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If they wear leather, they are a vegetarian not a vegan.

vegetarian = diet
vegan = lifestyle

You seem to be aware of that, but it is a pet peeve of mine for some reason ;)

That's a very idiosyncratic use of the terms. More conventionally: Vegetarians avoid meat, while vegans avoid animal products all together.

It should be no surprise that people chose to be vegans or vegetarians for a wide variety of different reasons (and thus interpret the restrictions in very different ways). Some consider it to be an ethical or lifestyle issue, but others do it for strictly health reasons.
 
MalFet said:
That's a very idiosyncratic use of the terms. More conventionally: Vegetarians avoid meat, while vegans avoid animal products all together.

It should be no surprise that people chose to be vegans or vegetarians for a wide variety of different reasons (and thus interpret the restrictions in very different ways). Some consider it to be an ethical or lifestyle issue, but others do it for strictly health reasons.
Thank you Malfet, and that's the point that I somewhat poorly tried to express. Of course diet is a huge part of "lifestyle". However for some health benefits and not the social aspects of using animal products are the only concern.

For example, we have a trucker who delivers metals to the shop. He's around 60 I'm guessing, and had lived on the trucker diet for his whole life. He nearly died about a year ago with some serious heart problems, and his doctor strongly recommended that he eliminate meat from his diet or greatly reduce it. His wife went the full yardage and put him on a vegan diet, and so he has had no animal products whatsoever for the last 6 months. Now I guarantee you this guy doesn't give a crap about the cows, or the whales for that matter but in an effort to preserve his health he chose to go vegan.

This may be a somewhat incidental example, but it still illustrates that not all that would choose veganism as a dietary choice also subscribe to the various other social aspects that we associate with this. I myself have been vegetarian my whole life, but just within the last year or two have included a very small amount of animal protein, and I'm not the least bit dogmatic about what people choose to eat as long as they are healthy.
 
A friend of mine has gone vegan for health reasons. She is significantly overweight and may be doing this to lose some weight, but I know that she believes that going vegan is simply healthier. It helps that she has a younger, very HOT cousin who is vegan.

At any rate I once asked her why she decided to go vegan and she said, "It ain't because I wouldn't kill a squirrel!"

So I'm guessing it's for the health benefits. And I won't be doing it as near as I can see. It's hard enough to limit the carbs and sugars.
 
Jaysus said:
Exactly, diet alone does not a vegan make.

Yeah I guess you're correct in that. A vegan is someone who practices veganism, and that involves more than just what you eat. So I guess without those other qualities it would be hard to qualify someone as a true vegan.

Edit: I don't think it's quite as binary as some are suggesting though. I guess it would be more accurate to say that the trucker is eating a vegan diet.
 
So let me get this straight....
leather is wrong cause it is an animal product and obviously the animal has to be dead to retrieve the product.
Honey is out because of slave labor apparently.
Where does that leave wool? You don't have to cut a sheep in half to get the wool out. Some might say the animal is better off with regular shearing.
 
So let me get this straight....
leather is wrong cause it is an animal product and obviously the animal has to be dead to retrieve the product.
Honey is out because of slave labor apparently.
Where does that leave wool? You don't have to cut a sheep in half to get the wool out. Some might say the animal is better off with regular shearing.

again, everyone has their own stance, just like not all catholics adhere to the same beliefs

most vegans that I know are ok with wool but try to make sure it comes from reputable/humane sources when possible

i know some vegetarians that eat dairy/eggs but won't wear leather
 
So let me get this straight....
leather is wrong cause it is an animal product and obviously the animal has to be dead to retrieve the product.
Honey is out because of slave labor apparently.
Where does that leave wool? You don't have to cut a sheep in half to get the wool out. Some might say the animal is better off with regular shearing.

Difference between vegatarians and vegans is that a lot of vegatarians do it for legit health reasons, trying to buck the obesity trends(no problem with those, more power to them for bucking the obesity trends); the vegans on the other hand are vegans to be able to feel superior to everyone else. It's an ego thing, for one-upping their eco-conscious friends (going vegan is a cheaper way to one-up them than buying a prius or converting your home to solar panels) and to feel superior to the common peons who "eat like savages", as more than a few vegans like to put it.
 
