My mother took me for a fool, and lied to my face.
When I was in college, I became a vegetarian for a few years, like many others before me. I wasn't particularly dogmatic about my reasons for my conversion, no PETA protests or Meat is Murder proclamations, though those thoughts crossed my mind. I was also not very strict-- I could eat non-meat items that had been cooked together with meat. I had never been much of a meat eater growing up, anyway, and my best friend, Victoria, was a lifelong vegetarian, as was one of my housemates, Patty. They were both excellent cooks, and through them I began to see and enjoy the infinite variety and complexity of vegetarian food. Once I learned to cook the vegetarian legume-based meals of different ethnic cuisines, rather than focusing on cheese for protein, I found it to be the cleanest, healthiest diet I've had before or since. I also enjoyed the discipline it took to cook and order only vegetarian food.
My mother, an otherwise accepting and honest woman, would have none of it. She feared that I would somehow waste away if I didn't eat meat, despite the freshman fifteen I had brought home with me. Aside from announcing her concerns once or twice, she didn't protest too much about my new diet when I came home from college to visit. She is a cook of extremely healthy food, mainly vegetables, so it wasn't too hard to feed me. But apparently she noticed that I was eating only the vegetables and tofu, and leaving behind any meat on my plate.
Over one of our family dinners, I was caught up in some discussion and did not look at my food as I was eating. It was a stir fry of a Chinese squash I really enjoy, opo, which tastes like a cross between a cucumber and zucchini. I was savoring the slightly sweet taste of the squash, when I felt between my jaws a familiar texture I hadn't encountered in a while. I chewed again, to figure out what it was.
"Mom! Is this meat?" I asked, slightly alarmed.
She looked straight at me with a placid expression. "Oh, of course not, you are a vegetarian now, aren't you?"
Then I inspected the food in my bowl. Now that I actually looked at it, I saw miniscule brown bits among the pale green slices of squash. "Are you honestly telling me there is no meat in this?" I picked up a morsel of the ground pork in my chopsticks and waved it towards her. "What is this?"
"Oh, it's just a little bit, it doesn't really count." She still hadn't changed her expression. Who knew she had such a poker face?
Yes, my own mother lied to me.
I forgave her, of course, and a few years later, caved back in to the delights of roast duck, bacon, and other meats I had been depriving myself of, and fell permanently off the wagon. My mother was smugly satisfied. I should not have been entirely surprised at her little trick, since she has told me other white lies over the years in the interest of my own good. I probably have yet to discover some of them.
Aside from the well-intentioned like my mother blatantly hiding meat in otherwise vegetarian dishes, I was always curious about the foods that are marketed to vegetarians as "meat substitutes." I don't think there is any truly convincing substitute for meat, although there is certainly a big market, with such products as TofuPups, Tofurky, and on. Even vegetables are promoted for their meatiness, with portobello mushrooms as the most famous, often grilled and served with steak sauce on the side. I am still not a big meat eater, but when I crave a steak, I want the steak, not a big mushroom.
The most developed cuisine of pretend meats that I know of is in Chinese vegetarian cooking, where there is a whole array of dishes that try to replicate the texture of meat with a wheat gluten product, known commonly in this country as the Japanese seitan. You can order dishes called either mock or vegetarian chicken, duck, or name your animal, all featuring the gluten product, which is a good source of protein. This cuisine was originally developed for religious purposes, for adherents of Chinese Buddhism. In the religious context of non-violence, I find it particularly curious that one would want to have not just a non-animal based protein source, but that it would be one which mimics both the appearance and texture of meat. Gluten or seitan prepared in this way is usually prepared simply, featuring the gluten in the way meat would be used, flavored with soy sauce and used in stir fries with an assortment of vegetables, or on its own, with rice porridge. It does look vaguely meat-like: chunky, brown and wrinkly, with the soy sauce giving it umami. I like the flavor, but more as a unique food of its own, and not as a meat simulacrum. Eaten in the traditional Chinese Buddhist way, I find that it all tastes the same, whether it is pretending to be chicken, duck, or otherwise.
But it is not meat, and hey, I am no April Fool. Following up on my mother's successful attempt years back to hide some real meat in my vegetables, I came up with a way to give make-believe meat a disguise, too. For this week's Salon Kitchen Challenge of food doppelgangers, I've prepared a Mock Duck Thai Red Curry.
