Reasons to Become a Vegetarian.

Often people wonder why some people would want to become vegetarians when they know that humans are at the top of the food chain, and that it is often thought to be difficult to meet their nutritional needs as vegetarians. After some research, those curious people will discover that there are many reasons to become vegetarians and they, themselves, might consider doing so. Those reasons are healthful and beneficial environmentally, helpful financially, and anti-animal cruelty.

Economy

In the book The Complete Guide and Cookbook for Raising Your Child as a Vegetarian, two studies have demonstrated being a vegetarian saves money. A study from "East-West Journal" has determined that a typical vegetarian family spends an average of $44.88 weekly while a typical American family spends $84.14 on a weekly basis. As you can see, a typical American family diet demands almost twice the financial requirements of a typical vegetarian family. The study in "Prevention" magazine claims that a vegetarian daily spends $13.98 while a person who consumes a typical supermarket diet spends $20.21 daily. So if a person were stuck in a financial situation, becoming a vegetarian might be helpful.

Animal cruelty

Often animals destined to become meat products face mistreatment. An example of animal cruelty which is found in Michael and Nina Strandler's book The Complete Guide and Cookbook For Raising Your Child as a Vegetarianis when cattle are force-fed until they gain seven hundred pounds. They also known have been know to be commonly fed DES, a hormone which FDA has banned since DES contributes to the building of cancerous cells in human beings. The cattle are fed DES to fatten up quickly. Those animals are not permitted any exercise. In addition, their cubicles do not allow them even minimal exercise. If enough people became vegetarians, the demand for meat would decrease and not as many animals would be treated so cruelly.

Here are some links against animal cruelty:

Animal Anti-Cruelty League

Animal Rights Resource Site

Jeff's Cruelty-Free Home Page

Humanity

According to the same book The Complete Guide and Cookbook for Raising Your Child as a Vegetarian, eating less meat will decrease our consumption of food in the world. United States consumes thirty percent of meat in the world while the United States' population is only six percent of the world population. The reason for this is that livestock requires a lot of feed. It takes eight to ten pounds of feedlot grain to make one pound of beef, three to four pounds of grain feed for one pound of chicken, six pounds for a pound of pork. So that means we eat a lot of meat and grain which comes indirectly. The grain used to feed cattle is enough to feed every person in the world a bowl daily for a year.

Environment

In the book The Complete Guide and Cookbook For Raising Your Child as a Vegetarian. Environmentally, being a vegetarian is a benefit. Statistics proves that 42% of land available in US is used for grazing then when it is overgrazed, the land suffers destruction. 17% of land in the United States is used for crop and 97% of the legumes and 90% of the grain grown of the 17% land are used to feed livestock. Some people predict that in ten years there won't be enough land to feed everyone on this planet. The usage of fossil fuel can also be reduced to save 21 million barrels of oil per year if everyone in US replaces a pound of meat with a pound of bread. Half of the water pollution comes from feed lots, broiler installations, and hog facilities. Those statistics can be found in Strandler's book The Complete Guide and Cookbook for Raising Your Child as a Vegetarian.

Health

A vegetarian has somewhat of a health insurance when it comes to blood pressure, cancer, heart disease, and basically being healthy. There was a study discovered in Encyclopedia Americana v. 27 where in 1907 a comparison was done on two types of athletes-one who had eaten normal high protein meals and two- athletes who had eaten meatless low protein meals. They were observed as they did different kinds of exercise. They held their arms horizontally as long as possible, raised their legs from a prone face-up position and bent their knees deeply. The results showed that those athletes who ate meatless low protein meals had greater endurance. Several studies prove that people who are vegetarians are more likely to be at less risk of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, hypoglycemia, obesity and hypertension than those who are non-vegetarians. That will only be proven to be true only if the meals are balanced. One million American Seventh-Day Adventists, who do not smoke or eat meat, were studied. They lead normal American lives. They are not isolated from the American society. They show forty percent less coronary disease, four hundred percent less deaths from respiratory disease, one hundred percent less morality rate from all causes, one thousand percent less death rate from lung cancer, and fifty percent less dental cares in children. Those studies are based on the book The Complete Guide and Cookbook For Raising your Child as a Vegetarian.

Longevity

Longevity increases for vegetarians and that has been shown in Strandler's book The Complete Guide and Cookbook For Raising Your Child as a Vegetarian. Several tribes were compared; Masai, an eastern African tribe, eat meat while Hunzas eat almost meatless meals with grown products and dairy products. Masai lives to be approximately forty years old while a Hunzas's life span reaches 100 years. Carnivores such as Eskimos, Greenlanders, Lapplanders and Russian Kurgis live an average of forty years while herbivores tend to live longer. Bulgarians, Russian Caucasians, Yucatan Indians and East Indian Todas are good examples of that.

Recommendations for becoming a Vegetarian

Now when considering becoming a vegetarian, it is important not to pursue any drastic changes in a diet because it can be frustrating and can be discouraging. As a vegetarian, it is essential in the purpose of being healthy to avoid refined, processed and chemicalized foods and processed sugar. Use whole grains, natural foods, fresh products and nutritious sweeteners. Dairy food can be used to balance meals, but can be substituted with soy products. Now there are few steps to become a vegetarian.

Slowly replace meat with various vegetables and grain rich in protein or complementary proteins.
Slowly replace refined grains and breads with whole grains and breads.
Replace refined sugar with malt, blackstrap molasses, dried fruit, fresh fruit and fruit juices, honey and maple syrup.
Replace oils with better vegetable oils or a homemade substitute butter.
Replace highly processed food that is filled with sugar and chemicals with fresh natural whole foods.
Replace processed, canned and frozen fruits with fresh fruits especially those in season.