Just out of curiosity, who here eats dog?

aaand here's one of the arguments they like to use; it's unoriginal as hell and has been responded to a thousand times on a thousand forums across the net, but hey, let's them feel superior "You wouldn't eat a dog, how is a cow any different? They're both so smart!" This **** line of reasoning has been kicking around the net for the better part of two decades now.

But to answer your question, the President of the US ate a dog
 
I honestly think it is silly that people get all weird about categories like this. Life is not that cut and dry. It's not like you are a vegan or you're not, at least in most cases. For me, "vegan" is just a word for me to discribe what I choose to eat the majority of the time. People tend to assume that I eat dairy and eggs when I tell them that I'm a vegetarian. So vegan is the most accurate descriptor (a dietary api-vegan to be specific). And boy do some people get weird when I say the word "vegan". You'd think that I just kicked their dog or something.
 
aaand here's one of the arguments they like to use; it's unoriginal as hell and has been responded to a thousand times on a thousand forums across the net, but hey, let's them feel superior "You wouldn't eat a dog, how is a cow any different? They're both so smart!"

But to answer your question, the President of the US ate a dog

So did I, on more than one occasion, and I bet it'll happen again at some point. It was neither the best nor the worst thing I've eaten.

Do you not eat dog because you feel that you are superior to me? That's not very nice.
 
Sorry if I contributed to this de-railing, but we are wayyyy off topic now.

As mentioned before, the vegan aspect isn't difficult, the raw food part is. How could you possibly extract sugars from the grains at 104? Would you have to use a different base than grain?

And (forgive me if I'm wrong) aren't those who are on raw food diets attempting to keep out all toxins and things that inhibit health out of the body? That would pretty much rule out anything with alcohol in it, correct? Why would one who adheres to a raw food diet want to consume alcohol?

Vegan/Raw/Alcohol Free beer?
 
Sorry if I contributed to this de-railing, but we are wayyyy off topic now.

As mentioned before, the vegan aspect isn't difficult, the raw food part is. How could you possibly extract sugars from the grains at 104? Would you have to use a different base than grain?

I think you could soak malted grain in RT water for a few days, but you might want to use campden to keep away the nasties.
 
I don't necessarily think you need to heat grain to malt it. Maybe it is common practice, but isn't malting just getting it wet and letting it grow for a few days? There is probably other methods to stopping the growing process -- perhaps freezing?
 
If a guy wanted to make a raw vegan beer, couldn't he do so with some sort of pressure cooker? Could he achieve a boil at a lower temp? Would make adding and stirring things much more difficult. :fro:
 
But I don't know what to do about converting the alpha acids in the hops to get the bitterness....
 
I swear I heard somewhere that bringing any food above ~105 or something made it non-rawfoodian.

Yeah, I made that up.

Wouldn't that rule out a decent amount of tropical food then? I'm sure it gets warmer than that just sitting on the vine.
 
This is an interesting topic about the raw process. The kilning process is a problem, so you're going to have very colorless beer, but what about using wheat, barley, oats, etc? Are any of those heated during production? What about floor kilned varieties, I have read about a few that come very close to raw specs, but that last step taken to kill off any last growth at around 160 ruins it.

My thinking is that if this is possible, it's going to take a ton more ingredients, hops, and time, and a lot of slow cooking to get to a potent product. I wonder if there are scientific things you can do to increase water loss without a boil, or is that even possible? Like start with 10 gallons of very weak wort and extract like 8 gallons of water to make it higher in gravity. Anyway to do that without boiling? Perhaps a 48 hour cook at 118 degrees in a dry environment where the air sucks out a lot of the moisture?
 
This is an interesting topic about the raw process. The kilning process is a problem, so you're going to have very colorless beer, but what about using wheat, barley, oats, etc? Are any of those heated during production? What about floor kilned varieties, I have read about a few that come very close to raw specs, but that last step taken to kill off any last growth at around 160 ruins it.

