new year resolutions
Cards on the table, I did feel quite sorry last year for posh-boy (Baronet dontchaknow) cum food critic, William Sitwell, and I suspect he’s one of the few people not giving up meat this January. Whilst not exactly marinated in mirth his off-the-bone comment to a foodie journalist “How about a series on killing vegans, one by one?” was not said with any particular malice or dark intent. Admittedly, it didn’t have anyone rolling in the aisle either but he ain’t a comedian, he’s a man who makes a living out of tasting other people’s cooking. Oh, and inherited wealth. Did he deserve the chop (enough already – ed) and did anyone truly take offense or was it a cause celebre that those who wished to make a point latched onto? Yep, the latter by a country mille feuille. It was neither a sackable nor resignable offence. It was an apology-worthy offence. At best.
The one thing the whole episode did do was place veganism well and truly in society’s spotlight. Practiced throughout the sub-continent for millennia, veganism has been slow on the uptake in the West, that is until relatively recently, when numbers exploded: Registered UK vegans now number 600,000 (up from 150,000 four years ago) and in certain demographic groups can account for as many as one in seven. And we owe it all to a pacifist woodwork teacher from Leicester, Donald Watson, who in 1944 advocated the doctrine that we should live without exploiting animals in any way.
As a vegetarian in the 1990s with a penchant for holidaying en France, it wasn’t a particularly easy choice and living on cheese, chips and Linda McCartney’s sausages proved to be the most unhealthy of lifestyle choices. To make matters worse, I was soon to discover I was also violently allergic to Quorn ferchristsakes! Unsurprisingly, my weight ballooned and fitness waned and, after nine years, I was welcomed back into the fold with an extremely rare Chateau Briand at Liverpool Street’s then-recently opened Gaucho restaurant. I kid you not – if you’re going to be a bear, be a grizzly!
Without going into the social ethics of animal husbandry and welfare, which you can find out about yourselves, the pressing personal questions are, is veganism good for you and is it is better for the environment? And with a raft of new year’s resolutions about to be imminently ditched they also may be questions you’re asking?
Put simply, it should be so on both counts. Since vegans eat more fruit & veg they invariably consume far fewer calories, fats and unnecessary additivities, and by excluding red meat and highly processed foods the diet is on the whole healthier than the standard calorific Western diet. By default, they also tend not to gorge on fast-food and take-aways: no, not for our vegan friends are the delights of a Friday evening beer-soaked XL doner with extra chilli sauce. No sh*t, Sherlock I hear you cry. However, the diet does need a certain level of consideration and planning as ‘balance’ is the key – rigid veganism still has the propensity to be vitamin (B12 & D), calcium and iodine light. Search out the right foods (which taste better than Kale) and spend enough time outside.
Unsurprisingly, the case for the environment is equally as straightforward. Livestock farming on an industrial scale causes potentially apocalyptical damage: the UN reported decades ago that over 70% of all agricultural land accounted for the production of only 17% of the world’s calories, and let’s not even stick our noses into CO2, methane, ammonia and slurry emissions. Deforestation, caused by the clearing of land for pasture, has accounted for the massive increase in soil erosion, land movement, mud-slides and removal of essential water supplies both above and below the water table. Reducing meat production is clearly beneficial for the environment.
As it moves increasingly into the mainstream social conscience, so veganism is losing mainly of its longstanding stereotypes: ascetic activists, political rebels, romantic radicals, soppy sentimentalists and hard-line hemp heretics. For many, gone are the associations to the Animal Liberation Front and as celebs and sportsmen/women join their merry throng (from ball-crushing Serena Williams to once-burger-toting Bill Clinton) it now smacks of lifestyle choice as opposed to an extreme self-sacrificing hair-shirt existence. However, it’s not for me just yet, though, like many, I do intend to become a little less of a carnivore and a little more a ‘flexitarian’, as modern parlance would have it.
Furthermore, with Waitrose (William’s ex-employer no less) having introduced a whole range of vegan dishes it certainly makes the reality of any such decision a little less difficult. Mind, I don’t think William will be either tasting or typing about them anytime soon.
