Vegan India!

An Interview with Dr. Sunil Srivastava, Vegan Veterinarian

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 19:32:50 PST

An ideal world, a reality of the future times, will perhaps have no place for the domestication of animals. An ideal world will regard every animal to have a purpose of their own and animals will no longer have human “owners”. Our present culture has quite some distance to cover before it realizes the cherished goals of an ideal world. Billions of animals of every kind suffer each day. If an Ishikawa diagram is traced to investigate what lies at the root of this suffering, it would inevitably point towards human beings as the cause. In this imperfect world, it is significant to assist in lessening the suffering of these sentient beings and contribute towards their rescue and rehabilitation.

The rehabilitation of animals resulting in the domestication of the likes of dogs and cats present thought-provoking scenarios in the vegan mind. ‘Is it ethical to feed my dog or cat non vegan food?’, ‘Is it against Nature to feed my dog or cat vegan food?’, ‘Can my dog or cat live healthy as a vegan?’ are some of the key questions in the consciousness of many vegans who actively contribute towards the rescue and rehabilitation of these animals within human homes. More often than not, an opinion of an expert in the field greatly helps. And, what can be better if the expert is a vegan!

Amruta Ubale, an animal rights activist and a vegan from Pune has done the remarkable job of connecting animal rescuers and people in general having animal companions to such an expert by introducing the page, Vet for Your Pet in her blog, Animal Rights India. The “vet” in question here is an accomplished Delhi-based veterinarian and a vegan of three years, Dr. Sunil Srivastava. Through the Vet for Your Pet page, Dr. Srivastava addresses the health concerns of your animal companions. Impressed by this initiative, we sought to interview Dr. Srivastava to learn more about his service to the animal world. But before you read the interview, here is a short biography of Dr. Srivastava:

Dr. Srivastava is a practicing veterinarian since 1984. In addition to allopathy, Dr. Srivastava has over 15 years of experience in alternative medicine such as homeopathy, ayurveda, Reiki, and naturopathy. Dr. Srivastava chooses to treat acute, emergency cases with allopathy and chronic cases with alternative medicines. However, Dr. Srivastava believes that the main ingredient to cure or keep an animal companion healthy is love and understanding. Dr. Srivastava’s belief stems from the fact that he is an ardent animal lover and very passionate about animal rights issues as well. For the full biography of Dr. Srivastava, you can click this page on the Animal Rights India blog.

An Interview with Dr. Sunil Srivastava

Dr. Sunil Srivastava with a rescued snake that was later released in the wild.

Vegan India!: Doctor, we are very pleased to have a vegan veterinarian amongst us. Thank you so much for your time. Could you please share with us when, why, and how you decided to embrace the vegan lifestyle? Also, how has living vegan benefitted you personally?

Dr. Srivastava: My ongoing discussions with Amruta Ubale, an animal rights activist, made me aware of veganism. I realized that by eliminating the use of animal products we could significantly reduce the suffering of animals. I was aware of the various cruelties inflicted on animals but I had never seen them from the perspective that by using animal products we are actually contributing towards animal torture.

So, one day we were discussing the dairy issue and it dawned upon me that I should quit milk products. That moment my entire world changed. Now it has been three years since I turned vegan. I realized that animal products are not limited to dairy products and to be vegan does not mean to quit dairy products only.

I see the benefits of veganism in two ways, emotional and physical. Emotionally, I feel happy that I am not consuming a product that was procured by causing pain or death of another living being. Physically, I am sure that I have avoided the chances of diseases, which may be caused by egg or honey or meat or dairy products. Though I have not got any tests done to see the differences in my pathological values pre and post vegan, yet I feel more agile, my stamina has gone up and yes, now I am little less aggressive and temperamental.

Vegan India!: Which animals do you treat? Could you please share whether there has been any difference in the way you treat animals post turning vegan, if yes, what has been the difference?

Dr. Srivastava: My aim is to reduce the suffering of these speechless yet wonderful friends who might I add are very expressive with their affection and emotions. Big, small, bird, animal, mammal, reptile, rodent, and amphibian etc. are words irrelevant for me. At the same time, I admit that I have always been away from people who deal in commercial activities of animals such as dairy owners, farm owners, breeders, or pet shop owners. Frankly speaking, I have not noticed my ways post turning vegan from this angle.

Vegan India!: Doctor, we have lately heard of interesting and inspiring cases of dogs and cats living vegan. These are the two types of animals that people in our culture tend to adopt and look after, either in a community or within human homes. We are told that not only do vegan animals live lives with ailments greatly reduced; they live longer as well. Please tell us what your opinion is on this observation?

Dr. Srivastava: With the passage of time, dogs have adjusted to a plant-based diet. I personally feel an adult dog does not need milk. Dogs can stay healthy if they are given wholesome vegan food and if need be, mineral and vitamin supplements may be given additionally. But puppies need milk. Cats on the other hand are obligate carnivores. Cats require taurine, an essential amino acid found in meat for the normal functioning of the eyes, brain, heart, and muscles. Unlike other mammals, their body is not capable of synthesizing their own taurine from other building block amino acids. Therefore, they have to rely on external sources. There are vegan taurine supplements available in the market. I am yet to study the effects of this supplement.

Vegan India!: What are the primary nutritional needs of dogs and cats? What are the essential plant-based food items we must include in their diet to fulfill those nutritional needs? Do vegan animals need to take medicinal supplements or is a well-planned vegan diet enough?

Dr. Srivastava: Protein, carbohydrate, fat, and minerals including trace elements and vitamins are the basic needs of domesticated dogs and cats. Rice, wheat, pulses, beans, millets, greens, other colored leafy vegetables and fruits, and cooked or raw coconut, sesame, groundnut, or olive oil (I prefer coconut) makes a good palatable diet. Soya bean, garlic, onion, tomato, kidney beans, spinach, and potato should not be given on regular basis. The food should not be over cooked and vegetables should not be fed raw. Fruits such as apple should be grated. Supplements are essential for vegan as well as non vegan dogs if the diet is not wholesome, which is the case with many.

Vegan India!: Doctor, if you had to give one message to people who wish to try the vegan diet plan for their companion animals, what would you say?

Dr. Srivastava: The animal product intake from the diet should be gradually reduced. Make sure wholesome vegan meals are provided to companion animals. Keep an eye on the health of the companion animal. With that being said, I must add I am not in favor of making companion animals suffer from health complications due to eating habits. The companion human should try to reduce the dependence on animal products keeping the health of the animal in mind.

