Thursday, January 14, 2010

Gummed up

I stumbled upon an important vegetarian/vegan question.  So I popped a piece of gum earlier today and noticed "glycerol" on the label.  I was curious... wonder if glycerol is anything like glycerin, which is made from animal fat.  So where to turn?  Why wikipedia of course!  I was shocked to find out that it was, in fact, basically the same thing.  I thought, "I bet nobody even knows this!" but then realized I'm new to this and many others are not.  So I looked up info about whether gum was vegan.  Apparently most of it is not, and really, being animal fat, it's not even vegetarian.  (And on Vegan Thursday, too!)  How sad.  I've got quite the stash, too!  Any tips out there from the more experienced?




So this may be a little TMI, but I tentatively think that going vegetarian has helped my, uh, monthly visit from Aunt Flo be a little less brutal.  That's all I'll say here.  Feel free to email or comment if you actually care to discuss my cycles.  My site or not, I won't make anyone endure that unwillingly!  Is this a common occurrence or possibly just a fluke?

Also, I met a lady today who is vegetarian for ethical reasons, but thinks it's stupid for people to be vegan because there's nothing wrong with eating the animal products.  Really?  I was shocked that she could be so uneducated about it. 



















She figured that the chickens would produce eggs no matter what, the cows would produce milk, and nothing got harmed by it. Live and let live.  This really shocked me.  I mean, I fully understand that people will believe and do what they want.  I can't say that I'm 100% vegetarian yet, and certainly not vegan yet.  And I know the harm and abuse that is caused.  Food is an essential part of our lives, but it's also become an emotional and sentimental experience for us as well.  We tie memories to food, which makes it much harder to change.  It can also mean that it's that much harder for us to allow our thoughts about the cruelty of the meal ingredients to trump the emotional memories of the dinner. (Hello Thanksgiving turkey!)  Anyway, I was just very surprised that she could be so uninformed about the sister of vegetarianism.

What are the sneaky ingredients you look to avoid to know that the item is vegetarian or vegan?

P.S. Averie is giving away chia seeds!  Cross your fingers that I'm the lucky one, so I can get past my monstrous chia fail from earlier this week!

1 comment:

Averie @ Averie Cooks said...

Thanks for the linky back to the chia contest!

Gum. IRONICALLY my sister is a research chemist and works for Wrigley Gum in Chicago and develops Orbit gum. I kid you not..what are the odds?!! Anyway, I will talk to her about it.

Aunt Flo...there have been many studies that show a non-animal eating diet (veggie/vegan) reduces negative symptoms so to speak. Google away, you shall find things that support this :) For me, totally true!