I learned how to beat meat and so can you!

My understanding of a blog is to impart my wisdom onto a reader, I would be incorrect in describing my life as perfect or something to model after. I am no expert on life, food, or organizing linen closets, especially as I just tried to spell model with an le instead of el, BUT a las I feel I do have some thoughts. As I sit hunched over on my bed cradling my 4 month old who probably shouldn’t be looking at a computer screen it occurs to me that maybe there’s another new mom with a baby in her arms thinking how can I live a vegan lifestyle? How do I get enough food to my baby and myself or family in a healthy, easy, sustainable manner? On this subject I can help. So to start my blog on “how to live like me” I’d really like to hammer out the point that I do not know what I am doing a lot of the times. I make mistakes often, and I sometimes do the wrong thing, But I learn, I make life changes and I continually am on a quest to “be the best me”. In my writing if there are ever quotations around something just read that in the most sarcastic voice you can think of. Not that I didn’t mean what I wrote just that I find most catchy phrases to be extremely corny and I have a hard to writing them without a sort of comic shield.

Being vegan is not what it used to be. We don’t hide in closets only to socialize in small numbers at Chinese restaurants (Because its always been easy to find options there!). Vegan has become a fad or a movement in recent years. My peanut butter even has Vegan written there right on the jar. And I’m sorry to offend anyone who thought that peanut butter actually had butter in it, but thanks for the heads up on letting me know that ground nuts had no dairy products in it. I thought this was rather obvious but I guess not to the trained eye. I even bought sunscreen that was labeling Vegan. Like what is that? What is going on in other sunscreens? Are they vegan? Do they have like cow eyeballs in it? Is my sunscreen being marketed as Vegan because they want to catch on the next big fad, or are sunscreens hiding secret animal products in them? Why did they need to confuse me now? I guess my point is if these labels are confusing me — a seasoned vegan veteran they would probably confuse someone new to the vegan world.

Let me guide you through the vegan and non vegan peanut butter. Well see to start I am already eating my words. The spread nutella, which is a chocolate hazelnut spread does in fact have dairy in it. But that’s because it is mixed with milk chocolate. But for the most all peanut butters do not in fact have butter in them. If we do want to go deep into peanut butters off the bat let me indulge you on the depths of peanut butter ingredients. Peanut butter is supposed to be ground peanuts and that’s it. Almond butters, cashew butters, sunflower seed butters, macadamia nut butters, etc. all should be just the nut or seed ground up. Nuts and seeds have a significant amount of oil in them so they grind easily. When buying peanut butter always buy the “natural” type. The biggest mistake you can make in buying peanut butter is buying hydrogenated oil. In recent years the natural is more widely available, they used to be just in glass jars for hippies and those elite vegans who hung out in small groups at Chinese restaurants. But these days your local grocery stores carry the natural kind for reasonable prices. When I say reasonable I mean Kroger (the local store in Columbus Ohio) will have a sale on Natural PB for like a dollar. That’s my kind of reasonably priced peanut butter. Just so were on the same page to start you should get an idea of my financial base. I think I am a little cheap. This would probably be news to my parents, but the further you get away from your parents (and believe me its been a while for me) the more you appreciate your own money and how far it goes. There was a time I would go to Whole foods and buy the fresh ground honey roasted peanut butter. This was not on my parent’s dime but was wrong for multiple reasons. One, that shit was expensive. Two, there is a lot of sugar in honey roasted peanut butter. Not that I am a Nazi about sugar, there is a time and place for it. But in something that I eat daily I didn’t need added white refined sugar. Three, I would make special trips to Whole Foods to get this peanut butter, what kind of Diva did I think I could pull off? I digress; a one-dollar jar of natural peanut butter is my kind of price and my kind of peanut butter.

Lets talk about hydrogenated oils now. What it is and why is it bad? In laymen terms this type of oil. Hydrogenated oil turns a liquid into a partial solid. This is done to provide a longer shelf life for the peanut butter. That’s why the natural peanut butter has oil on top when you buy it. The hydrogenated peanut butter has that oil mixed in it. This process uses hydrogen to turn the oil into a partial solid. During this process trans fats are produced. When you eat trans fats they raise your bad cholesterol (LDL) and insult to injury they lower your good cholesterol (HDL). Note about cholesterol, only animals produce cholesterol. Good cholesterol is called HDL bad cholesterol is called LDL. Certain foods will raise both good and bad cholesterol. You can raise your bad cholesterol by eating animals because they obviously contain cholesterol. But then you can raise your good cholesterol by eating certain foods that will help your body produce the good HDL kind. Does that make sense? Okay I honestly was just trying to write and intro. Apparently I do have a lot to write about when it comes to food. I had some thoughts on peanut butter!

Although I was trying to keep this introduction brief I have a feeling it will be the opposite. But if I could bring it home I think the rolling lesson on peanut butter proves my point. Being vegan used to be just avoiding meat and dairy. I even avoided talking about it because it was embarrassing or took too long to explain to someone. Now that I am out of the closet I see that eating vegan or plant based or herbivore (I really like that description like were dinosaurs or something). I see this “diet” is much more. In avoiding certain foods you are forced to open your mind and mouth to foods that don’t just satisfy a craving but are to give you a long healthy life. I hope to give some guidance on how to adopt a vegan lifestyle. I’ve been at this for a while and know how to cook. Like I described before I’m not perfect and make mistakes all the time; currently every electronic I own is in the red on battery life; my computer, my phone, my baby monitor; but I believe I’ve got some stuff right and it starts with what you eat and better yet it’s not that hard! I’d like to show you how to eat healthy, workout minimally and feel like a champ inside and out. Side effects include less sickness, more energy, more money in your pocket and furthermore time to spend with the ones you love. When all is said and done being skinny, or eating a hamburger is not what is important and we all know this. Living a long healthy life spending time with our family and friends is what is important. Here’s to a long healthy life beating meat!

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