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the future of ethical eating: why carnivores are cutting back

the north american diet, with its preference for choice cuts of meat, is unsustainable for our health and environment, turgeon says.

by ottawa citizen
published aug 05, 2021
read time 11 minute read
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read time 11 minute read
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by: peter humfor years, juniper turgeon and alex mackay-smith heard from customers coming to shop at their farm: “do you think you could serve us a little something to eat?”the couple that owns juniper farm, which produces organic vegetables grown on 200 acres in wakefield, definitely wanted to meet that demand. but they were also determined to serve their visitors the kind of food they themselves eat.“with other agri-tourism food vendors, it’s fries and doughnuts and fried food,” says turgeon. “we didn’t want to have that. we wanted something farm-to-table.”this year, they built a takeout window at the farm, and put as many picnic tables as would fit on a porch and under a tent. last month, the farm also hired a chef — but not just any chef. cooking on fridays and weekends at the farm is caroline ishii, one of ottawa’s pioneers of vegan cooking.vegetables and plant-based products from juniper farm are the stars on ishii’s menu, but it’s worth noting meat has not been entirely banished from what she makes. after all, turgeon and her family still eat meat, if sparingly so.“right now, it’s rustic and it’s takeout,” says turgeon of the food her farm stands behind. “it’s not fine dining. it’s a fun, outdoorsy, community farm-to-table feeling, but really good refined sandwiches and things like that.”ishii’s food is not just meant to satiate and nourish the farm’s customers, turgeon adds.“it’s a great way to engage the public around food and conscious eating,” she says.while it’s hardly a novel ambition, cutting back on, or at least questioning, one’s meat consumption may well be having a moment.with environmental concerns foremost in their thinking, turgeon, mackay-smith and ishii are far from alone in advocating for a diet that relies on and elevates vegetables and plant-based staples while at least marginalizing meat. they stop short, though, of eliminating meat from their diets because they see a place for ethically raised, locally farmed animals, even as they question the environmental costs of some vegan staples.this year has seen two highly influential players on north america’s food scene turn their backs on meat because the environmental costs of factory farms that yield the burgers flipped on our barbecues and the filet mignons served at our steakhouses are world-threateningly high. 
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in late april, the popular cooking website epicurious announced it would not publish any new beef recipes “in an effort to encourage more sustainable cooking.”similarly inclined is superstar chef daniel humm, who in june re-opened his revered new york restaurant eleven madison park, but with an exclusively vegan menu.“the way we have sourced our food, the way we’re consuming our food, the way we eat meat, it is not sustainable,” humm said on npr’s how i built this podcast. “and that is not an opinion. this is just a fact. so we decided that our restaurant will be 100 per cent plant-based.”it’s been understood for years that we eat animal products from factory farms at the world’s peril. a 2006 report, released by the food and agriculture organization of the united nations, states that “the livestock sector is a major stressor on many ecosystems and on the planet as a whole. globally it is one of the largest sources of greenhouse gases and one of the leading causal factors in the loss of biodiversity, and in developed and emerging countries it is perhaps the leading source of water pollution.”the water requirements for livestock production are another concern for the environmentally minded. according to the world wildlife fund, water used for livestock production is expected to rise by 50 per cent by 2025 and at present accounts for 15 per cent of all irrigated water. the amount of water needed to raise cattle, and the irrigated crops that yield their feed, is especially high. research suggests that on average, it takes about 1,800 gallons of water to produce one pound of beef.this is not to say the country’s beef producers have reason to be anxious — yet. in canada, those who eat beef still vastly outnumber those who don’t. a study this spring by dalhousie university’s agri-food analytics lab surveyed more than 1,500 canadians and found 65 per cent of respondents ate beef once a week. alberta has the highest rate of consumption (73 per cent); british columbia the lowest (58 per cent). just eight per cent of respondents shunned beef completely.