The opinions given in this interview are my personal views and in no way are they intended to hurt any body’s feelings and emotions. Food allergies are not very common in animals but they are existent. So, the owner should be vigilant. I have always been against commercial pet foods. That is why I always advise people to provide homemade food—because its purity and freshness is guaranteed by none other than owners themselves.

~x~x~

Note: If you have a question for Dr. Srivastava concerning the welfare of your companion animal, you can send them at animalrightsindia@gmail.com or pull up a comment box at the Vet For Your Pet page and type in your question.

In Conversation with Dr. Will Tuttle: Towards a World Peace Diet

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 08:06:11 PST

On a blessed afternoon in August 2009 in Bangalore, a *Peas v/s Pills seminar had introduced us to an audio CD entitled, “Living in Harmony With All Life”. Later we got the book, The World Peace Diet on which the CD is based and read it from cover to cover several times; in retrospect, this was an exercise that helped our veganism find zestful expression. After more than two years of the beginning of this beautiful new journey, on a whim, we wrote to Dr. Will Tuttle, the creator of The World Peace Diet—a No.1 Amazon best-seller of March, 2010—and the owner of the exceptionally soothing voice we had heard in the CD. We were thrilled to receive an instant response. Dr. Tuttle consented to a discussion revolving around The World Peace Diet for all of us here in India!

Dr. Will Tuttle needs no introduction, because if we attempt at introducing him, no words will be enough. It is Dr. Tuttle’s gift of thoughts and ideas, contained in his writings, music, and speech that help express the forgotten ideals dwelling in the deepest recesses of all human hearts, which define him. It is how people change their lives for a truly beautiful present and future with his facilitation that define him. He is an institution that we have come to deeply revere. From His Holiness, The Dalai Lama who has acknowledged the wisdom in The World Peace Diet (you will find the kitchen of the monastery of His residence now vegetarian) (Source), to other Tibetan monasteries who have similarly converted their kitchens, to individual selves such as many like us, the book has appealed to the higher good residing in every human being. Hailed as “one of the most important books of the 21st century”, The World Peace Diet has begun a peaceful revolution in the minds of many! Sure enough, if there was a parallel to the Nobel Prize in the ‘Kingdom of Light, Love, and Compassion’ that would include the fascinating Animal Kingdom, The World Peace Diet would receive the undisputed crown.

In this discussion with Dr. Tuttle, we learn about the beginnings of The World Peace Diet, the moral basis of other movements in the world to stream into including the rights of animals, the spiritual approach to veganism, and the substance that comprises the innate intelligence of humans. The discussion ends with an intuitive message from Dr. Tuttle for all of India. Dr. Tuttle reminds us of the nobility of our land, in the collective conscience of which is buried the highest ideals of reverence for all Life. Each section in this discussion in the form of a Q&A is a wholesome commentary by itself; so you will find each section labeled accordingly. Happy reading, dear Readers.

In Conversation With Dr. Will Tuttle

Dr. Will Tuttle at the Farm Sanctuary’s Animal Acres in Acton, CA (www.farmsanctuary.org)—a sanctuary for animals rescued from factory farms and slaughterhouses.

On the birthing of The World Peace Diet…

Vegan India!: Dr. Tuttle, your book, The World Peace Diet is a unique modern-day discourse on the universal Law of Karma, perhaps the mother of all laws, that calls urgent attention towards understanding the interconnectedness between every single life-form on Earth, every cultural predicament that we humans face. This universal law of Karma is not alien to our culture—the popular proverb, “as we sow, so we shall we reap” has translations and variations in perhaps all languages. With Newton’s law, “every action has an equal and opposite reaction”, we find an acknowledgement even in “scientific” terms. However, when it comes to making food choices, our ability to make connections in line with this universal law simply freezes. We deny that food has any power at all. Your book answers the question—what gives food such power and why this power is unrecognized today. It helps connect the array of problems that beset us—such as “chronic war, terrorism, genocide, starvation, the proliferation of disease, environmental degradation, species extinction, animal abuse, consumerism, drug addiction, alienation, stress, racism, oppression of women, child abuse, corporate exploitation, materialism, poverty, injustice, and social malaise” (pg. xiv-xv)—to the lifestyle choices we make as an individual, community, nation, and world citizen. You have also cautioned that by “refusing to make this essential connection, we condemn others and ourselves to enormous suffering.” Please tell us of that moment which inspired you to write The World Peace Diet when all the connections became clear and how long did it take to complete writing the book?

Dr. Tuttle: Yes, even though I never use the word, karma in the manuscript of The World Peace Diet, you are correct that the book is essentially an in-depth discourse on the karmic repercussions of our food choices. For some reason, I was strongly attracted to eastern religions and cultures from my youth, and in my early twenties an intense yearning for spiritual awakening propelled me into a life of meditation, wandering, and scriptural study. This led pretty quickly to questioning the official stories I had been raised to believe, including the necessity of eating animal flesh to be healthy. I became a vegetarian in 1975 at the age of 22 at a Zen-inspired spiritual community called The Farm in Tennessee, and that opened the doorway to a deeper understanding of the spiritual and karmic effects of my actions. I read ravenously the teachings and life stories of many of the sages from India, such as Ramana Maharshi, Shankara, Patanjali, Yogananda, Vivekenanda, Muktananda, Prabhupada, Nisirgadatta, Krishnamurti, Nagarjuna, and practiced yoga and meditation, and studied Zen and Vajrayana Buddhism, as well as Jainism, Sikhism, Sufism, Taoism, esoteric Christianity, and other traditions. I lived in both Vajrayana (Tibetan) and Zen Buddhist meditation centers, and in 1980 I became a vegan because of grasping the bigger picture of animal suffering not just for meat, but also for dairy products, eggs, clothing, entertainment, research, and so forth.

            All the connections between our food choices and our broad range of problems that are elucidated in The World Peace Diet grew gradually in my consciousness over a period of many years, like a garden that takes time and a lot of tending and inputs. The main inputs were the ancient spiritual teachings from Asia, as well as regular meditation practice to free the mind from conditioning, plus many years in academia studying, writing, and teaching literature, drama, philosophy, history, comparative religion, sociology, anthropology, mythology, education, peace studies, and the arts. I feel that many insights emerged through the interplay of this broad range of intellectual study, and also through my regular practice of piano music composition and improvisation as well: music can be an activity that integrates and harmonizes the rational and intuitive capacities of the mind, like meditation, and in retrospect I can see this was an important foundation for the work of writing The World Peace Diet.