* * *
Mock Duck Thai Red Curry
Ingredients
2 cans mock duck, available in Asian markets*
2 1/2 cups coconut milk
1 cup of pineapple chunks
1 cup Kabocha squash or pumpkin, in chunks
1 cup bamboo shoots, sliced
1-2 Japanese eggplants, sliced on the diagonal, or 6 (round) Thai eggplants, cut in half
4-5 kaffir lime leaves, torn into small pieces
1 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp fish sauce
1/2 cup water or chicken stock
1 1/2 tbsp canola or vegetable oil
3 tbsp red curry paste (can use prepared, or recipe below)
Accompaniment: steamed Thai jasmine rice
Technique
1. Heat oil in a wok or saute pan over medium heat, and add red curry paste. Stir well.
2. Add 3/4 cup coconut milk and stir to mix thoroughly.
3. Add the mock duck and stir well.
4. Add the remaining coconut milk, then add all remaining ingredients.
5. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat, simmering for about 20 minutes.
6. Serve over steamed rice and enjoy.
*You could substitute roast duck from a Chinese market if you prefer the real thing, or for another (and more honest) vegetarian option, deep fried tofu cubes.
Thai red curry paste
Ingredients
13 small dried chilies, seeds removed, soaked in water until softened
3 tbsp chopped shallot
4 tbsp chopped garlic
1 tbsp chopped galangal
2 tbsp chopped lemon grass
2 tsp grated rind from kaffir or other limes
1 tbsp chopped coriander root (or substitute fresh coriander stems)
20 white peppercorns
1 1/2 tsp ground roasted coriander seeds
1/2 tsp ground roasted cumin seeds
1 tsp shrimp paste
1 tsp salt
Technique
1. Grind up all ingredients in either a mortar and pestle or with an electric blender or food processor. Add a tablespoon of water, if needed, to assist with blending.
2. Cook as above.
Thai red curry recipe adapted from templeofthai.com
© 2010 Linda Shiue
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Comments
My daughter gave up meat when she was 16, and after maybe 10 years, added back fish so that she can order a meal at any restaurant. Cooking for her has been enlightening and healthy for me. I recommend it.
In college I took a course in "Designing Alternative Futures" and every member of the class had to buy the cookbook "Diet for a Small Planet" and cook one of the recipes for an evening class dinner. That was an eye opener about not only feeding the planet's population by avoiding meat, but a nice introduction to vegetarian cooking and finding the proper amount of proteins in vegetables such as you mentioned about legume-based meals.
Great opening, solid content, a fun read as always!
Great post as always.
You’re a kind and forgiving soul :)
As a lifelong vegetarian meat look-alikes have no appeal to me. I prefer food that looks and tastes like itself and 'tastes like meat' is a detractor.
But many new to the vegetarian lifestyle find mock-meat satisfying and a good replacement.
dianaani, Joan, scupper, and caroline marie: glad to know I might have 4 buyers should I come out with a book! Too kind of you all.
green heron: I guess we're in good company!
designanator: Diet for a Small Planet should be resurrected; I agree it is an important and still/again timely read. My lentil soup recipe is from there.
Rebecca: your experience with fake meat sounds traumatic. Technology has improved somewhat, but it's still not the same.
Lucy: yes, bacon. Regarding my week off... I did intend one...
Robin: what a tasty coincidence!
oryoki bowl: I agree, real food is the better way to go.
ladyslipper: glad to find a fan of mock duck!
Jenna: thank you!
Bonnie: I wish.
diary of a food addict: I'd say mock meat is better as a food category of its own, and not for what it's pretending to be.
Ayala: good points. I really do think for someone who is opposed to eating meat, "tastes like meat" would be a huge turnoff.
Anyway, beautiful mimickry, Linda and it sounds very tasty. I have never succeeded in my attempts to make vegetarian jerky, but seeing your results I may give it another try.
The one I really don't get is the soy ice cream. There are delicious sorbets that are vegan, why pretend soybeans are cream?
The day he died I was driving home from the hospital & stopped at a Mexican food place & while eating my "vegetarian" refried beans, bit into a large piece of gristle. I still think it was a message from beyond the grave from my grandpa. "Hah! Gotcha!"
I've had the fake meat in Chinese restaurants & to me it tastes so much like "meat" (or what I remember as meat) that I'm always thinking, Hmmm...is this REALLY fake or are they pulling one over on me...
Rated.
G.B. Shaw--always right except when he slipped, as in his pronouncements on Hitler, Mussolini & Stalin--said, "I do not eat the flesh of dead animals."
http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/03/peeps-recipes-how-to-make-peepshi-sushi-rice-krispies-treats-easter.html
I think it's adorable and if I had kids, I'd do it with them. I probably will do it w/ my niece next year.
kissinglessons: thank you!
malusinka: I agree, real is the better deal.
suzie: that is quite a story! thank you.