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let’s just say canada is not denmark or sweden, which are the countries mcdonald’s chose as a test market in february when it launched its mcplant burgers co-developed with beyond meat inc., featuring patties made from pea and rice protein.but the dalhousie lab’s findings also suggested one in four canadians had considered cutting beef from their diets in the year before the survey was conducted. nearly half (47 per cent) of respondents believe the number of people quitting beef will increase over time, and 44 per cent consider this a move in the right direction.“canadians are still committed to beef, but there are some clouds on the horizon for the beef industry,” prof. sylvain charlebois, lead author of the report and lab director, said.for those who find hardcore veganism too extreme, there’s a principled position that allows for eating limited amounts of meat from local farms that practice what’s known as regenerative agriculture, which aims to improve rather than plunder the soil, and often involves growing a diverse range of crops, complemented by grazing animals.a new word has even sprung up, alongside “vegan” and “vegetarian,” and that’s “reducetarian,” as in reducing the amount of meat one eats. brian kateman, the american co-founder and president of the reducetarian foundation, last month released a documentary, meat me halfway, in which he posits that a more efficient way to combat the environmental calamities wrought by factory farms is to convince more people to eat less meat rather than convert a smaller number of people to veganism.“everybody agrees that we should be eating far more plants. in order to be a world without factory farms, there needs to be way less demand for meat. way less,” kateman says. “anyone who can must make an honest effort to cut back on the amount of animal products they consume. we’re running out of time and i believe every effort, no matter how small, will count in the end.”juniper turgeon practises reducetarianism, even if she does not call it that, because the watchwords of her thinking are sustainability and locavorism — eating locally sourced food as much as possible so as to shorten supply chains, promote small businesses and the local economy, and enjoy fresher food.turgeon says she has found the vegan diet is not local. “it comes from all over the place,” she says, citing nuts as an imported vegan staple. for canadian vegans, another would be avocados. the last decade’s booming global demand for avocados has driven deforestation in mexico, leading to soil erosion, overflowing rivers and flooding, according to a 2020 world resources institute article.“i prefer the veggie-forward diet with a bit of meat,” turgeon says. at her family’s dinner table, which includes her two children and sometimes her in-laws, organic vegetables come first, while meat and eggs round out meals.“i never ate big hunks of meat. it’s always kind of been our way,” turgeon says. “it’s kind of become more mainstream recently — roast a chicken and eat it over a couple of days.”the north american diet, with its preference for choice cuts of meat, is unsustainable for our health and environment, turgeon says. “it’s ridiculous and supports factory farming,” she says.she lauds the linchpin principles of how japanese people eat, employing smaller portions of meat dispersed into dishes, sometimes as garnishes.
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the japanese diet also comes easily to ishii, who is japanese-canadian and recently spent a year in japan, including the first few months of the pandemic.more than a decade ago, ishii became ottawa’s leading advocate for veganism, when she was the chef that opened zenkitchen on somerset street, a celebrated but now-shuttered restaurant that moved veganism out of the health-food realm and into the quarters of gourmets. ishii’s cooking at zenkitchen, which was open between 2009 and 2014, won her a slew of fans. representing zenkitchen, ishii also finished second in ottawa’s 2010 and 2011 gold medal plates competitions.however, ishii says she “never wanted to be judge-y about being vegan” and that while she was previously a vegan and recently wrote a book on canadian plant-based cuisine, she is now a flexitarian — a vegetarian who will eat some meat and fish.“i am such a curious soul, whatever it may be, trying new foods,” ishii says. “i have nothing against meat. it’s how much,” she adds.interestingly, some chefs who specialize in plant-based cuisine downplay the environmental justification for their cooking.the ottawa-born chef amanda cohen, whose vegetable-forward restaurant dirt candy in new york has been called “one of the 10 restaurants changing how america eats,” says she does what she does not to save the planet or advocate for animal rights, but because vegetables can be delicious. 