            After many years of practicing vegan living and studying it in depth, and contemplating the powerful effects of our food choices, I began to see the “big picture” of The World Peace Diet in my consciousness as a vast mandala of interconnections that influences and is influenced by virtually every aspect of our personal and collective lives, as well as the lives of nonhuman animals and the Earth. I began saying to my spouse Madeleine, as I described my vision to her, that there is so much more to veganism than most people realize, and that someone would certainly be writing a book about it soon, and that it would be great to read that book when it was published. I could see clearly that the three main generally-recognized reasons for going vegan—boycotting cruelty to animals, alleviating environmental destruction, and improving health—while hugely important, are just part of the story. There’s actually much more to it—the psychological, spiritual, cultural, and historical dimensions—that were virtually invisible and not discussed or understood.

            So I kept telling Madeleine how I would enjoy reading the book that I was sure someone would be writing soon, and as the years went by, and it never appeared, I began to realize that I was being called to write the book myself. After several starts, I got an introductory chapter overview written, and got an agreement with Lantern Books in New York to publish it, and from that point, it took about five years of full-time work to create The World Peace Diet. The creative process of writing and editing the manuscript was helpful in further refining the ideas, and helped me to discover more connections as well.

On other movements in the world and connecting the dots…

Vegan India!: Dr. Tuttle, the tag line of your book is, “Eating for Spiritual Health and Social Harmony.” This is a powerful tagline. However, since many of us construe spirituality as a “wishy-washy” term with “elusive” concepts, we tend not to pay attention. Nevertheless, when we begin to read the book, we cannot help but marvel at the dexterity with which you have combined core concepts from the fields of Psychology, Sociology, Economics, Anthropology, History, Science, Gender, Politics, Medicine, Ethics, Ecology, Human Rights, Music and so on to present such a remarkable commentary that helps “see” the connections our culture has never taught us to see. As you have rightly pointed out, we are manipulated by vested interests whose profits depend on our inability to make meaningful connections. Our urge to empathize with and protect the vulnerable is repressed by our “herding culture.” You have construed a completely different reality that actually takes us closest to realizing Who We Really Are. Dr. Tuttle, if all the pro peace, justice, equality, rights, and freedom movements in the world were to accept this reality and were to join hands, do you think the “critical mass” would be attained to elevate the Earth of human and animal suffering, alienation, and exploitation? Please elaborate.

Dr. Tuttle: This is an intriguing question, and the implicit question in it is: Why do the millions of people actively working for peace, justice, equality, rights, sustainability, and freedom in our world continue to pay for and eat the flesh and secretions of enslaved animals when it is clearly antithetical to their values and goals? How is such an obvious contradiction not recognized, and why do so many have such a difficult time actually bringing their lives into alignment with their values? I devote several chapters to responding to this question in The World Peace Diet and it seems to me that while there is some progress being made, it must accelerate quickly if we are to survive and successfully transform our culture.

            As I discuss in The World Peace Diet, the problems we create are based on the underlying mentality of reductionism, disconnectedness, elitism, and exclusivism required by our most powerful connection with our culture and with Nature and each other: eating. It is absurd to think we can make significant progress in our quest for universal peace, justice, equality, and sustainability while enslaving and killing animals routinely for food. When we look deeply and carefully into these matters, we see that there are two levels at work simultaneously, both of which are consciously and subconsciously suppressed in our awareness and in public conversation and in the media. The first level is that eating animal foods is the primary driving force behind the actual problems that we have—culturally, economically, ecologically, and in virtually every dimension of our shared life. The second level is the inner mentality required to get us to regularly purchase and ingest animal foods.

            For the first level, because it takes enormous amounts of land, water, petroleum, pesticides, and fertilizer to grow grain for confined animals, and to graze them (10-30 times more than eating plant foods directly), animal agriculture is the main contributor to environmental devastation, global climate disruption, rainforest destruction, topsoil loss, water pollution and shortage, over-fishing, ocean acidification and dead zones, species extinction, habitat loss, and loss of genetic diversity, as well as human hunger, starvation, and malnutrition. As Thich Nhat Hanh has written, “Every day forty thousand children die for lack of food. We who overeat in the West, who are feeding grain to animals to make meat, are eating the flesh of these children.” These inequities contribute to war and political and cultural tension. In addition, it’s well-recognized now that eating animal-based foods is the main force behind the physical diseases that are pandemic in industrialized countries: diabetes, osteoporosis, cancer, heart disease, strokes, liver and kidney disease, obesity, and autoimmune disease. I discuss in The World Peace Diet how eating animal foods contributes to psychological disease (anxiety, depression, insomnia, and drug addiction are rampant in the animals confined in factory farms and in the people consuming these animals), as well as spiritual, moral, economic, and cultural disease and discord.

            The second level, which is the more hidden inner level, is that eating animal foods requires us to adopt precisely the mental and emotional disconnections that reduce our capacity to deal effectively with the problems we’re creating. We’re all born into a culture that conditions us not just to witness the eating of animal flesh and secretions, but to participate in it ourselves from infancy. This suppresses our natural wisdom, compassion, creativity, joy, self-confidence, and sense of being part of a benevolent and beautiful universe. We learn to compete, and to stay shallow in our quest for truth, because we’re unable usually to question the violence we cause and eat with our daily meals, and we become easily manipulated and controlled like the animals we are abusing by proxy every day. We inevitably become obsessed with consuming, which serves the corporations well, and gullible, which serves governments and the ruling elite well.

            To create the critical mass necessary for the peace, justice, equality, freedom, and sustainability movements to be effective, we are called to realize that our routine mistreatment of nonhuman animals for food is the defining and driving inner and outer obstacle to progress, and that by radically including animals in our loving and compassionate embrace, we create the actual foundation for success in all the liberation movements, which are all interconnected. Oppressing animals, raping them, stealing and killing their babies, stealing their milk and their lives and their purposes—this all sows the seeds of our own oppression. It also suppresses the inner feminine wisdom residing in all of us (I call this Sophia in The World Peace Diet), and so what we really need to see—and I think we are seeing it—is the resurrection of Sophia in the world today. Sophia, our innate feminine wisdom, is the passionate loving protection of the vulnerable and innocent and is the core of veganism and of the ancient teaching of ahimsa: that nonviolence is the path to joy and liberation for all. We live on a beautiful, abundant planet, and there is nothing stopping us from living healthy, peaceful, celebratory lives, except the habitual practice of enslaving animals for food and the mentality this practice requires of us.

