Ever since we’ve started eating vegan foods around this here house of mine, I’ve been trying to come up with a better way to explain our eating habits. After all, even hard-core veganistas (like the beautiful, talented Ruby Roth, author of
Vegan is Love) admit being wary to saying the big, fat “V” word. VEGAN. It’s like the mark of the demon, labeling you as a radical food extremist. When, really what you are is just a person who loves your body and the world too much to cut into a cow for dinner.
A few weeks ago, I chatted with Kim Barnouin of
Skinny Bitch fame, and told her I was determined to come up with a better way to say “vegan” than “vegan.” She giggled and said, “Oh I am so on board with this. There has GOT to be better term out there. Tell me if you figure it out, because I want to start using it.”
Sometime mid-dinner making last Wednesday, it hit me. I would no longer tell my kids that dinner was “vegan.” No. As much as I love the description of vegan eating, it feels too harsh sometimes. I don’t want to raise my kids with labels. I want to teach them to look past labels and seek to fill their souls (and their bellies) with stuff that heals and makes them whole. Right now, with the best scientific understanding I can muster, a mostly-vegan, plant-based diet seems to be the clearest approach to wellness. However, I want them to always stay curious, to be open to new truths that may help them find an ever better, more healthy way to be.
And so, in conjuring up an Easter bunny-inspired carrot soup, it came to me. The meal I was making wasn’t for carnivores. It didn’t require viciously sharp eye teeth or the cooking off of blood and bacteria. Rather, this meal was for plant-eaters. And then it hit me…it was a plantie meal.
How cute is that!