Tempeh and Me

Last night I went to a local pizzeria and got a deep-dish pie with everything: Mounds of creamy mozzarella, chunks of sausage and slabs of pepperoni, with a few anchovies and black olives strewn around and a ton of grated Parmesan cheese on top. It was to die for.

Just kidding. I didn't do that because it literally would have been to die for. Apparently my days of eating mouth-watering foods are over as I enter the austere, serious and semi-monastic world of vegetarians. When it comes to eating my new test will be: Did it have a mother? If not, it's a go. I am doing this to save my life (only up to a point of course since we all die), and to avoid future heart problems.

Based on my reading and talking to others with similar concerns, it's my only option. The fact is that wherever a plant-based diet is the norm, heart disease simply does not exist. These countries include China, much of Africa, Japan, South Korea, France, Portugal, and many, many others. According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), "in the United States, heart disease is the leading cause of death for people of most ethnicities including African Americans, Hispanics, and whites. For American Indians or Alaska Natives and Asians or Pacific Islanders, heart disease is second only to cancer."

I'm ready to commit, but I sure hope I don't turn into one of those vegetarians. You know the type: holier-than-thou (certainly paler-than-thou), the men with long ponytails and bald on top, the women wearing sandals with heavy socks even in winter, all of them loudly lactose-intolerant and proudly gluten-free, loving the environment and hating GMOs, and most especially looking down their noses at all the prehistoric meat-eaters. I intend to just sit quietly and eat my seven different kinds of beans with bowls of kale, carrots, tofu, berries, tempeh (whatever that is), soy milk, whole grains and most especially quinoa salad (which is very "in" these days) and get healthy. Who knows -- one day I might even become a vegan.