I'm not a vegetarian, but I do enjoy lots of vegetables, different types. And I buy vegetarian meals at the store quite often too. I try to go meat-less a couple times a week for dinner.

Down here, the offerings were few but both grocery stores in my area have expanded their offerings.
Kashi's Meditteranean pizza is quite good, for instance. Amy's and Health Valley (chili is real good!) have some quality foods as well. Boca's chili and their veggie burgers are quite tasty too.

I'm a former long-time vegetarian and still eat a lot of vegetarian meals. What a great idea for a site! Can't wait to share it with my veggie friends.

Speaking of vegetables, The Washington Post had an article yesterday about the easing of some European Union regulations concerning vegetables' size and appearance. Apparantly you can be fined, prosecuted, or, at a minimum, be required to destroy vegetables that don't quite measure up, literally to the millimeter.

We, too, try to eat veggies at dinner every day although we avoid starches most of the time. We just returned from a lengthy cruise on which my DW ate the vegetarian selection each night except when escargots or lobster were offered. Oh, and there was the night she had meatloaf. Go figure.

On my weekly menu planning day, I find myself more and more looking for vegetarian meals. Not only are the health benfits there, but I can make a veg. meal for significantly less than any meal with meat short of canned tuna - but who wants canned tuna?

EL, I would love to know what research you are using to back up your statement that vegetarians lead longer healthier lives. I tried googling the topic but found no scientific articles to support this theory. Lots of vegetarians making the claims but no sound research. If the vegetarians you know seem heathier maybe it is their overall lifestyle that contributes to improved health like more exercise, better access to health care, less stress, etc.

Vegetarians have no better access to health care than anyone else. That argument is specious, at best.

The argument is most vegetarians are better off financially than the average person so they have better access to health care. When you think about it you don't see vegetarian restaurants in poverty stricken areas (rural or urban). When I was just starting out I ate alot of sausage and rice because it was cheap and filling. (Now I eat it because I like it.) Compare the cost of vegetable wrap to a $1.00 double cheeseburger at McDonald's. However, comparing the players in this sandbox I would assume the vegetarians have no better access to health care than anyone else.

Vegetarians have no better access to health care than anyone else. That argument is specious, at best.

Untrue.

If vegetarians are more educated (which I suspect), then they certainly haver better access to health care because education is correlated with wealth. It's all very complicated. I suspect that vegetarians' SES is quite different than the national median. Plus vegetarians select that aspect of their life style as part of a their whole life style, which includes exercise and the avoidance of other health risk factors such as smoking and other drug use.

It's hard to tell what vegetarian even means anymore, with many many eating everything except so-called red meat.

Here is an ineresting article on the myths of vegetarianism:
http://www.westonaprice.org/mythstruths/mtvegetarianism.html#7

This is part of it:

And that is what most of the claims for increased longevity in vegetarians are: anecdotal. There is no proof that a healthy vegetarian diet when compared to a healthy omnivorous diet will result in a longer life. Additionally, people who choose a vegetarian lifestyle typically also choose not to smoke, to exercise, in short, to live a healthier lifestyle. These things also factor into one's longevity.

In the scientific literature, there are surprisingly few studies done on vegetarian longevity. Russell Smith, PhD, in his massive review study on heart disease, showed that as animal product consumption increased among some study groups, death rates actually decreased! (79) Such results were not obtained among vegetarian subjects. For example, in a study published by Burr and Sweetnam in 1982, analysis of mortality data revealed that, although vegetarians had a slightly (.11%) lower rate of heart disease than non-vegetarians, the all-cause death rate was much higher for vegetarians (80).

Despite claims that studies have shown that meat consumption increased the risk for heart disease and shortened lives, the authors of those studies actually found the opposite. For example, in a 1984 analysis of a 1978 study of vegetarian Seventh Day Adventists, HA Kahn concluded,

Although our results add some substantial facts to the diet-disease question, we recognize how remote they are from establishing, for example, that men who frequently eat meat or women who rarely eat salad are thereby shortening their lives. (81)

A similar conclusion was reached by D.A. Snowden (82). Despite these startling admissions, the studies nevertheless concluded the exact opposite and urged people to reduce animal foods from their diets.