On the spiritual approach to veganism…

Vegan India!: Dr. Tuttle, The World Peace Diet also provides a framework to get into the minds of the entire gamut of human “perpetrators” from the transnational corporations who dominate over and are responsible for the suffering and killing of millions of innocent animals for profit to the person who procures, cooks, and eats animal suffering. Such groups of humans are themselves victims of violence—abused and wounded. It seems that their way to keep the control is by making “victims” of the enslaved animals. In doing so, not only do they hurt the animals but they hurt themselves as well. While this is a very reasonable explanation, at times it becomes very difficult to admit we “understand” this vicious cycle because “understanding” at one level does make us less judgmental and bring about “sympathy” for the perpetrators, something that we want to deny ourselves. This is perhaps where the overarching spiritual approach to veganism could help us in our quest to rid the world of suffering, in a peaceful manner. Could you please elaborate and highlight the basic tenets of the spiritual approach to veganism that can help all of us (“the attentive and articulate bystanders”) spread the essence of a peaceful revolution without being judgmental, yet by acting as the true conscience of the perpetrators, to heal their wounds without feeling outraged?

Dr. Tuttle: Excellent question—it follows from the prior one. A spiritual approach is essential because we are called to go to a higher level to solve our problems. Violence, in the form of judgment and blame, only breeds further hostility and misunderstanding. The spirit of veganism is making an effort to evolve to become an embodiment of universal loving compassion for all—attaining a consciousness of radical inclusion that includes not just those close to us, but all animals and humans, including those who we may not like, such as, for example, hunters, greedy bankers and chemical company executives, and so forth. We cannot force others to change; we can only change and awaken our own consciousness, and to the degree we authentically do this, we will be more effective in being “articulate bystanders” and helping others to evolve in their behavior and understanding.

            Meditation is important I believe, because when we quiet our minds and directly experience the truth that we are, we discover that we are, essentially, eternal consciousness, and that our true nature is freedom, joy, and tender compassion. We begin to peel away the layers of cultural conditioning. We reconnect with our authentic feelings and with our inner intuitive wisdom. We question and see through the official stories of our culture, and how they imprison us in lies and delusions. We open to higher understanding and we begin, as Gandhi so poignantly encouraged us, to be the change we wish to see in the world. With this new and higher perspective, rather than blaming and judging others for buying hamburgers, for example, we understand with compassion that they are obediently following a conditioned program that has been powerfully injected into their minds from infancy. It is not their fault that they are eating meat and dairy; they haven’t yet been able to break free of the cultural program and to see that it has been imposed on them, and that it is absolutely not in their best interests, or in the best interests of animals, the Earth, future generations, or any of us, except, perhaps for a tiny handful of wealthy war and drug profiteers.

            So a spiritual unfoldment is essential. Veganism and ahimsa are essentially spiritual practices, and they lead onward and upward to ever-higher realizations and awakenings. We can strive to live and exemplify the vegan ideal, and this helps others to do the same.

On the innate intelligence of humans...

Vegan India!: Dr. Tuttle, we understand that we were not born with sensibilities to exploit others. We are socialized into it. In that sense there are no “enemies”, it is simply a quest to realize who we really are. For those of us who have been blessed with this consciousness, it becomes a moral responsibility to help others with a positive approach come closer to whom they really are—a part of that “eternal benevolent consciousness”. Please help summarize for the benefit of our readers what in your opinion comprises the innate intelligence of humans that responds to the call of its highest, true self?

Dr. Tuttle: Yes, this positive approach is essential. Vegan living is a solid foundation for joy in our lives! And the innate intelligence that responds to the call is the inner feminine wisdom I referred to earlier as Sophia. Sophia is the ancient Greek goddess of wisdom and represents the capacity within all of us to awaken compassion and transform self-centered delusion into healing insight and joyful living. Another name for Sophia is Mahakaruna—“great compassion” in Sanskrit—this is the natural functioning of our true nature, free from the delusion of self-preoccupation that is ritually injected into all of us by our cultural upbringing, and especially by the socially-mandated practices of routinely eating foods derived from imprisoned animals.

            It’s important to remember that when we consider nonhuman animals, we know in our bones that these beings, like us, yearn to fulfill their purposes and to avoid pain and confinement, and to live freely, as they did for millions of years before we began to interfere with them and imprison them. We are all called to realize that the very attitude of owning another being is an act of himsa, or violence, and that it is a stealing of a being’s sovereignty for our own ends. We know for ourselves that to be imprisoned is a terrible punishment. It is what we do to condemned criminals. Our sovereignty is precious and is essential for our happiness and fulfillment. Raised in a culture of oppression, though, we are taught that other beings exist for our purposes, and it is of no consequence to own them as property. This is what we did here in the American South for hundreds of years to people from Africa, for example, and what we still do to animals for food.

            So if we “own” cows and treat them kindly and use their milk, we are committing violence and cruelty at the fundamental level of stealing their sovereignty. We make them dependent on us for food and protection. We reduce them in countless ways. They are not able to fulfill their inherent drives to live as part of a free-living community of bovines roaming the land and looking after themselves and relating with each other and the rest of Nature in an open, unencumbered way that would provide for them a sense of joy, freedom, and fulfillment that we can barely imagine with all our preconceptions about cows. The fact is that owning cows for milk is utterly unnecessary today. Cows’ milk is a source of no nutrients that we cannot get from plant-based sources, and is the source of a variety of substances that are essentially toxic to us as human beings, such as casein, IGF-1 growth hormone, estrogen, and other hormones, as well as saturated fat, cholesterol, and concentrated environmental toxins, all of which are linked with cancer, diabetes, obesity, heart-disease, arthritis, osteoporosis, and autoimmune diseases. And besides the existential cruelty inherent in all dairy foods is the added and inescapable cruelty in all operations, even small family-owned ones.

            I have a friend from India who traveled the country and interviewed small family cow owners and he learned that he could ask two questions that would always reveal the cruelty to cows required by milk products. One question was, “What do you do with the male calves that are born?” The typical answer was, “We sell them.” The vast majority end up being sold and slaughtered for meat (either veal or beef). In some cases, they may be first castrated and used as oxen to work in fields, after which they are sold. The second question was, “What do you do with the female cows after their milk production declines?” Again, the cow owners would get uncomfortable and say, “We sell them.” Meat again. Or perhaps they let them go to wander the countryside, where they often starve slowly.

