My Favorite Subject: Food

I went vegetarian when I was 15 for animal-humanitarian reasons but the reason I've probably stayed vegetarian for so long is because I've learned about all the other effects the meat industry has. It has a huge impact on the environment. I learned that the methane gas cows produce is more hazardous to climate change than the carbon emissions created by transportation. For that reason and many others I don't eat meat, poultry, fish or any other products in which an animal was killed for. Every once in a while I will try to cut down on dairy but it is just so hard! 

When I do make choices they are usually focused on three main things. Will it fill me up? Is it quick? And is it cheap? I usually go for foods packed with carbohydrates and dairy. I'm probably one of the only vegetable hating vegetarians you'll ever meet. I eat a lot of pasta. I don't have time to make things from scratch. Most of my foods from the store come in boxes or other packages. I do try and stay away from fast food restaurants for the most part and I don't usually buy very elaborate drinks. I usually just drink water from the tap and if I do buy drinks they're usually organic. 

I kind of use being a vegetarian as a free pass. My logic is since I'm already vegetarian I shouldn't kill myself over not eating enough locally grown organic foods. I do shop at Whole Foods and buy organic when I can. However my friend brought up to me that a lot of Whole Foods' foods are imported from other countries as well so I don't think I'm doing much good by shopping there. 

In the past few days I've eaten a lot of Annie's Organic Pasta. I also had Near East Couscous tonight. I don't think those two items are that bad for the environment. I don't usually eat breakfast either. The worse thing I've eaten in the past few days is probably the crescent roles I just made with my roommates. Considering I can't pronounce most of the ingredients, they probably weren't made anywhere near hear. The ingredients were probably shipped from all over and then the final product had to be shipped here. Also the packaging doesn't look to environmentally friendly. 

I'm looking forward to learning more about the effects of food on the environment.