My thinking is that if this is possible, it's going to take a ton more ingredients, hops, and time, and a lot of slow cooking to get to a potent product. I wonder if there are scientific things you can do to increase water loss without a boil, or is that even possible? Like start with 10 gallons of very weak wort and extract like 8 gallons of water to make it higher in gravity. Anyway to do that without boiling? Perhaps a 48 hour cook at 118 degrees in a dry environment where the air sucks out a lot of the moisture?

Perhaps a vacuum evaporator would be useful.
 
Wouldn't that rule out a decent amount of tropical food then? I'm sure it gets warmer than that just sitting on the vine.

No idea. I'm no expert on the topic. I am just posing the questions I would have if I were asked to solve the problem of brewing a vegan/rawfood beer. Not sure this would actually qualify as a beer per se. Grain might seriously be out of the question.
 
TyTanium said:
Does that go for meat too? Wonder what a steak or chicken at 105F tastes like.

Actually it does. You wouldn't want to eat chicken but sushi is acceptable for some raw foodists.
 
It is not even a boil problem yet. Germinate to malt and then run it through a blender and dose with amylase and yeast. Wait a week and dose with iso hop extract. Bottle with sugar. Wait three weeks, drink, then vomit. Give up veganism forever.
 
It is not even a boil problem yet. Germinate to malt and then run it through a blender and dose with amylase and yeast. Wait a week and dose with iso hop extract. Bottle with sugar. Wait three weeks, drink, then vomit. Give up veganism forever.

The rest of vegan food is pretty much terrible. The beer might as well suck too.

Would they care?
 
CGVT said:
The rest of vegan food is pretty much terrible. The beer might as well suck too.

Would they care?
Actually some vegan food is pretty awesome if its prepared properly. My wife got me to try a meal she made that was not only vegan but raw, and it was delicious. Of course it took her almost 8 hours to prepare and I was hungry after 30 minutes, but it was good flavor wise.
NervousDad said:
I think wine is the answer here.
Bing!
 
The rest of vegan food is pretty much terrible. The beer might as well suck too.

Would they care?

the majority of beer is vegan

and most vegan dishes are plenty tasty - may not be an ideal lifestyle or way to eat everyday all the time but to say all vegan food is terrible is a pretty ignorant blanket statement
 
the majority of beer is vegan

and most vegan dishes are plenty tasty - may not be an ideal lifestyle or way to eat everyday all the time but to say vegan food is terrible is a pretty ignorant blanket statement

Not sure he meant that all vegan dishes were nasty. I could be wrong though :p. I've had a lot of vegan dishes that were delicious. But, I think they would have ALL been better with some meat added. Then again, I love my meats.
 
the majority of beer is vegan

and most vegan dishes are plenty tasty - may not be an ideal lifestyle or way to eat everyday all the time but to say all vegan food is terrible is a pretty ignorant blanket statement

Lighten up, Francis. It was joke.:drunk:
 
Ya know, the whole veganism thing cracks me up. While people are entitled to eat the way they wish, when I see the following scenario, I crack up:

You'll see these people come up with some elaborate concoction they call a "meal", in which they attempt to copy something like a burger and fries, all the way down to fake bacon. It always leads me to the logical conclusion that these people are really foolish, no offense intended. If you have to go so far as to build a veganized version of something that's SUPPOSED to contain meat, oil, raw items, etc, then something is clearly wrong with that approach. If you want the real deal so bad.....then EAT the real deal, and quit telling yourself it's bad. If it's so against your beliefs, why do you want to go as far as possible to copy the real deal?



It's like buying a $20,000 VW and spending $30k upgrading its body panels, engine, exhaust, wheels, etc, all to get it to look like a $50,000 BMW -------- except that the VW ends up costing more and performing worse. Coulda just bought a BMW and called it a day. All this being said, I'm not ripping on the lifestyle as a whole, but instead all of the one's I've personally experienced/seen.


/rant
 
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