Füsun: thanks so much.
PattyJane: thanks for the Peeps tip!
Ann: hope you enjoy the recipe. I'm glad to get you all fired up to try it. I love Thai curries because you can really cook anything in them, and they look more difficult to make than they are.
The ethical teachings of the Buddha are quite similar to those found in the Gospel of Jesus: One must never be proud nor harbor anger against anyone. He who humbles himself shall be exalted, while the one who exalts himself shall be degraded. Harsh language must never be used against anyone.
Avoid lust, anger and greed. One should not scrutinize the mote in a neighbor’s eye without first noticing the beam in one’s own. One must “turn the other cheek” if attacked or abused. One’s own possessions must be shared with the less fortunate. If a man obtained the whole world and its riches, he still would not be satisfied, nor would this save him.
In 261 B.C., the Indian emperor Ashoka witnessed firsthand the innumerable casualties he caused during one of his many military campaigns. His heart was filled with grief. He converted to Buddhism. 19th century scholar and writer H.G. Wells considered Ashoka’s conversion to Buddhism one of the most significant events in world history.
Ashoka, formerly a bloody and ruthless emperor, became a remarkably kind and gentle leader. Ashoka established some of the first animal rights laws. He stopped the royal hunt, stopped the sacrifice of animals in his capital city, stopped the killing of animals for food in the royal kitchens, and gave up the eating of meat. Ashoka made it illegal to kill many species of animals, such as parrots, ducks, geese, bats, turtles, squirrels, monkeys and rhinos. He forbade the killing of pregnant animals, or animals that were nursing their young. He declared certain days to be “non-killing days,” on which fish could not be caught, nor any other animals killed. He established wells and watering holes, places of rest and hospitals for humans and animals alike.
Ashoka educated his people to have compassion for animals, and to refrain from killing or harming them. He sent missionaries to all the neighboring kingdoms to teach mercy, compassion and nonviolence. Through Ashoka’s patronage, Buddhism was spread all over the Indian subcontinent. Buddhism would eventually reach the rest of Asia; today there are an estimated 300 to 600 million Buddhists worldwide.
The first precept of Buddhism is: “Do not kill, but rather preserve and cherish all life.” There is an ancient poem, reputed to be the only text ever written by the Buddha himself, which states:
“Let creatures all, all things that live, all beings of whatever kind, see nothing that will bode them ill. May naught of evil come to them.”
The Buddhist emperor Ashoka (268-223 BC) declared in one of his famous Pillar Edicts: “I have enforced the law against killing certain animals..The greatest progress of Righteousness among men comes from the exhortation in favor of non-injury to life and abstention from killing living beings.”
The Dalai Lama has said, “I do not see any reason why animals should be slaughtered to serve as human diet when there are so many substitutes. After all, man can live without meat.”
Mahayana Buddhism supports the vegetarian way of life. According to the Mahaparinirvana Sutra: “The eating of meat extinguishes the seed of great compassion.”
The Lankavatara Sutra says:
“For the sake of love of purity, the bodhisattva should refrain from eating flesh, which is born from semen, blood, etc. For fear of causing terror to living beings let the bodhisattva, who is disciplining himself to attain compassion, refrain from eating flesh…It is not true that meat is proper food and permissible when the animal was not killed by himself, when he did not order others to kill it, when it was not specifically meant for him…Again, there may be some people in the future who…being under the influence of the taste for meat will string together in various ways many sophisticated arguments to defend meat-eating…But…meat-eating in any form, in any manner, and in any place is unconditionally and once and for all prohibited…Meat-eating I have not permitted to anyone, I do not permit, I will not permit…”
The Surangama Sutra says:
“The reason for practicing dhyana and seeking to attain samadhi is to escape from the suffering of life. But in seeking to escape from suffering ourselves, why should we inflict it upon others? Unless you can control your minds that even the thought of brutal unkindness and killing is abhorrent, you will never be able to escape from the bondage of the world’s life…After my parinirvana in the final kalpa different kinds of ghosts will be encountered everywhere deceiving people and teaching them that they can eat meat and still attain enlightenment…How can a bhikshu, who hopes to become a deliverer of others, himself be living on the flesh of other sentient beings?”