Further, both of these studies threw out certain dietary data that clearly showed no connection between eggs, cheese, whole milk, and fat attached to meat (all high fat and cholesterol foods) and heart disease. Dr. Smith commented,

In effect the Kahn [and Snowden] study is yet another example of negative results which are massaged and misinterpreted to support the politically correct assertions that vegetarians live longer lives. (83)

It is usually claimed that meat-eating peoples have a short life span, but the Aborigines of Australia, who traditionally eat a diet rich in animal products, are known for their longevity (at least before colonization by Europeans). Within Aboriginal society, there is a special caste of the elderly (84). Obviously, if no old people existed, no such group would have existed. In his book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, Dr. Price has numerous photographs of elderly native peoples from around the world. Explorers such as Vilhjalmur Stefansson reported great longevity among the Innuit (again, before colonization). [85]

Similarly, the Russians of the Caucasus mountains live to great ages on a diet of fatty pork and whole raw milk products. The Hunzas, also known for their robust health and longevity, eat substantial portions of goat's milk which has a higher saturated fat content than cow's milk (86). In contrast, the largely vegetarian Hindus of southern India have the shortest life-spans in the world, partly because of a lack of food, but also because of a distinct lack of animal protein in their diets (87). H. Leon Abrams' comments are instructive here:

Vegetarians often maintain that a diet of meat and animal fat leads to a pre-mature death. Anthropological data from primitive societies do not support such contentions. (88)

Gimme a break, Bird! Waddaya, getting paid bu the word??

Are you sure VegNews.com is new? It's the Web site for VegNews magazine.

As for you anti-veg commenters, give it a rest.

That's what they told me. EL

Owl,
That was a well-researched article. Having just come from the doctor's office today, where we reviewed my blood work done, I'm on the right track. I limit the amounts of pork and shellfish I eat, and eat a variety of fruits (mostly dried, from nutsonline!) and veggies.
The review I got was excellent, my doc said he wished his blood work was as good as mine.

Where I am going with all this is that, while its probably okay to eat meats and cheeses (and rarely, pork and shrimp), everything in moderation.

I love my meats and cheeses, and pork and shrimp, but know that veggies and fruit definitely need to be part of the mix.

I think that there are many delicious vegetarian choices out there for us carnivores.

Gimme a break, Bird! Waddaya, getting paid bu the word??

Copy
Paste

2 words

One of my cousins has a daughter who decided to become a vegetarian when she was a teenager. Unfortunately, the girl didn't really like veggies, so they called her a "junkatarian." She ended up in medical distress because of her poor diet, and her doctor ordered her to eat meat. It is possible to eat a healthy vegetarian diet, but there is more to it than just swearing off the red meat.

I spent several years as a vegetarian. I have always eaten a variety of veggies and loved whole grains so that was no problem. On that diet, my cholesterol went up rather than down and the total reached to almost 300.

About 5 years ago, I went on Atkins. All the veggies except the starchy ones are fine once the 2-week induction period was over. I ate eggs, lean meat, chicken, and fish with nearly every meal in moderation and I lost 80 pounds and my total cholesterol came down to 198.

The most important thing for me was that the low-carb eating plan greatly reduced the inflammation and pain from a condition I have.

In the past year, I have been eating breads and some sweets again with very bad results.

This is not to say that this works fro everyone – each of us processes whatever we put in our bodies for fuel differently – but it is the best way for me to eat. Now, if I can just through the holidays…

I think "vegetarian" is becoming a precursor code word for eating disorders among girls. I've met a lot of junkatarians. Thank Vishnu that most situational/fashionable vegatarians are fake-atarians who eat everything in private. Then there are the cute-atrians who don't eat overly cute animals such as lamb or veal or puppies. Side note: what percentage of the general population could identify what animal veal comes from? My guess: 20%. It is an intriguing question: is it less morale to kill a young animal? I would say it doesn't matter. Mutton anyone?

Good morning Baltimore.

Longevity
A 1999 metastudy[11] compared six major studies from western countries. The study found that the mortality ratio was the lowest in fish eaters (0.82) followed by vegetarians (0.84) and occasional meat eaters (0.84), and was then followed by regular meat eaters (1.0) and vegan (1.0).[72] When the study made its best estimate of mortality ratio with confounding factors considered, the mortality ratio for vegetarians was found to be (0.94).[73]

In "Mortality in British vegetarians",[12] it was concluded that "British vegetarians have low mortality compared with the general population. Their death rates are similar to those of comparable non-vegetarians, suggesting that much of this benefit may be attributed to non-dietary lifestyle factors such as a low prevalence of smoking and a generally high socio-economic status, or to aspects of the diet other than the avoidance of meat and fish."

