Did you know the average American eats a whopping 45% more meat than the USDA recommends? Were you aware that reducing your meat intake can lessen your risk of the primary chronic preventable diseases killing Americans today? I had no idea before I heard about the Meatless Monday movement. But what finally sold me was how easy, fun and delicious it was to try new foods while going meatless on Monday!
Meatless Monday is a nonprofit public health initiative of The Monday Campaigns in association with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The idea is a simple one -- to encourage people to cut their meat consumption just one day a week to improve their health and the health of the planet.
You may be asking yourself why you should eat less of something when it's as tasty as meat? Well, scores of studies have shown that diets high in meat products (and therefore saturated fats) may increase your risk of cancer, heart disease, type 2 diabetes and stroke. Further, by going meatless you can limit your carbon footprint and save precious resources like fresh water and fossil fuels required in industrial meat production. Plus, it can save you serious cash!
Ultimately, though, this isn't about snatching your burger and throwing it in a lockbox. Nor is it about turning everyone into vegans and bark-eaters. It's about moderation, choice and starting the week off right -- making a little more space on the proverbial plate for fruits, veggies, nuts and legumes.
And it's catching on: the Meatless Monday movement is international and spans 8 programs from Taiwan to Brazil; it's alive in cities such as San Francisco, which just last week became the first major U.S. city to adopt Meatless Monday; and it runs the gamut from media portals to Mommy bloggers concerned about the foods their children eat.
In the coming weeks and months, I'll take a closer look at hot-button issues like: can you get enough protein on a Meatless Monday diet, why Monday, does the meat industry have a beef, are GMOs (genetically modified organisms) a concern with meat substitutes, are farmers losing their jobs thanks to the movement, and will you develop weird bad breath and lose your friends if you go meatless on Monday?
But for now, let's get to the good stuff, what you actually DO with Meatless Monday: eat fresh, healthy, delicious food! These are some of my favorite meatless recipes...
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Ellen Kanner: Meatless Monday: Produce to the People
Ellen Kanner: Meatless Monday: Earth Day Looks at Forty
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Mama Earth Rocks!
caprese salad
2 giant tomatoes cut into thin slices
a ball of mozzarella ( you can find it even at aldi's cheap)
a small bunch of fresh basil ,torn into small pieces
good flavored olive oil
Slice mozzarella into thick pieces arrange tomatoes on plate . wash basil thoroughly , put on top of tomatoes , drizzle olive oil on top. Enjoy !
I think a day that focused on sustainable, local food would do a whole lot more to raise awareness and benefit health. The carbon footprint of many of the foods encouraged by the Meatless Monday movement is vastly bigger than eating local, sustainable animal proteins. And the healthfulness of some of the foods that they encourage, particularly processed soy foods, is far inferior to sustainable animal proteins.
That said, I genuinely do appreciate that the recipes that Chris Elam recommends here really are thoughtful and delicious sounding. One thing I noticed is that some of the recipes have eggs, which are meat as far as I'm concerned, and that's fine with me, if the eggs were raised sustainably. I raise my own, and they are sublime.
It is easier for me (and probably many people) to have a hard and fast rule like 'no meat on Mondays rather than to have a rule with some leeway like 'no food on at least one day per week'. The hard and fast rule is something I feel I must follow and I can plan for and is easier for me to follow.. whereas the wiggle room rule allows me to think 'well.. i'll do it tomorrow', and then before you know it it's the end of the week and I haven't had my meatless day.
I feel the specific day thing works for me. But if you can do it in other ways, that's great.
eating local vegetables and (if you must) proteins would be a huge step
in terms of both health and environmental concerns.
community supported agriculture is a nice way to take on both of these issues.
i'm a member of a local organic farm CSA. my share is vegetables, herbs and flowers.
however, most farms also allow one to purchase a share of the farm raised meat,
eggs, and even home-made bread.
collecting the weekly farm share, cutting flowers and socialising with my fellow CSA'ers is
a brilliant way to spend a warm summer day. i highly recommend it.
Tonight we are having a falafel casserole. It's fun.