More information:

More details on eating a healthier diet

Facts om butter and margarine

Take Charge of Your Health site

Take a look at the Food Pyramid

Are you eating enough fruits and vegetables?

Nutritional Awareness

The only way you really benefit from being a vegetarian is to eat balanced meals. If the meals are not balanced, permanent damage can be done. Eating a vegetarian diet that does not consist of a variety of vegetables and fruits, beans, calcium-rich products may leave out vitamin B, calcium, and especially high-quality protein. Those nutritional needs are often met when eating meat products and dairy products. There are many other food that can satisfy one's nutritional needs such as beans, and grains. Supplements can be taken after getting approval from a doctor or a nutritionist.

Protein

Protein is essential to the human body in the demand of protein in building of enzymes, collagen, muscles, hair, genetic information. They are found everywhere in the human body, and without protein, development and constant renewal will not be possible. High quality protein is abundance of protein for use in the human body. High-quality proteins can consist of complete proteins or complementary proteins where different types of proteins are combined to produce high-quality proteins. Awareness of complementary proteins is the key to a balanced vegetarian diet. Nutritional deficiency of proteins is often found in imbalanced vegetarian diets. If there is any missing essential amino acid, less protein will be produced for human body to use. If not enough carbohydrates are consumed, then protein will be used to be converted into carbohydrates so the consumption of carbohydrates are also essential for the intake of protein.

Based on the book Recipes for a Small Planet by Ellen Ewald, to determine how much protein a person needs, one will need to multiply .28 by body weight in pounds. A person needs .28 of usable protein per pound daily. If a person were to weight 113 pounds, she would require 31.64 usable protein. The nutritional labels on food products often show how much protein contained in the product.

When balancing meals, try to eat grain and legumes at the same meals. Serve small amounts of seeds with legume meals. There are some examples of good combinations of food in complementary proteins: rice with legumes, corn with legumes, peanuts and sunflower seeds, sesame seeds with beans, peanuts with soybeans, and wheat with soybeans. There are beans high in protein such as mung beans, red kidney beans, chick peas, red pigeon beans, lentils, peas, and split peas. For some people who may find beans unappealing, sprouted beans might taste better. It is important to soak beans for 24 hours and de-husk them to reduce gas problems. Sesame and rice are high in complementary proteins. Soy sauce is also high in protein. Brewer's yeast is a good source of protein, so are oats, buckwheat and wheat germ.

Vitamin B

Vitamin B complex is essential for health of nerves, providing body with energy by catalyzing conversion of carbohydrates into glucose, in the metabolism of fats and proteins, maintaining of muscles in lower stomach, health of skin, hair, eyes, mouth, and liver. In a vegetarian diet, sources of vitamin B complex can be found in whole grain cereal like wheat, malt, brown rice, and oats. Brewer's yeast and nutritional yeast are good sources of vitamin B. Some deficiencies of vitamin B are sleepiness, irritability, nervousness, depression, poor appetite, insomnia, neuritis, acne, anemia, and constipation.

Vitamin B6

Vitamin B6 (pyridoxine) is crucial for production of red blood cells and antibodies, facilitating release of glycogen from liver for energy, for vitamin B12 absorption, for the production of hydrochloric acid and magnesium, helping with controlling body fluids and normal behavior of nervous system by watching sodium and potassium in the body. Good sources in a meatless diet consists of whole grains, brewer's yeast, blackstrap molasses, brown rice, nuts, seeds, and wheat germ. Deficiency symptoms of vitamin B6 are muscular weakness, nervousness, irritability, depression, arthritis, hypoglycemia, diabetes, learning disabilities, and visual problems.

Vitamin B12

Vitamin B12 (cyanucobalamin) promotes longevity, and is essential for metabolism, nervous system, and a healthy appetite. Sources of B12 are miso, seaweed, tempeh, comfrey, spirulina, plant plankton, and dairy products and eggs.

Calcium

Calcium helps build and maintain bones and teeth, aids normal growth such as blood clotting and speeding up of healing processes, assists in the regulating of heartbeat, muscle movement, helps the bodily absorb iron, and helps to balance the concentration of magnesium, sodium and potassium. Calcium sources are alfalfa, lettuce, kale, cabbage, watercress, brussel sprouts, dandelion greens, broccoli, navy beans, almonds, sunflower seeds, walnut, sesame seeds, wheat germ, millet, and dairy products. Blackstrap molasses contains more calcium than milk or eggs. The symptoms of not eating food high in calcium are nervousness, muscle cramps, numbness, and tingling of arms and legs, cramps, joint pains, tooth decay, insomnia, irritability, and impaired growth.

Supplements

Supplements are recommended because soil in US is starting to miss some important minerals. Pollution on water and air can be protected by minerals and vitamins in supplements which studies have proven to be true. It is always a good idea to talk with a nutritionist before going ahead with supplements. Click on a recommended a brand of supplement: Freelife

Here are links to more information:

Fats of edible oils

Nutrition Labels

Diet and Nutrition Resource Center

Cutting cost on Food

Vegetable vitamin Chart

Cancer Prevention

Mineral chart

Bibilography:

Ewald, Ellen B. Recipes for a Small Planet. Ballantine Books Inc: New York, New York, 1973.

Encyclopedia Americana. Grolier Incorporated: Danbury, Connecticut, 1995 v.27.

Perl, Lila. Junk food, Fast Food, Health Food. Houghton, Mifflin, Clarion Books: New York, New York, 1980.

Brooks, Karen.The Complete Vegetarian Cookbook.Pocket Book:New York, New York, 1974.

Davies, Stephen, and Stewart, Alan. Nutritional Medicine. Avon Books: New York, New York, 1987.

Strandler, Michael, and Nina. The Complete Guide and Cookbook For Raising Your Child as a Vegetarian. Schocken Books: New York, New York, 1981.