Contemporary Hindu spiritual masters have taught us that if one wishes to eat cow’s flesh (or the flesh of any other animal for that matter), one should wait until the animal dies of natural causes, rather than take the life of a fellow creature. This indicates that we are vegetarian first and foremost out of nonviolence toward and compassion for animals, rather than because we follow “dietary laws.”
Avoidance of onions and garlic is not limited to Hindus in India; there is a tradition of avoiding these foods in China, antedating the arrival of Buddhism. ‘Enjoy’ Vegetarian Restaurant in San Francisco, CA is run by Chinese Buddhists, and they do not serve onions or garlic in any of their preparations. However, they do serve mushrooms!
In Theravada Buddhist countries (Burma, Ceylon, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, Tibet, Malaya), although the monks are forbidden to kill animals, they beg for food and are expected to eat whatever is offered them. Contrasting the Mahayana Buddhist countries (e.g., China) with the Theravada, in A Vegetarian Sourcebook, author Keith Akers writes:
“In the Mahayana countries, the custom regarding monks is completely different, reflecting a different attitude towards meat consumption. The Mahayana Buddhist monks do not beg for food at all; they prepare their own food, which is either bought, grown, or collected as rent. The Mahayana monks in China were strictly vegetarian in ancient times and remain so today.
“Dietary abstinence from meat was an ancient Chinese tradition that antedated the arrival of Buddhism. In China, all animal foods, onions, and alcohol were either forbidden or customarily avoided. Animal products were avoided in dress as they were in diet. There was a prohibition on the use of silk or leather (not observed in Theravada countries).
“Not only are the Mahayana Buddhist monks vegetarian, but so are many Buddhist lay people in China. Lay people usually receive a lay ordination, in which they must take from one to five vows. Almost everyone takes the first vow, which is not to take the life of any sentient creature.”
Misturu Kakimoto of the Japanese Vegetarian Society writes: “A survey that I conducted of 80 Westerners, including Americans, Englishmen and Canadians, revealed that approximately half of them believed that vegetarianism originated in India. Some respondents assumed that vegetarianism had its origin in China or Japan. It seems to me that the reason Westerners associate vegetarianism with China or Japan is Buddhism. It is no wonder, and in fact we could say that Japan used to be a country where vegetarianism prevailed.”
Gishi-wajin-denn, a history book on Japan written in China around the third century BC, says, “There are no cattle, no horses, no tigers, no leopards, no goats and no magpies in that land. The climate is mild and people over there eat fresh vegetables both in summer and in winter.” It also says that “people catch fish and shellfish in the water.” Apparently, the Japanese ate fresh vegetables as well as rice and other cereals as staple foods. They also took some fish and shellfish, but hardly any meat.
Shinto, the prevailing religion at the time, is essentially pantheistic, based upon the worship of the forces of nature. According to writer Steven Rosen, in the early days of Shinto, no animal food was offered in sacrifice because of the injunction against shedding blood in the sacred area of the shrine.
Several hundred years later, Buddhism came to Japan and the prohibition of hunting and fishing permeated the Japanese people. In 7th century Japan, the Empress Jito encouraged “hojo,” or the releasing of captive animals, and established wildlife preserves, where animals could not be hunted.
There are many similarities between the Hindu literature and the Buddhist religions of the Far East. For example, the word Cha’an of the Cha’an school of Chinese Buddhism is Chinese for the Sanskrit word “dhyana”, which means meditation, as does the word “Zen” in Japanese. In 676 AD, then Japanese emperor Tenmu proclaimed an ordinance prohibiting the eating of fish and shellfish as well as animal flesh and fowl.
During the twelve hundred years from the Nara period to the Meiji restoration in the second half of the 19th century, Japanese people enjoyed vegetarian style meals. They usually ate rice as staple food and beans and vegetables. It was only on special occasions or celebrations that fish was served. Under these circumstances the Japanese people developed a vegetarian cuisine, Shojin Ryori (ryori means cooking or cuisine), which was native to Japan.
The word “shojin” is a Japanese translation of “vyria” in Sanskrit, meaning “to have the goodness and keep away evils.” Buddhist priests of the Tendai-shu and Shingon-shu sects, whose founders studied in China in the ninth century before they founded their respective sects, have handed down vegetarian cooking practices from Chinese temples strictly in accordance with the teachings of the Buddha.
In the 13th century, Dogen, the founder of the Soto sect of Zen, formally established Shojin Ryori or Japanese vegetarian cuisine. Dogen studied and learned the Zen teachings abroad in China, during the Sung Dynasty. He fixed rules aiming to establish the pure vegetarian life as a means of training the mind.