            Our religions often provide justification for cultural practices that are harmful, and part of spiritual awakening is evolving to the point that we can question traditions and official stories that are no longer appropriate. The beauty in all of this is that if we all switched to a plant-based diet of organic foods, we would need a small fraction of the land we are now using for agriculture, and vast areas could be returned to wilderness and habitat for animals, and so there would be plenty of room for bovines to roam freely again throughout central Asia as they did for millions of years, and for chickens to live again in the jungles of southeast Asia, and all the animals to celebrate their lives free from human oppression. New relationships with free-living, powerful, and respected animals could be mutually enriching in ways that we cannot imagine from our current impoverished and shallow relationships with animals whom we treat generally as either property or pests.

            Each one of us can be a force for freedom, joy, healing, and compassion. As we rely less on the narratives and dictates of an essentially exploitive culture, and learn through meditation to rely more on our inner intuitive wisdom and compassion, we can help our culture evolve to a higher level. This is, I think, the greatest gift we can give to our loved ones, our world, and ourselves. As Krishnamurti said, “It is not a good idea to be well-adjusted to a sick society.” Although we all want to fit in with our society, at a certain point we awaken and realize that we have a higher purpose than just fitting in and suppressing our inner light of compassion and joy. This is when the spiritual path begins, and we begin to become a true human being.

A message for India…

Vegan India!: Dr. Tuttle, in the last chapter of your book, “Living the Revolution” you have said something very beautiful about the fact that “each one of us has a piece of the puzzle to contribute, and our overall success (to transform our inheritor dominator mentality by liberating those we have enslaved for food) depends on each of us discovering our talents and passion and persistently contributing them.” In the Indian context, vegans in India come from almost every walk of life and many are doing brilliant outreach work in ways they are gifted in and most comfortable with. Definitely, many have started to “live the revolution” and are plugging in myriad ways to educate others. Dr. Tuttle, if you had to share a message with the vegans, vegan aspirants, and everybody else in India, what would it be?

Dr. Tuttle: My basic message to Indians is one of gratitude and encouragement. My own veganism is really a product of the ancient Indian spiritual teachings that came through the centuries to me in the West as Buddhist, Jain, and Hindu teachings and inspired countless people who inspired me, such as Emerson, Thoreau, Alcott, Tolstoy, Gandhi, King, Gaskin (the founder of The Farm), and going further back, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plotinus, and many others who were also inspired by the sages of India. Your land is the world’s greatest living repository of the spiritual wisdom that can heal and transform our world today. Both the vegetarian and the vegan movements in the West and worldwide can easily be traced back to India. You carry the light and are the keepers of the flame of ahimsa and spiritual liberation. I have nothing but enormous respect and gratitude for your shining example for thousands of years, and up to the present day.

            I would encourage you not to be seduced by the mechanistic immaturity of the West, and especially not to adopt the cruel food practices of the West. I would encourage you to remember your glorious heritage of compassion and cooperation, to remember Asoka and other enlightened examples of kindness for all, and to strive to live the teaching of ahimsa and continue to make India the light of sanity and harmony in the world.

Thank you Dr. Tuttle. We are grateful to be able to host this wonderful discussion with you here on this space.

How to procure your copy of The World Peace Diet: For those of you who wish to procure a copy of The World Peace Diet, it helps to know that you can purchase via Flipkart. You can also purchase a signed copy of the book from The World Peace Diet website by clicking here. And, for those who would like it, you can borrow the book from the SHARAN library that delivers books on loan anywhere in India. For more information about how the SHARAN library operates, you can click here.

Notes:
*Peas v/s Pills: Life-transforming seminar\workshop\talk conducted by SHARAN that has facilitated the efforts of many people in India to lead holistic, healthy lives: physically and psychologically, by reconnecting to Nature. For more information, you can click here.

In Conversation with Amala Akkineni: Towards the Shared Vision of a Vegan World

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 03:05:32 PST

It is that time of the year again—a time to reflect on the outgoing year and a time to scrawl out new resolutions. Earlier this month, a Harris Interactive® poll revealed that about 7.5 million Americans have embraced the Vegan lifestyle, a number that is said to have doubled since 2009. This is heartwarming news. Although there is no study of that sort been conducted in India yet, we can see that change is clearly, slowly, steadily happening. This year we found significant awareness of the word, “vegan” among the metro dwellers. "Awareness" is the first step to change. The year has seen a good sprinkling of vegan-related news features in mainstream media and some of them are documented in our Indian Media Links page. The challenge for the coming year is to ensure that the V-word is understood and celebrated in the spirit it is intended. The challenge is also to facilitate this understanding in creative and harmonious ways. No effort made is irrelevant; all have a purpose. Afterall, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Today we feel privileged and excited to have amid us a celebrity Indian vegan who breathes the essence of veganism and is leading an extraordinary life. She has graciously consented to share some pages from her Vegan journey in our year end post series. She provides insights and tips to shop, eat, and live vegan. She is none other than Amala Akkineni, former actor and Indian Classical dancer, an ardent human-and-animal rights activist, and a Vegan of four years. We hope that her experience will inspire the new vegans and the vegan aspirants among us. Here is a short biography of the illustrious, multi-faceted Amala Akkineni before you read the interview.

Amala Akkineni: A Biography

Amala Akkineni is the co-founder of Blue Cross of Hyderabad, a registered non-profit animal welfare organization working for the welfare of animals in Hyderabad and extending support to other groups in the state of Andhra Pradesh.

A graduate of Kalakshetra College of Fine Arts, she completed her education in Chennai and toured extensively with the renowned Kalakshetra Dance Troupe both in India and abroad before joining films.

Her career in Indian cinema (1985 – 1992) had her complete 50 films as leading lady in five Indian languages (Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, and Hindi) after which she married co-star and leading Telugu Film Actor, Nagarjuna.

Amala has worked for the last 18 years in South India through various non-governmental and governmental organizations in animal welfare, wildlife protection, child welfare, rural women’s empowerment, HIV awareness, and for the protection of the environment. Amala has trained as a presenter with Mr. Al Gore and The Climate Project India on climate change issues and has reached out to thousands of people in Andhra Pradesh regarding sustainable lifestyles through her presentations.

As a film personality, she constantly brings into focus social and environmental issues through media interactions, speaking at public gatherings in both rural and urban communities, at educational institutions, and on popular television shows, to increase understanding and motivate social change.