The Adventist Health Study is an ongoing study of life expectancy in Seventh-day Adventists. This is the only study among others with similar methodology which had favourable indication for vegetarianism. The researchers found that a combination of different lifestyle choices could influence life expectancy by as much as 10 years. Among the lifestyle choices investigated, a vegetarian diet was estimated to confer an extra 1–1/2 to 2 years of life. The researchers concluded that "the life expectancies of California Adventist men and women are higher than those of any other well-described natural population" at 78.5 years for men and 82.3 years for women. The life expectancy of California Adventists surviving to age 30 was 83.3 years for men and 85.7 years for women.[74]

However, Adventist health study is again incorporated into meta studies titled "Does low meat consumption increase life expectancy in humans?" published in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, which made the conclusion that occasional/low meat eating and other life style choices significantly increase the life expectancy.[75] The study also concluded that "Some of the variation in the survival advantage in vegetarians may have been due to marked differences between studies in adjustment for confounders, the definition of vegetarian, measurement error, age distribution, the healthy volunteer effect, and intake of specific plant foods by the vegetarians." It further states that "This raises the possibility that a low-meat, high plant-food dietary pattern may be the true causal protective factor rather than simply elimination of meat from the diet." In a recent review of studies relating low-meat diet patterns to all-cause mortality, Singh noted that "5 out of 5 studies indicated that adults who followed a low meat, high plant-food diet pattern experienced significant or marginally significant decreases in mortality risk relative to other patterns of intake."

Statistical studies, such as comparing life expectancy with regional areas and local diets in Europe also have found life expectancy considerably greater in southern France, where a low meat, high plant Mediterranean diet is common, than northern France, where a diet with high meat content is more common.[76]

A study by the Institute of Preventive and Clinical Medicine, and Institute of Physiological Chemistry looked at a group of 19 vegetarians (lacto-ovo) and used as a comparison a group of 19 omnivorous subjects recruited from the same region. The study found that this group of vegetarians (lacto-ovo) have a significantly higher amount of plasma carboxymethyllysine and advanced glycation endproducts (AGEs) compared to this group of omnivores.[77] Carboxymethyllysine is a glycation product which represents "a general marker of oxidative stress and long-term damage of proteins in aging, atherosclerosis and diabetes." "Advanced glycation end products (AGEs) may play an important adverse role in process of atherosclerosis, diabetes, aging and chronic renal failure." The researchers theorised that it may be the higher fructose intake of these particular vegetarians (from higher fruit and vegetable intake) that increased their AGEs levels.

^ a b c Key, Timothy J, et al., 1999 "Mortality in vegetarians and nonvegetarians: detailed findings from a collaborative analysis of 5 prospective studies" American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol. 70, No. 3, 516S-524S, September 1999 http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/70/3/516S

^ a b c Key, Timothy J, et al., "Mortality in British vegetarians: review and preliminary results from EPIC-Oxford" American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol. 78, No. 3, 533S-538S, September 2003 http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/78/3/533S

^ "Mortality in vegetarians and nonvegetarians: detailed findings from a collaborative analysis of 5 prospective studies - Key et al. 70 (3): 516S - American Journal of Clinical Nutrition". Retrieved on 2008-06-23.

^ "Mortality in vegetarians and nonvegetarians: detailed findings from a collaborative analysis of 5 prospective studies - Key et al. 70 (3): 516S - American Journal of Clinical Nutrition". Retrieved on 2008-06-23.

^ TODAY - July 26, 2001

^ Does low meat consumption increase life expectancy in humans? — Singh et al. 78 (3): 526 — American Journal of Clinical Nutrition Abstract

^ Trichopoulou, et al. 2005 "Modified Mediterranean diet and survival: EPIC-elderly prospective cohort study", British Medical Journal 330:991 (30 April) http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/bmj;330/7498/991
News story based on this article: Science Daily, April 25, 2005 "Mediterranean Diet Leads To Longer Life" http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/04/050425111008.htm

^ "Advanced Glycation End Products and Nutrition". PHYSIOLOGY RESEARCH. Retrieved on 2008-04-11.

