Veganism - a diet that claims to eliminate illness and disease.

I was watching a documentary called ‘What the Health’ recently and my was it an eye opener for me.  It’s quite a controversial topic and I’ll leave you to check it out fully and formulate your own opinion (you can watch it on Netflix).  However, what it did trigger for me is that I need to reconsider my diet. 

I’ve always eaten meat, quite enjoy it, but lately I’ve been noticing that there is a new trend emerging, I’m starting to see a shift...a lot people are no longer eating meat as a main component of their meals. There are a lot of people switching to vegetarian and vegan diets and I am quite tempted to join the revolution after watching the documentary.  It really made think that my meat heavy diet  may not be a good thing.  Whilst watching the doc it was really alarming to see the amount of chemicals, drugs, hormones that are being injected into the animals we eat these days.  I always kind of knew that it was being done but to actually see it, had a huge impact on me.


Another interesting issue discussed was the consumption of these meat, poultry and dairy products being linked to the onset of many diseases - which I can believe to be true. Now, whilst I think that there are a number of factors that contribute to disease and illness, I do think that diet also plays a crucial role. They also suggested that sugar may not be the cause of diabetes but that a diet high in meat could be the possible cause.

On one hand I do know that the documentary was somewhat biased.  They were expressing the detrimental effects the rearing of these animals is having on the planet, I think many of the people interviewed where environmentalists so they didn’t really give an objective perspective. Whilst I’m inclined to believe that a lot of the information did hold some truth, I would like to look at further research outlining whether or not there actually is a correlation between the consumption of meat and dairy products and diseases. They showed a few cases where people had miraculously been healed from severe illnesses after switching to a plant based diet, but I wasn’t totally convinced it was that straightforward.  

So at the moment I’m slowly, cutting down on my meat intake and have cut out processed meat completely, but I understand it’s not going to happen overnight because it's is a big lifestyle change for me.  However, I am hoping it will prove to be beneficial for both me and my family.  I’ll have to observe this over a period of time...... I may even lose a few pounds, which I sure wouldn’t mind! 

So this week I have only eaten meat twice, I’m learning new recipes and the food is actually quite tasty... it’s not been as bad as I thought it would be either.  

I don’t think I can do vegan right now and may never make the full transition, but at the moment I’m aiming to have at least 3 vegetarian meals a week.  It actually works out a lot cheaper and I'm sure I am getting a lot more nutritional value from eating more plant based foods... also, my 2 daughters are not complaining........ yet!

I would love to be inspired by others who are vegan or vegetarian with some quick and easy, yet very tasty recipes.