Amala is a practitioner of Yoga and Vipassana and believes the key to social change is through education and a commitment to sustainable lifestyles: physically, environmentally, and spiritually.

In Conversation with Amala Akkineni

A Pretty Picture: Amala and Baby Cow

Photograph courtesy: WOW Hyderabad Staff Photographer

Vegan India!: Amala, thank you so much for taking out time to share your perspectives, a few pages from your journey with us. We shall start with the question that comes foremost in the mind. Most of us have had an epiphany moment when we have decided we want to go vegan. Please tell us when and why you decided to embrace the Vegan lifestyle.

Amala: I turned Vegan four years ago when a number of truths dawned on me. I was a vegetarian since the age of 11, but recently for a few years since 2005, I had been having stomach problems. I thought it was just a stomach bug at first and later a sensitive stomach, so I avoided spicy food. The doctors would say, “you work with animals it must be something you get from them”, and they would give medication. It would always come back. I was eating well but did not feel energetic. It’s terrible to be constantly low on energy. And it’s not any fun eating boiled food all the time thinking one has to be careful. No one suggested I could be lactose intolerant and it didn’t strike me either.

Then in October 2007, I was asked to inspect a slaughterhouse for Animal Welfare Board of India, which turned out to be an eye opener. All the animals at the slaughterhouse were female buffaloes from the dairy industry. There were 500 of them waiting their turn for slaughter. Every day hundreds of them are sent from the dairy for slaughter when their milk production drops. This is a sad and harsh reality all vegetarians need to accept. These creatures were enormous, healthy and young, but they were not considered economically viable to keep alive when milk production drops after birthing a number of calves.

That day looking at their terrified expressions, it dawned on me that despite being vegetarian, my consumption of milk products was a direct cause for the commercial breeding and slaughter of these beautiful creatures. I experienced being part of the cycle and I knew I had to step away. I became Vegan.

That’s when I signed up for *Dr. Nandita Shah’s workshop “Peas v/s Pills”. The workshop helped me make a smooth and easy transition into the new lifestyle.

Vegan India!: You have recounted a distressing reality of commercial milk production about which all of us must educate ourselves. Please tell us how this “new lifestyle” or of living vegan has benefitted you personally?

Amala: One week into being Vegan, all my stomach problems cleared up. I had been lactose intolerant without knowing it. The Vegan diet healed my stomach and brought my energy back, the relief was tremendous. My inner strength grew. It has helped me become more detached about everything, more conscious, more responsible. Now I never take things for granted or expect to be served or fed—I always plan and feed myself. It has certainly made me more responsible, respectful about food.

Vegan India!: So wonderful, do tell us what has been the reaction of your family, friends, fans, and the society at large to your choice to live Vegan and how did you/do you deal with it?

Amala: Everyone admires my ability to do what I want, believe in, make up my mind about. They are very respectful and supportive. My dear friends and close family always plan a Vegan item on their menu for me if I am eating at their homes. They understand the benefits from my good health and try it out sometimes for themselves, though they do find it difficult. My sister tried being Vegan for a whole month when I visited her. Now she says the Vegan diet suits her much better than a dairy-based one. As we age, our bodies have different needs. If we understand these needs and address them, our health can be so much better.

I deal with the subject of food with respect. Having been a non-vegetarian by birth and giving it up by choice, I know that the time comes to us in a sequence of life-changing events. When I know a person has arrived at a life-changing event and makes a pro choice that will save the lives of thousands of animals, I acknowledge it with ceremonious gratitude. But I am careful not to offend the choices of others. There are good people in this world doing their bit and yet not vegan or vegetarian. Who are we to judge?

Amala with Good Boy, a young differently-abled horse rescued and adopted by NGO, Samabhava.
Photograph courtesy: Samabhava

Vegan India!: We are eager to know who/who all has/have been your inspiration and why?

Amala: I have read Mrs. Maneka Gandhi’s pieces on the suffering of dairy animals many times and it struck a chord. But what finally drove the point home and made me change was to see it for myself. The animals inspired me to give it up. Dr. Nandita helped me do it without any fear or stress. Changing one’s lifestyle, diet, can be stressful especially when you have been accustomed to something all your life. The body carves for what it has been used to, so knowing how to handle that stage is helpful.

Vegan India!: Dr. Nandita and her team have guided the intent of so many people in the most creative and positive ways, thank you for sharing this. Amala, according to you, how easy or difficult has it been for you to find Vegan parallels to food, clothing, footwear, accessories, cosmetics, jewelry, and other articles of daily use?

Amala: I don’t find it difficult, because I am not fanatical. I love being Vegan and do my best to find Vegan options, so is easy. Family and friends also shop for me on my birthday—I get Vegan bags, shoes, jewelry, energy bars, biscuits—anything they get excited to find that is Vegan. I have quite a stash!

Vegan India!: Could you please share some tips on how to shop Vegan, especially for the new vegans and the vegan aspirants among us?

Amala: Well, firstly it helps to not want everything one sees! When you want to buy something, look at the label, if it’s not Vegan, put it down. In fashion, there is always cotton, linen, or synthetic fabrics to choose from, even in shoes. For food, you can’t want dessert all the time and then demand vegan as most desserts have dairy. It’s easier to give up dessert and be happy with a date or piece of fruit. Actually, Vegan can be the most simple and environmentally sustaining lifestyle on this planet. My advice when shopping is, don’t be fanatical and don’t be greedy; be patient and persistent and you will always find what you need.

Vegan India!: You are so right, shopping vegan can actually be fun and we end up making all sorts of discoveries about the market, about ourselves if we go with an open mind. Amala, how do you see the Vegan movement shape up in India?

Amala: I dread armchair activists or critics and avoid people who sit in judgment of others. There are vegans with these attitudes who I believe do more damage and harm than inspire others. As of now, I stay far away from movements as I don’t think people who are moralistic or judgmental are better human beings just because they are vegan. Change needs inspiration, inner awareness, and a whole lot of purpose. To reach there takes time and life gives us opportunities for this. Each to his/her own, at their own pace. I hope the Vegan movement in India takes a proactive, welfare involved approach that inspires others. I don’t see the difference between a dog, a cow or a buffalo, they are all wonderful creatures to me and deserve a better life.

Vegan India!: Definitely! You have been associated with animal rights activism even before you embraced the Vegan lifestyle. Please tell us what motivated you to found Blue Cross of Hyderabad and what is the organization’s goal?

