I watched Food, Inc. in 2009. I became vegetarian the next day, though I was an ovo/lacto vegetarian and still ate some seafood. I did this for just over two years, as I swilled the information around in my head and read more on the subject and watched some other movies and let the whole thing stew.
At the end of those years, I came to the realization (that I had really known all along) that my being ovo/lacto still supported the factory farming business, and I didn’t want any part of it, even if it was indirectly enough to put it out of my mind. So, what are the choices? There are only two. Go vegan. Well, I’m not convinced that’s the answer in the long run, simply because the world will never become vegan. It’s a nice pipe dream, but it won’t change the face of farming back to what it should be, simply not enough people will be vegan, ever. I support veganism, I would have far fewer friends if I didn’t! And there are lots of other reasons I didn’t choose that route, I just don’t think I need to put them all here since that’s not what this thread is about.
Second choice, find local family farms and buy meat/eggs/dairy from them directly. Cut all factory animal farming from my diet. This includes everything I buy, so no more store-bought cheese, mayonnaise, snacks with whey added, milk chocolate, or anything. I found a hog farmer who runs a co-op with three other farms who all have the same farming philosophy. Pastured animals, raised outside with appropriate shelters, raised from birth to death on the farm, eating whatever those animals were made to be eating, no sub-therapeutic antibiotics, treated well and getting to do stuff that makes them happy until their last day.
Is it sometimes a pain in the butt? Yes. I eat a lot less meat now than I used to. I am able to buy meat once a week. In the winter it’s two trains or two buses away to get to the nearest place she sells from. In the summer, there’s a farmer’s market just a block away where her mom sells from a smaller van and it’s easier then. But I still have to plan ahead. Is it more expensive for me? Yes, but since I eat a lot less, I don’t really spend more than I used to.
The thing with attaining meat this way is that it’s not always available exactly when you want it or even in the quantities you want it. Which is why the farmer using a grocer as a middle man doesn’t work. At least not yet. People want to go to the grocery store for a ribeye and they expect a pile of ribeyes to be there waiting for them to choose from. My farmer gets one cow at a time. When the ribeyes are gone, the ribeyes are gone until she gets another cow, usually in another month or so. Or until the beef farmer has a cow old enough to slaughter. That happens, too. So you have to be okay with what there is available, and I am because I support sustainable farming, and when farming sustainably you don’t kill another animal just to get that one preferred cut of meat. In place of that sort of shopping, I am more open to other cuts of meat, and other animals. I eat more lamb and bison than ever, and have also started buying ground duck and whole duck.
Why I don’t even buy meat from Whole Foods: Don’t be fooled by organic labels. Beef can be USDA Organic labeled, because it wasn’t given antibiotics in feed, and the feed was organic, but that feed may still be corn, and that cow may still be on a feedlot and actually factory farmed. You want pastured animals, and those may not be labeled “organic” because the small, sustainable, family farm doesn’t bother with the extra expense of certification. If beef isn’t 100% pasture-raised and grass-fed, then it was likely sold to a feedlot for the last four months of it’s life, getting fattened and sick on grain, and trucked to a massive slaugherhouse with all the others in the end.
I am lucky that I have two tiny, local, organic stores within walking distance of my home. These places carry eggs from local farmers, and they run $4.50 to $5.50 a dozen. I happily pay that. My meat farmer also often has eggs from her chicken co-op partner and they run $5 a dozen. Sometimes she even has duck eggs, or she has tiny eggs that are from really young hens and those are 2 dozen for $5.
Dairy is the item that has been tricky. It’s the only thing I’ve compromised on. The only store I can get local half and half from reliably is just too much of a pain in the butt to try to get to once a week. Cheese is also a challenge when the farmer’s markets aren’t open. I eat a lot, lot, lot less cheese than I used to! So, with dairy the compromise I’ve made is buying the least commercial products possible, and the only one near acceptable to me is Organic Valley. It’s a nation wide cooperative, made up of thousands of smaller farms. The Organic Valley website allows a zip code search to find out which dairies deliver to the store you buy from. Some of those farms have websites, all of them have contact information so if you were so inclined to contact them about their farming practices, you could. I haven’t gone that far.
The final point I wanted make regards eating out. Save for three nearby restaurants that are farm-to-table, and that use local family farms that they list on their menus or that I can ask about where their meat comes from, I eat vegan when I eat out. I haven’t eaten fast food in years, and yes, sometimes if I’m stuck eating at a restaurant I normally wouldn’t choose, I find myself ordering sides sometimes to make a meal for myself. Baked potato and veggies, sometimes with olive oil if the only alternative is butter, or just marinara sauce over pasta. Eh. It doesn’t happen very often, and there’s usually something I can make due.
So let me know if this has spurred any questions, I’ve been eating this way since about October of 2011. I can go into even more detail about my farmer and her co-op and how they do things, if you want me to.