“my cause is great food,” she told this newspaper in a 2019 interview. “the restaurant has always been about vegetables and serving great food more than about any sort of ethos.“the fact that we happen to be morally superior is just a bonus,” kidded cohen, who studied at the natural gourmet institute in new york, as did ishii.
like ishii, cohen is a flexitarian. she allows herself to sample meatier dishes because she thought being a vegetarian was holding her back professionally.briana kim, the chef-owner of alice, the acclaimed ottawa restaurant that serves an elevated plant-based tasting menu, says environmental principles are extremely important for her.“when we’re cooking, we need to be hyperconscious about the impact that we create,” says kim, who has done an internship at eleven madison park. “we want to be as zero-waste as possible, we want to be as sustainable as possible. plant-based is one of many ways that you can do that.”she adds that when it comes to plant-based cooking, one of her greatest motivations is the creativity it entails.“a lot of chefs might think i must have chosen plant-based cooking because i’m following a diet or something,” kim says. “obviously i love plant-based food, but i don’t really follow it strictly. i love anything innovative and anything new. it (plant-based cooking) makes you think in a completely different way.”although chef jeff bradfield is a vegan in personal life, he is fine with frying chicken and smoking beef and pork at union local 613 in centretown.bradfield says he became a vegan last year for health reasons, and specifically to complement his weight-training efforts. “since then, i feel way better than i’ve ever felt. i have a lot of energy. my workouts have been way better. i’ve put on more muscle. i’ve lost more fat. it seems to work for me,” he says.
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asked if ottawa’s restaurant scene might embrace more vegetable-forward and plant-based menus, bradfield, whose career in the city includes a stint as ishii’s sous-chef at zenkitchen a decade ago, says that if change happens, it won’t happen quickly.“i can’t see ottawa going that way, for a long time,” says bradfield. “this stuff starts happening everywhere else and we’re kind of last to the party.”that said, he notes that in nearly two years of working at union 613, he’s seen “a significant jump in vegan/vegetarian orders” to make up roughly a third of all orders.whether it’s vegans or flexitarians who account for that jump is unclear. regardless, that increased interest in plant-based alternatives at union 613 lines up with the thrust at north america’s chain and franchise restaurants to cater more to the meat-averse in recent years. the decision by a&w canada to offer the beyond burger in 2018 was no one-off. in 2019 and 2020, technomic, a research and consulting firm servicing the food and food service industry, forecasted the proliferation of plant-based proteins across canadian menus, with restaurant brands creating proprietary plant-based meat products.in technomic’s 2021 global trends outlook, analyst aaron jourden wrote: “there is zero doubt that plant-based foods and drinks are now fully mainstream on the global stage. brands and products have launched at rapid paces from latin america to china and from south africa to germany (and all places in between) … expect plant-based meat players to begin cementing points of differentiation from key competitors to stand out in the crowd. think local, healthy, indulgent, sustainable.”
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meanwhile, an ottawa butcher who caters to more discriminating carnivores says his business has increased during the pandemic, up about 30 per cent from last year.“we are seeing more people interested in what we’re doing and more people coming through the door, more first-timers every week,” says david wallace, owner of around the block butcher shop on cobden road.documentaries and news stories that scrutinize the meat industry have had an impact, prompting people to visit wallace’s eight-year-old store, he says.the customers want meat that doesn’t come from a factory, that’s free from antibiotics and steroids and hormones and that’s more dense in nutrients, having been grass-fed or grass-finished.“they do want something of higher quality. they don’t need to eat as much of it,” wallace says.“they’re looking for animals that were happy and healthy, that is food that’s better for you, better for the planet. i don’t blame them.”wallace says his sales are up even though the price of meat is rising.“the thing about it to me is that beef should cost a lot. what we’re seeing is the real cost,” he says. for much of the meat industry, everything from grain to water to labour has been heavily subsidized, keeping costs artificially low for consumers, wallace explains.“it’s actually quite expensive to raise beef. those costs are hitting the consumer in the pocketbook and us too. we’re not making as much as we used to,” he says.on the other hand, customers have been showing more interest in cooking different and more economical cuts of meat, wallace says. being locked down meant carnivores raised their cooking game at home, and spent some of the money at the butcher shop that they would otherwise have spent at restaurants, he suggests.“business is the best it’s been. quality, selection, all of these things are coming together,” wallace says. “covid has been a fantastic catalyst to speed that all up.”phum@postmedia.com

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