One of the other influences Zen exerted on the Japanese people manifested itself in Sado, the Japanese tea ceremony. It is believed that Esai, founder of the Rinazi-shu sect, introduced tea to Japan and it is the custom for Zen followers to drink tea. The customs preserved in the teaching of Zen lead to a systematic rule called Sado…a Cha-shitsu or tea ceremony room is so constructed as to resemble the Shojin, where the chief priest is at a Buddhist temple.
Food served at a tea ceremony is called Kaiseki in Japanese, which literally means a stone in the breast. Monks practicing asceticism used to press heated stones to their bosom to suppress hunger. Then the word Kaiseki itself came to mean a light meal served at Shojin, and Kaiseki meals had great influence on the Japanese.
The “Temple of the Butchered Cow” can be found in Shimoda, Japan. It was erected shortly after Japan opened its doors to the West in the 1850s. It was erected in honor of the first cow slaughtered in Japan, marking the first violation of the Buddhist tenet against the eating of meat.
An example of a Buddhist vegetarian in the modern age: Kenji Miyazawa, a Japanese writer and poet of the early 20th century, who wrote a novel entitled Vegetarian-Taisai, in which he depicted a fictitious vegetarian congress…His works played an important role in the advocacy of modern vegetarianism. Today, no animal flesh is ever eaten in a Zen Buddhist monastery, and such Buddhist denominations as the Cao Dai sect (which originated in South Vietnam), now boasts some two million followers, all of whom are vegetarian.
The Buddhist teachings are not the only source contributing to the growth of vegetarianism in Japan. in the late 19th century, Dr. Gensai Ishizuka published an academic book in which he advocated vegetarian cooking with an emphasis on brown rice and vegetables. His method is called Seisyoku (Macrobiotics) and is based upon ancient Chinese philosophy such as the principles of Yin and Yang and Taoism. Now some people support his method of preventative medicine. Japanese macrobiotics suggest taking brown rice as half of the whole intake, with vegetables, beans, seaweeds, and a small amount of fish (optional, not required).
In his 1923 book, The Natural Diet of Man, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg writes: “According to Mori, the Japanese peasant of the interior is almost an exclusive vegetarian. He eats fish once or twice a month and meat once or twice a year.” Dr. Kellogg writes that in 1899, the Emperor of Japan appointed a commission to determine whether it was necessary to add meat to the nation’s diet to improve the people’s strength and stature. The commission concluded that as far as meat was concerned, “the Japanese had always managed to do without it, and that their powers of endurance and their athletic prowess exceeded that of any of the Caucasian races. Japan’s diet stands on a foundation of rice.”
According to Dr. Kellogg: “the rice diet of the Japanese is supplemented by the free use of peanuts, soy beans and greens, which… constitute a wholly sufficient bill of fare. Throughout the Island Empire, rice is largely used, together with buckwheat, barley, wheat and millet. Turnips and radishes, yams and sweet potatoes are frequently used, also cucumbers, pumpkins and squashes. The soy bean is held in high esteem and used largely in the form of miso, a puree prepared from the bean and fermented; also tofu, a sort of cheese; and cho-yu, which is prepared by mixing the pulverized beans with wheat flour, salt, and water and fermenting from one and a half to five years.
“The Chinese peasant lives on essentially the same diet, as do also the Siamese, the Koreans, and most other Oriental peoples. Three-fourths of the world’s population eats so little meat that it cannot be regarded as anything more than an incidental factor in their bill of fare. The countless millions of China,” writes Dr. Kellogg, “are for the most part flesh-abstainers. In fact at least two-thirds of the inhabitants of the world make so little use of flesh that it can hardly be considered an essential part of their dietary…”
Misturu Kakimoto concludes: “Japanese people started eating meat some 150 years ago and now suffer the crippling diseases caused by the excess intake of fat in flesh and the possible hazards from the use of agricultural chemicals and additives. This is persuading them to seek natural and safe food and to adopt once again the traditional Japanese cuisine.”
Vasu Murti: thanks for your very informative comment.
My conversion: Reading a supplement from the NYT magazine from Jonathan Safran Foer's book "Eating Animals". It changed my life, I kid you not. I am going to buy the entire book (as soon as it comes out in paperback) but I just moved across the sea and luggage space was tight.
All this to say, great article. I loved it and I'm going to rate it!
My father will try and coax me to eat bacon the next time I see him. I plan not to. But it is bacon, isn't it?
Enjoy!
It's like being roped into a cult.....