, I think I might have to try something new this year. :)

Much better than Tofurky.

I don't think I could ever give up meat completely - any of it. And I try to by the humanely raised, chemical-free stuff from Whole Foods whenever possible.

But I have reduced my overall consumption of meat, and usually 1-2 days a week I don't eat any meat at all.

IMO, if groups like PETA and the militant vegans really care about the animals, they should focus their energies on getting people to cut back their meat consumption, rather than trying to shame them into dropping it altogether. One step at a time.

Because honestly, I think a lot of PETA's campaigns cause people who might waver to move firmly into the anti-PETA mindset. In other words, they do more harm than good.

I dunno why but for some reason fish seems ok

You know, just 'cos you can't cuddle them and they seem pretty dumb... mind you I feel the same way about dogs and I don't eat them either.

There are different types of vegetarians. I don't eat fish either so now you know two vegetarians who don't eat fish. ;-)

The logic seems fairly shaky. When I was a vegetarian, I didn't eat fish, but the whole point of the diet was to shake off some allergies by reducing my exposure to animal proteins, which fish have in abundance. It worked well. I can eat fish, meat, dairy, etc. just fine now.

Fish certainly do feel pain, and they can put up quite a fight for their lives. At least some fish do. And at least some of them behave as if they have some degree of sentience.

One of my friends explains that fish are not raised in cruel ways, while cows are raised in cruel ways. Well, what is cruel? She eats salmon, which is farmed, which is a contributing factor to the extinction of the wild Atlantic salmon. Being made extinct is fairly cruel in my humble opinion. But I don't want to get into it too much, because I don't want to give her reason to restrict her diet even more.

I love meat. Can't live without it. Vegetables are gross and lack flavor. What's worse than vegetables is tofu. :puke: Worst. Food. Ever. That's just my 2 cents.

I started becoming a vegetarian when I was 4 years old because I REALLY didn't like meat.

When I went to college and could finally decide for myself what to eat I became a vegetarian.

at 21 I became a vegan.

Now at 35 I am still a vegan. I look at mean and eggs and I have a hard time imagining that people actually eat that stuff. It just doesn't seem like it would be edible stuff.

I do miss diary. I used to eat and drink huge amounts of dairy every day growing up. But you can't have a dairy industry without having a veal industry as a result. Ick.

meat and eggs instead.

beat!

Mmmmmmmmmmmmm

I look at that and it doesn't appeal to me at all.

:puke:

That's certainly your prerogative, and I wasn't attempting to proselytize. :eyes:

I'm broke, otherwise I'd be all over that like a cheap suit. It's leftovers for me tonight.

And, I'll have to skip my favorite breakfast of country ham and grits tomorrow, since I can't afford the ham...thank god grits are cheap hehehe.

I'd be such a good little vegetarian then. :D

to be a vegetarian, a lot of vegetarians eat fish. I don't eat fish because I can't stand it but if you like it eat it, to my mind you would still a vegetarian.

What kind of logic is that???:shrug:

I have been a vegetarian all my life and people always assumed I ate chicken and fish. I found it strange but apparently non-vegetarians define vegetarian as someone who doesn't eat meat meaning cows, pigs, sheep anything with hooves but not wings or fins. Personally I won't eat meat, fish or fowl but I know many vegetarians who eat fish and chicken and still say they are vegetarians and I'm not going to tell them they aren't ;) since they are trying to make the effort. :-)

fresh from the Pacific Northwest...mmmmmm...

or Chinook Salmon....with a lemon dill seasoning....

I eat a lot of meat (beef, chicken, turkey, shrimp, clams), because I used to eat a LOT of carbs (potatoes, bread, mac and cheez, etc.), and that was contributing to my weight gain some years ago. I think that eating a whole bunch of carbs is more harmful than eating a bunch of meat. I'm a believer in the Atkins' diet. My father lost 40 lbs. on that plan, and I've lost over 20 so far. Also, meat generally has lots of proteins and nutrients that you won't find anywhere else in plants or dairy. Anyone (PETA, I'm mentioning you) who tells you that meat in itself is BAD for you is full of horseshit.

and at one point, managed to give up all animal foods. That didn't last - I missed dairy and eggs (especially cheese), and I really missed seafood. I don't miss beef or pork at all - I never liked hamburgers to begin with, and pork never liked me, it always gave me a tummyache. So gradually I added eggs and dairy back in, and then seafood, especially shellfish (I loves me some shellfish!), and these days, because I'm lazy and don't cook, I eat some poultry too.

But I'll probably never eat red meat again.

None of this is for cute and fuzzy type reasons - originally I gave up beef as a protest against what free-range cattle farming does to the environment around here. Then there were so many other reasons not to eat it, chief among them being that, well, I don't miss it. I gave up pork because I tried to eat it after having eschewed it for a long time, and was in agony for days. I don't think I have the enzymes to process that stuff anymore.

It's no sacrifice to me to give up red meat. If I cooked more, I'd give up poultry too, but I'm too lazy. It's difficult to find prepared foods that don't use meat of some sort.

I found that people in the midwest think you're a vegetarian if you don't eat beef and pork, regardless of how much fish and poultry you might consume. Around here, they're more likely to not consider you a "real" vegetarian if you eat any animal products at all. I think making any kind of moral judgements about people based on what they do or do not eat is pretty silly and shallow.