WELLNESS
SALAD DAYS WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE YOU GO VEGETARIAN BY JODY BOYNTON
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t makes sense that meat makes meat. That said, meat has a whole host of other implications to consider. Going vegetarian is not so cut and dry: • Cholesterol, for one, only comes from
14 OUTLOOKS SEPTEMBER 2012
Yuri Arcurs
2008 study shows that four per cent of Canadians follow a vegetarian diet; in the U.S. it’s almost 10 per cent. As I’ve recently run into new veggie aficionados, I’m seeing that some of them are quite educated about food and the implications of eliminating meat from their diets. Of course, there are others who’ve stopped eating meat but aren’t necessarily making healthier choices about everything they consume. What does meat have that’s so great anyway? Well, the carnivore in me says the taste of barbecue is hard to match with that of eggplant. But on top of that, meat is the original convenience food. It is calorically dense, high in fat and protein and has allowed us as a species to stay alive with little food during times of scarcity. In fact, it’s kind of a chicken-andegg story. Did eating meat allow us to develop a larger brain, making us smarter and able to evolve to where we are today? Or did we have the bigger brain first that allowed us to figure out how to live as an omnivore (eating both plant and animal products), eventually foraging less, farming and hunting more and ultimately building the metropolises we now occupy? Flesh has all the essential amino acids needed to build protein (e.g., muscle), maintain our body’s structure and even make our happy neurotransmitters. Iron and B-12 are also present in amounts that are beneficial and in forms that are more absorbable to us. Omega-3s and other omegas are found in plants, animals and fish (which have the highest amounts by weight, making fish an easy source of brain-building unsaturated fats).
animals! No plant on the planet produces cholesterol. So if your potato chips say “cholesterol free,” well, they never had it! Cholesterol is important, though. It is a backbone molecule for hormones, part of fat-soluble vitamins; it is part of every cell membrane in the body. In fact, our body makes a whole bunch of it, with our liver making 80 per cent or more of our circulating cholesterol. That said, if we don’t have enough fiber (which comes from plants) to absorb and eliminate it, we just reabsorb it and recycle it over and over again. • What about fats? Animal products have plenty! That marbling in your steak is fat, and it’s responsible for the memorable mouth feel and flavour. Fats are calorically dense and take some work for us to break down and use for energy. Unsaturated fatty acids, like those
found more in unadulterated plant oils, are potentially a little easier for our bodies to use. • Iron is more difficult to absorb in the non-heme (blood) form, most found in flesh. We can take up about 18 per cent of iron from meat but only about 10 per cent from plantbased foods. Iron is the central element inside a hemoglobin molecule. Without it, we can’t make red blood cells, essential to circulating oxygen in our bodies. Cereals, nuts, seeds and legumes are good sources, but phytates, phenols, tannins and calcium can inhibit absorption. Vitamin C, on the other hand, is an absorption enhancer. That’s why spinach has lots of iron, but if you eat it raw—as opposed to cooked with a squeeze of lemon—the amount you can potentially absorb becomes very different.