Amala: Aha! That’s a long story. But it started with me rescuing animals as a student and taking them to Blue Cross of India in Chennai. Later when I moved to Hyderabad, I found animals lying on the road after accidents or sick, and no organized rescue or shelter to take them to. My home became a shelter and soon my husband suggested I start something more permanent. He gifted me an ambulance and that’s how Blue Cross of Hyderabad began. Dr. Chinny Krishna (*BCI) guided me and I trained with *AWBI.

Amala at a press meet in Bangalore to prevent dog killing and support ABC/ARV for street dogs.
Photograph courtesy: The Voice of Stray Dogs

Vegan India!: Everybody who has met you has described you as a person who exudes peace that comes from deep within you. Please tell us how you retain the peace within and achieve so much for the rights of animals while at same time deal with animal cruelty perpetrated by thoughtless human behavior.

Amala: Thank you, but I was not always like that. After a year of doing animal rescues, I fell apart. Helping animals in thousands just made me feel worse as I realized it was just a drop in the ocean. Facing suffering day in and out drained me of hope. I became bitter and angry like many working for animal welfare that I see around me. So of course, I started the universal search for a way out of suffering. I learnt to meditate Vipassana as Buddha taught it. I learnt about the impermanence of life, joy, and suffering. I learnt detachment from suffering itself, from my own beliefs and judgments. It was all very liberating.

I continue to mediate every day and I go on a retreat every year. If things get to me, I step aside and meditate for a while. Buddha says, “If you take praise, you must learn to take blame”. Those are very wise words for all of us. People lift you up and throw you down on a whim. If it weren’t for the animals, I wouldn’t be in animal welfare, so I must find my peace and carry it wherever I go.

Vegan India!: Amala, if you had to send out one prayer for animals to the Universe on this New Year, what would it be?

Amala: Rukmini Devi, my teacher at Kalakshetra who was like a mother to me used to say that humans can liberate themselves from suffering, but animals require the help of humans. That is why as humans we must help them. But I strongly feel that the Universe does watch over all irrespective of species, and if we play any role to channel this positive support, we feel one with the Universe. My prayer will be that of the Buddha, “May all living beings be happy! May all be liberated from their suffering!”, please join me in this prayer.

Thank you Amala! We hope these prayer flags will carry the message really far and wide!

Dear Readers, we wish you a very happy new year. Thank you for your mails containing words of encouragement that inspire us to continually create content for the benefit of the shared vision of a Vegan world. May the purpose triumph! May veganism triumph! Amen!

Acknowledgements:
We wish to express our deepest gratitude to Sandesh Raju, Co-founder & Managing Trustee of Samabhava—an organization for the rights of working animals. Sandesh helped us connect with Amala Akkineni, thereby making this interview possible. Thank you, Sandesh!

Notes:
*AWBI: Animal Welfare Board of India
*BCI: Blue Cross of India
*Dr. Nandita Shah: Reputed medical doctor in the field of “preventive medicine” whose workshops, seminars, talks, etc. have helped many people reverse life-threatening diseases, look at “nutrition” and “health” with a holistic perspective, implement the learning into their lives, and reap enormous benefits for themselves and consequently for everybody else inhabiting the Planet. Anybody who seeks details can please check Dr. Nandita’s website by clicking here.

Christmas-themed Recipes from the Pages of ‘Spork-Fed’, Vegan Recipe Book from the Spork Sisters!

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 06:00:01 PST

About a year ago, we had featured the “Spork” Sisters and introduced you to their online Vegan cooking classes, which anyone, anywhere in the world can take up, in this story. To recall, the sisters also manage Spork Foods, a Los Angeles-based organic-vegan cooking company offering in-person cooking classes, consultations on healthy eating, and recipe development.

We recently caught up with the sisters, Jenny Engel and Heather Goldberg and were excited to learn that they have just published their first cookbook, “Spork-Fed: Super Fun and Flavorful Vegan Recipes”! And, what’s more, they have graciously offered to share two Christmas-themed vegan recipes from the pages of their new book on this space, as you will see, quite literally!

Before you take look at the recipes, here is the foreword to the recipe book by another set of sisters, Emily Deschanel (star of the TV series, 'Bones') and Zooey Deschanel (film and TV actor):

“Spork-Fed is a savvy, upbeat introduction to vegan cuisine written by sisters who know great food! Flavor is the top priority in these easy-to-prepare recipes, many of them gluten-free. With full-color photographs throughout, this visually striking book shows you how to make everything from decadent desserts to homemade tofu. The Spork Sisters share more than 75 delicious recipes, along with dozens of health tips. In addition to the recipes, Spork-Fed’s themed menu pairings will help any cook prepare for special occasions, quick family weeknight meals, or extravagant feasts sure to impress any guest.”

And, now for the two Christmas-themed recipes straight from the pages of Spork-Fed! Please note that you can substitute agave syrup with jaggery syrup if you have difficulty procuring the former, so the sisters have informed us.

Creamy Tomato Soup

Click the image to zoom out the recipe.

Creamed Onions with a Whole Wheat Bread Crumb Topping

Click the image to zoom out the recipe.

Christmas is approaching and you have lots of time to plan and prepare a dinner for a Vegan Christmas! For more recipes from Spork-Fed, you can click the Spork Foods website to find out how to order your copy of the recipe book.

“Our food choices have an incredible impact not only on our metabolism, but also on the initiation, promotion and even reversal of disease, on our energy, on our physical activity, on our emotional and mental well-being and on our world environment. All of these seemingly separate spheres are intimately connected.” ~Dr. T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University & Author of ‘The China Study’~

Non Leather Shoes from 'Crocs'

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:44:58 PST

For more non leather/cruelty-free leather/synthetic leather/alternative leather/faux leather/non-animal leather/vegetarian/vegan shoes and accessories in India reviewed in this blog, you can click the story, "Who Pays For Your Leather Shoes?".

A few days back, the shoes worn by a vegan friend at a vegan food binge caught our eye. They were pristine white, classy, and anything unlike we had seen before. One glance and you would wonder what they are made of. Looked plastic-ky but way too sophisticated for a plastic with excellent finish. We were told this is the women’s range of “Crocs” shoes and they are vegan! Crocs, the name rung a bell. Like most, we were under the impression that Crocs is a euphemism for perforated bright colored beach shoes! However, when we visited one of the Crocs stores, we were amazed at the variety and the riot of colors; it clearly appeared that Crocs wants to diversify their portfolio and be known as a company that makes more than just colorful beach shoes.

