The Great Vegetarian Con

With more and more of us converting to vegetarianism all the time, is it really a healthier option than being a meat eater or a vegan?

When, at the age of 10, I became a vegetarian, my mum was pleased I still ate dairy products as my diet wouldn’t lack protein. Having recently read up on this subject, I’ve discovered that it’s highly unlikely that anyone these days would have a protein deficiency, the amount of protein required by adults being easily met by many foods including green vegetables, pulses and nuts.

However, this common misconception leads to friends/restaurants all offering up vegetarian meals containing dairy products in lieu of meat, meaning that, ironically, the average western vegetarian diet contains more animal protein than the average meat-eating diet.

Dairy products provide us with way too much fattening animal protein; just think about it – eggs have everything in them to form a chicken; milk contains enough nutrients to wean calves. It makes sense that dairy products contain more concentrated animal protein than meat itself, which, it could be argued, is simply fermented vegetable protein in an animal skin.

So, with its high proportion of animal protein, the perceived ‘healthy’ western vegetarian diet could infact turn out the unhealthiest option of all. Don’t say I didn’t tell you so.

In case you’re interested, here are some of the books:

Posted 12:49 PM on Sun Feb 08 2009

By Freak

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