OMG, here's a pretty good rebuttal to the Price Foundation article:

http://www.energygrid.com/health/2002/06ap-stephenbyrnes.html

A snippet:

Myth #7: Vegetarians live longer and have more energy and endurance than meat-eaters.

Byrnes rightly points out that although vegetarians tend to live healthier lifestyles, it is difficult to ascertain whether increases in longevity are due to dietary influences or overall lifestyle choices (that include diet). Overall, vegetarians do live longer than meat-eaters, but there are so many other factors involved in longevity — such as genetics, culture, physical activity, beliefs, smoking, alcohol consumption, etc. — that is almost impossible to pin down the exact role that diet has. Studies that match people in all these influences tend to be small in scale (due to the difficulty in finding matches) and so statistically less significant.

Byrnes quotes Dr. Russel Smith's study as showing that a meat diet was healthier for "some" study groups. But with so many interrelated factors to take into consideration this sort of confusion and contradiction is what we might expect in comparing dissimilar groups of people. As Tarasuk and Brooker write in the September 1997 edition of the Journal of Nutrition, "A dietary factor which appears to be important may simply be acting as a proxy for some other factor which has not been measured but which is also commonly found in the dietary patterns observed… unless both factors are considered, it will be difficult to discern the true dietary effect". They go on to state that, "To be considered causal, an association between a specific dietary factor and disease occurrence should be observed consistently across a number of population-based studies, conducted by different research groups in different settings. Conclusions cannot generally be drawn from a single study." There is little point, therefore, in Byrnes quoting isolated studies whilst ignoring the main accumulating body of evidence.

Much of Byrnes' article focuses on the work of Dr. Weston Price, a dentist who did a tour of the world in the early 1930s to understand the effect of modern diet on teeth and health. (Byrnes is on the honorary board of directors of the Weston A. Price Foundation, so it is no surprise to see him base much of his article on Price's work.) Price noted that the traditional peoples around the world, who ate their traditional diets, were much healthier and had fewer dental cavities than their modern counterparts. He noted that much of the food they ate was raw and that they included animal products in their diets.

The problem with Price's work is that it was undertaken 70 years ago, in cultures that are very different from ours. Price, as with scientific understanding of his day, did not grasp the complexity of health and so relentlessly pursued a simplistic diet-based causality in his research, whilst ignoring many other factors such as genetics, lifestyle, physical exertion, mortality rates etc. Indeed, being a dentist, he may not have been the ideal person to judge how healthy an individual was outside of tooth health (which is not necessarily the best indication of health as malnourished people often have few cavities.) His research did indicate, as many others' have before and after him, that a modern diet of processed foods, high in sugar and refined flours, is decidedly unhealthy. We all know that. It is also undeniable that the less processing foods go through, the healthier they are to our bodies. However, drawing the conclusion that Price's research indicates that a meat-based diet is healthier than a vegetable-based diet is to draw a very weak inference from his observations, especially considering that "Price was on the lookout for a vegetarian culture, but he came up empty"—so he had nothing to make a comparison with. (In Price's day, vegetarianism was also unheard of in Western society, and so he would hardly be researching it per se.) Even just from a tooth cavity point of view, meat is not necessarily healthier as New Zealand has one of the highest per capita consumptions of meat in the world and yet suffers from some of the worst tooth decay. Byrnes also mentions that the largely vegetarian Hindus of southern India have the shortest lifespan in the world, but that is due largely to extreme poverty, extremely high infant mortality rates, overcrowding, and poor sanitation.

What Price does not mention is that many of the traditional people he examined had and continue to have shorter life expectancy than modern people and far higher infant mortality rates. When we see traditional people living to a very healthy old age it is easy to forget that for each one of them there are many others that died a lot earlier. Traditional lives are extremely tough which tends to weed out the weaker individuals, so that the old that survive tend to be stronger and healthier than the average Westerner of a similar age.

As for "fat-loading" before an athletic event, short one week periods of high fat diets may shave off a few seconds from an athletic performance as the body has become adapted at burning fat more efficiently, but to do this longer term is definitely not a healthy option. Fat adaptation is also unlikely to be the answer to increasing everyday stamina for non-athletes.