On Wed, 20 Dec 2006 17:54:51 -0500, chico > wrote:
>* t.racer wrote:
>> I live in San Diego (USA) and have seen vegan restaurants with GREAT
>> FOOD go belly up. From my observations, I am of the opinion that the
>> owners go wrong by trying to do it all themselves, failing to
>> delegate.
>
>They go belly up because they cater to a tiny niche rather than to
>a base wide enough to generate a profit and keep them in business. The
>only way a vegan restaurant can stay in business is to be in an
>area with a larger-than-average population of vegans and/or
>vegetarians.
Is that your lay opinion? Is it rationally based upon your own
perception? The restaurant owner (Mr. Yaffe) quoted in the article
below says the opposite and he qualifies as an expert.
http://www.projo.com/news/content/pr...g.3216b8c.html
At this holiday dinner, hold the turkey
The annual Compassionate Thanksgiving dinner, sponsored by Rhode
Island Vegan
Awareness, promotes vegetarianism for reasons of animal rights,
improving the
environment and nonviolence.
01:00 AM EST on Monday, November 20, 2006
By Michelle J. Lee
Journal Environment Writer
WARWICK -- Paul Dumont, a piano tuner from Lincoln, celebrated
Thanksgiving
early yesterday at the Radisson Airport Hotel with a feast of
butternut bisque,
stuffing and potatoes with gravy.
What was missing from his plate was the turkey. Instead, he ate
seitan, a meat
substitute made of wheat gluten.
Dumont became a vegan in 1997 when his older brother sent him a box of
books on
animal rights and health. The books persuaded Dumont to give up meat,
dairy and
other animal-based foods so he and his twin sons can prevent such
problems as
heart disease and high cholesterol.
"It made my life have meaning, not hurting animals and making my
children
healthy," he said. "There's a lot of positive things from it. It makes
my life
fuller."
Dumont was one of 110 people who attended the sixth annual
Compassionate
Thanksgiving held by Rhode Island Vegan Awareness, a group that
promotes a vegan
diet for animal rights, improving the environment and nonviolence.
Elana Kirshenbaum, the president and cofounder of the organization,
held the
Thanksgiving event at her house in 2001.
She noted some vegans and vegetarians might face confrontation when
celebrating
with family members who eat meat. "Thanksgiving can be a stressful
time because
their ethics aren't understood, their values, whatever [reason] they
chose to be
vegetarian," she said. "Sometimes they feel misunderstood and they can
feel
trivialized."
It is difficult to count the number of America vegetarians. One
national poll
this year by the Vegetarian Resource Group estimated about 4.7 million
adults
over 18, roughly 2.3 percent of the population, said they never eat
meat, fish
and poultry.
There are a number of reasons people embrace a vegetarian diet. Some
believe in
animal rights, others choose it for aesthetic or religious reasons.
Still others
choose vegetarianism for environmental reasons because industrial
farms use tons
of grains, thousands of acres and millions of gallons of water to
raise animals.
The farms can produce tons of waste, leading to air, water and land
pollution.
While some may view vegetarianism as a lifestyle, it is more of a
"philosophy
and practice of living in harmony with animals and nature," said Karen
Iacobbo,
a Glocester journalist, cofounder of the online Vegetarian Museum and
coauthor
of two vegetarian books with her husband, Michael.
"Vegetarians had a remarkable influence on society that the community
isn't
aware of," Karen said. She noted that vegetarians were early champions
of ideas
such as preventive medicine, exercise, eating fruits and vegetables,
and
abstaining from drugs and alcohol.
Vegetarianism has been practiced for thousands of years in religions
such as
Buddhism and Jainism. Notable figures such as philosophers Plato and
Pythagoras
were vegetarians.
One of the first famous American vegetarians was Benjamin Franklin,
who gave up
meat for humanitarian reasons and even served a vegetarian meal to
George
Washington, Iacobbo said. However, during a fishing trip off Block
Island,
Franklin was tempted by cod and reverted.
Vegetarians also played a strong role in how Americans eat today. The
man
considered the "father" of American vegetarianism, the Rev. Sylvester
Graham,
promoted "natural hygiene" and advocated using whole wheat in the
1830s. In the
1870s, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg proved Americans didn't need to eat ham
or
sausage for breakfast and developed cereals, Iacobbo said.
Vegetarian food festivals in America date to the 1840s and meat-free
Thanksgivings can be traced to 1895, according to Iacobbos' book .
Nowadays, vegetarianism is more accepted by Americans and even meat
eaters are
willing to try the occasional vegetarian meal. Robert Yaffe, owner of
the
vegetarian Garden Grill Restaurant, in Pawtucket, said about 60 to 70
percent of
his customers aren't vegetarian. "My customers are primarily into
eating
healthy, natural foods, but [are] not necessarily vegetarian," he
said.
The restaurant has offered five-course vegetarian Thanksgiving dinners
since
2003. Last year, the dinner drew 75 people. Yaffe, who worked in the
natural
foods business for 36 years, opened the restaurant partly for
environmental
reasons and to cater to a special niche.
Meatless Thanksgiving can provide a sense of community for vegans such
as Barry
and Chris Brown, of Warren. While the couple celebrate Thanksgiving
with their
own family, which includes vegetarians, they have attended the RIVA
event since
2003 to show solidarity and meet other vegans.
Being vegan made a huge difference for the Browns, who became
vegetarians in
1991 when Barry was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, a type of
cancer. In
1993, they became vegans after watching a film about a chicken farm.
Barry said his cancer has been in remission since 2002, and he credits
his diet.
And Chris changed her career from layout artist to natural foods
educator in
1997.
Chris Brown said events such as Compassion Thanksgiving "brings people
together
and introduces them to healthy eating and changes their minds on what
vegan food
tastes like."
The other benefit of a vegan diet is not worrying about hormones and
food-borne
diseases in meat, Barry said. "There's no such thing as mad tofu
disease," he
joked.
For more information about Rhode Island Vegan Awareness, visit
www.veganawareness.org. For more information about the Vegetarian
Museum, visit
www.vegetarianmuseum.com.
-- Michelle J. Lee is a fellow with the Metcalf Institute for Marine
and
Environmental Reporting.