Cheese!!

   Hi everyone!  How are you? Hope your Tuesday is going swimmingly and this week is flying by fast for you!


   I've had a great day so far. This week is "core class" for some of us icu nurses, so I was in class all day with some friends, learning nothing something new about the heart, and brain, etc... It was fun because I got to chat with two of my good buds and meet a handful of other great nurses too! 


 But first, I'll chronical my day in food pictures just so you can see how easy it is to eat yummy and cruelty-free ! My day started off with a tasty green smoothie 

 Like I've mentioned before:

• green smoothies give you your daily value of dark, leafy green vegetables. Read: dark, leafy green (not iceburg lettuce)
• They taste like a fruit smoothie!
• They are packed full of vitamin C, vitamin A, calcium, potassium, iron, fiber, and yes even a little protein.

Yesterday I ran 8 miles outdoors with a friend, most of which was uphill, so my muscles were in need of some replenishment. Throwing a banana into my smoothie took care of my potassium, because if I don't have one each day I will have muscle cramps in my legs.


 For lunch I nibbled on some chickpea salad that my girlfriend and I got at a cafe called Dean & Deluca

This chickpea salad was beyond amazing. It had sundried tomatoes, eggplant, and a light olive oil dressing which blended harmoniously with the parsley. So healthy and filling. Since becoming vegan and trying to eat more natural, raw fruits and vegetables, I'm amazed at how quickly I fill up and how long I stay full. I ate less than a cup full of this chickpea salad and was still full 4 and a half hours later. 


For dinner, The Boyfriend made us pizza. We used to love eating our homemade pizza, but since banning casein from our diet, we haven't had pizza because I thought I would miss the cheese. Casein is a product found in dairy cheese and even "vegan cheese", I was dissapointed and frankly, I felt misled and lied to when I found out my "vegan cheese" had casein in it. Let me explain why.


 In order for milk to curdle and turn into cheese, you must have a curdling agent. Rennet is a curdling agent put into milk in order for it to curdle. It is naturally produced in the stomach of a cow so that the baby cow can break down the mama cow's milk. 

Let's recap: Rennet is found in the fourth stomach of a young cow. It is extracted from the fourth stomach of a young veal cow and put into the dairy milk you drink in order for it to curdle. You are eating the fourth stomach of a young cow when you drink cow's milk. 


In cow's milk, 80% of the protein is in caseins. Casein has been called the "#1 carcinogenic (cancer causing substance) that people come in contact with each day. We are eating, drinking, and digesting this stuff every time we drink milk!" - From T.Colin Campbell's The China Study. 
 You can read more about this here if you would like, because Colleen is my role model, or you can buy your own copy of the china study for dirt cheap and find out for yourself! :) 


So, let me get this straight. I do not consume dairy for a number of reasons (It's stealing from the cow, it's unethical, I don't want to drink the breast milk of a cow, I don't want to consume the stomach of a baby cow, I don't physically need the secretions of a grown cow, etc etc.) but then it's determined that casein is put in veggie cheese too? Unacceptable! The fourth stomach of a dairy cow will not be on my pizza! 


Insert, daiya cheese 

Casein free, dairy free, soy free. No matter your intolerance, it's perfect.
So if you have a soy intolerance, bam. This might be for you.
If you have a dairy intolerance, bam. This might be for you.
If you have an aversion to eating the 4th stomach of baby cow and ingesting casein, bam. This is so for me. 
The Boyfriend couldn't get enough of this cheese. It was melty, gooey, and salty enough to remind him of cheese without any of the guilt or cruelty associated with eating animals

 He also put some mushrooms, banana peppers, onions, and black olives on the pizza. 

 The pizza was sinfully delicious, and we devoured it. 


However


 Since transitioning to almost completely raw fruits, vegetables and whole grains and legumes, we eat little to no sodium anymore (unless it is naturally in the said food). The pizza sauce, olives, and banana peppers gave us more sodium than we probably eat in a week. Since eating it, we have been extremely thirsty, and I feel bloated and, well, thirsty. We were dissapointed to find out that eating pizza doesn't bring us the joy it used to, but ultimately we were happy to discover that we have become so healthy that our (past) usual intake of sodium creates a noticeable imbalance in us.


My point is: I never thought pizza would make me feel gross, but alas it has. I have become so accustomed to eating real food; food that is Healthy. Tasty. Juicy. Naturally sweet.  Whole foods can be enjoyable. Which brings me to my next point:


I've touched on this before, but will again, because someone said something confusing to me today. During class today, the teacher was talking about a new medicine that her doctor has put her on. Undoubtedly she is on multiple meds for blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar, the typical cocktail for the average american. She said, and I quote, "The medicine is 400 dollars a month. After insurance, I pay 100 dollars a month. That's insane. That's really expensive! For just ONE of my medications." She concluded by (shouting) "That's ridiculous!"


  
Again, what is difficult to you? What is ridiculous to you? What is "too expensive"? 
People endlessly accuse veganism for being "too difficult", or "too expensive", yet it's not difficult to suffer through triple bypass, open heart surgery, angioplasty, and transplants? To only then be on medication for the rest of their life, paying hundreds of dollars a month in medications, rather than simply change their diet? 


  You can't put a price on your health.   It is worth the extra three dollars you will spend at the grocery for organic or fresh produce. I promise you this.