Megan Record (6)

So for the last meatless Monday, I don’t think that I could have been any less prepared. With all the nice weather this weekend, I completely tried to ignore my normal weekend chores like homework, grocery shopping, and cooking for the week ahead so I could enjoy the rare warm weather. On top of that, this weekend I was scheduled to work all of Sunday, which really changed my normal routine for the day since we also went over our scheduled time. So for this meatless Monday my meals were very limited since I had no been to the grocery store in about two weeks.  Breakfast I managed to have enough food to make a good meal. I had an egg and egg whites with sautéed kale, Ezekiel toast with peanut butter and a half a grapefruit. Ezekiel toast is probably my favorite “bread”. It is technically sprouted grain and does not include any other added sugars, which means there are less carbohydrates in each piece. I also love it because it come frozen so it stays in the freezer for a while before it can get stale, which is always nice not to waste food. Than lunch was for sure the most effected meal of the day for me. I basically had nothing left in my house. The best thing I could manage to come up with was a smoothie because I had enough fruit frozen in the freezer and a very ripe banana. The smoothie was made up of ice, frozen blueberries, frozen pineapple, plain greek yogurt, kale that was almost too old, the very ripe banana, a little honey for sweetener, and just barley enough milk. I’ve made this smoothie many times before. I like that it has greens in it as well as fruit to make it more filling and the greek yogurt for some protein. Unfortunately, for some reason it came out horrible. It was too bitter and thick so I must have not added enough honey and definitely did not have enough milk to add to it to have a smoothie like consistency. I tired to drink, well spoon as much as I could but I ended having to eat a Special K protein plus granola bar and an apple for a snack. This Monday I had class than went directly to the gym till 5. I was too hungry to go first to the grocery store than home to cook dinner. As I was on twitter right before leaving the gym, I saw that my favorite food truck Lloyd, which it a taco food truck, for some awesome coincidence was offering taco or burrito with tofu! Typically, I would either order chicken or pork on top or with in a taco or burrito with all the other topping like rice, beans and jalapeños so this would never of been a meal option for meatless Monday. So since this project is also about trying new foods I thought this was a perfect meal options because I had no food at home to food. I had only made tofu ground up within lasagna before for my first meatless Monday, and honestly couldn’t even taste it so I was excited to see how they would make a taco or burrito with in.  Once we got here I order one taco, which is relatively small just to try it out since there was not a long line. It was amazing. It had crispy fried organic tofu, thai peanut sauce, pickled vegetables, radish, scallions, cilantro and lime. It was so good I went back and ordered two more tacos! I even forgot to take a picture since I was so hungry. This meatless Monday started challenging but it was nice to be able to go out and order a meatless meal as well since typically I do not think to do that very often.

Overall, I think this program is awesome. Before this class I honestly only thought meatless Mondays were created for individuals’ health to help reduce cholesterol and heart disease.  I believe to be pretty healthy and choose to eat what most people consider health food also, so I never really considered going meatless one day a week. On top of that I already do not like red meat and most promotions of meatless Monday that I have seen, have stressed cutting out red meat. After the first few classes it was much clearer to me that meatless Monday was much more than just for my own health reasons. The impact on the environment that meat production has is incredibly negative and actually extremely frightening. Most people don’t understand, since from what has been explain through class, that the government and food production industries are closely tied together. Many of the negative side effects are masked or twisted so the public does not know the whole truth. The negative side effects seem to be hidden by the fact that the world’s population continues to grow and more and more food will be required. Additionally, we as consumers do not like to be told what we can and cannot eat and most are not accustom to change.  To help improve the expansion of this program I think it is key to stress the environmental impact more and more.  I feel like after doing this project most still only thing meatless Mondays is for there own personal health. It seems like many people would not consider going meatless on a Monday for their individual health reason since many people think they are healthily enough but when they see how it can effect the environment and everyone else in a positive way, they might be more willing to make changes.

The main challenge for me was finding the time to cook and meal prep. This is not just for meatless Monday though. Realistically it did not take any longer to come up with filling meals that were meatless in comparison to preparing meals with meat. I noticed that I do eat at least two meals a week out, which allows me to spend more time on not having to cook. What was more challenging was finding meatless meals while out to eat that were filling and not extremely expensive so therefore I needed to spend the time cooking. What was nice though on the Mondays or Sundays that I was able to cook, the meals typically lasted for the majority of the week so in the long run it did either save me time or was the same amount I would have spent cooking meals with meat.

The biggest thing I learned in relationship to this project is that even the little steps you take to help the environment can add up and it can even help your own personal health. Small sets are better than none at all and you can always build on more steps from there. For example, if going vegetarian is not for you, the meatless Mondays are still a great help or even starting just with one meal of the Monday being meatless.  Another great options are to eat locally or organic, which are both great the environment, your own economy and your health! The key is to start to change and to keep making small step to help improve the environment!