On digging deeper, we found that the Crocs range was founded by three American friends with the objective of creating unique spa or beach shoes. Unlike most American companies, this is a relatively young brand, which will celebrate 10 years of existence next year. It is amazing that in merely 10 years one can find a pair of these colorful Crocs in almost any part of the world. On wearing one of those, the first thing that came to our mind is how snuggly they fit in the feet. Light and sprightly.

What are Crocs shoes made of?

Now that is the question that is foremost in a vegan mind. An email from a company spokesperson as well as salespersons at the Crocs store confirmed that Crocs shoes are primarily crafted from a material called croslite. Croslite is a proprietary resin substance made from a polymer by the name of ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA). EVA is sometimes more popularly known as “foam rubber” or “expanded leather”. We were told that the women’s and children’s selections are made of the croslite material; however a few designs in the men’s range use a strip of animal-derived leather. It is easy to bypass these designs with non-vegan strips. The salespersons guide you at the stores. For a glimpse into the myriad Crocs designs and their prices, you can click this link on the Crocs website.

Where are Crocs shoes available?

Crocs shoes have become so ubiquitous that it has given birth to a counterfeit look-alike industry where the products may be available at cheaper prices. If you want to purchase the authentic version of Crocs, you will need to go to the exclusive Crocs stores. Presently, Crocs has stores in 12 cities in India: Amritsar, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi, Goa, Jalandhar, Kolkata, Ludhiana, Mumbai, Noida, and Pune. For the store addresses, you can click this link on the Crocs website.

Additional information

One of the most striking features we feel about Crocs shoes is that they constrict or expand to match the shape of your feet. The Crocs website confirms that “Croslite works to the wearer’s best benefit because it forms to the wearer’s feet and, therefore, offers the best support to individual’s unique feet shape”. So even when you are jogging, the shoe would never slip out, rather stick to your skin snuggly. And when it is maintenance time for the shoes, all it needs is a stream of water that can clean it for the next use!

As we speak about Crocs, a dialogue from the film, Forrest Gump comes to the mind. Forrest says, “Those are magic shoes, they could take you anywhere.” Quite so! You could slip into one and wade into any surface—land, water, mud, slush, beach, party, and even your office. They just work. Most importantly, barring a few designs, everything else is vegan!

“By having reverence for life, we enter into a spiritual relation with the world.” ~Albert Schweitzer, German Theologian, Philosopher, and Physician~

Alternative to Animal Wool: Vegan Wool. A World Vegan Day Special!

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 04:06:21 PST

Courtsey: EVOLVE! Campaigns

Merino wool, angora wool, shahmina wool, shahtoosh wool, vicuña wool, "pure" wool... behind the colors, the softness, the expensive tag, the brand, the style… there is ONE story: the story of confinement, of loneliness, of trauma, of bereavement, of illnesses, of deliberate physical hurt, of loveless touches, of being used, of being abused, of suffering in the cold, of suffering in the heat, of suffering without food, of suffering without water, of smelling death, of suffering in silence…

Myth: When sheep shed their fleece naturally or are shorn to relieve them of too much of it, it is collected and converted to wool.

Fact: Sheep do shed their fleece naturally. Nature’s wisdom provides for sheep to retain or shed just enough fleece to protect them from different weather conditions—heat, cold, or rain. They do not need human intervention to maintain themselves. Therefore, sheep do not “give us” wool as our primary school text books teach us. Their fleece is extorted from them and converted to "wool" as part of a profitable industrial process.

Forty-five percent of the world’s wool comes from Australia, followed by China, New Zealand, and UK. The Merino, Australia's most commonly raised sheep, is selectively bred to have wrinkly skin to produce more wool. The Merino carries fleece equal to their body weight, with what consequence, we shall find out. The unnatural breeding of sheep has the following impact on the animals:

The overload of wool causes many sheep to collapse and even die of heat exhaustion during hot months.

The overload also causes farmers to shear sheep before they would naturally shed their winter coats and consequently millions die during the cold months from freezing temperatures.

Flystrike is common. The flies seek out the moist areas of the animal (such as around the backside) and lay their eggs. The maggots, when hatched, initially live and feed in the moist skin of the sheep and slowly move out to feed on the healthy skin. In an attempt to prevent this, when they are still lambs, sheep are subjected to mulesing, a cruel mutilation in which farmers carve skin and flesh from the animals' backsides, often without anesthetic.

When sheep begin to produce less wool, millions are loaded onto extremely crowded, multi-tiered filthy pens inside cargo ships and sent on terrifying long journeys to the Middle East or North Africa, (where there are no animal protection laws) with little access to food or water through all weather extremes.

When the sheep finally arrive at the destinations, if they have not already perished on the journey due to suffocation, trampling, or starvation, they are taken to unregulated slaughterhouses where their throats are cut while they are still conscious. They are slaughtered for “meat” while a last attempt is made to extract wool from their slain bodies; this wool is known as “skin wool”. The skin wool is named such because it is closest to the skin and the skin must be torn to extract the wool.

Alongwith wool, an oily substance from the sheep’s fleece called lanolin, is also extracted from the animal. Lanolin is used in the preparation of cosmetics and vitamin D3. Therefore, vegans do not use cosmetics that list lanolin as an ingredient or purchase supplements and food containing vitamin D3. (The best source of vitamin D is sunlight that Nature meant to provide us without harming animals.)

Besides the procedural horrors, the shearers treat sheep very roughly since they are paid by the volumes and not hours. The shearers are known to kick, injure, and cut off parts of the animal’s body in their hurry to extract maximum fleece from them.

The wool industry is comparable to the dairy and egg industries where the animals may not be killed at the time of extracting marketable substances and portions from their bodies; but the manner and scale at which the extortion is done causes them a few cycles of immense suffering before they are finally destroyed at the slaughterhouse.

Did you know that sheep are gentle, sensitive animals who are emotionally complex and highly intelligent creations of Nature. To reiterate, sheep does not “give us” wool as our primary school text books teach us just like the cow, the hen, and the goat do not “give us” milk, eggs, and meat. Any industry that depends on raw materials from animals cannot be anything but cruel because in order to make profit, which is the primary reason for their existence, they will have to exploit the animals to extract maximum from them.

Source: EVOLVE! Campaigns and The Vegan Society.

For an in-depth story on the bloody, cruel wool industry with eyewitness accounts, you can click this link on the Animal Liberation Victoria website.

For an informative article on the wool industry in India, you can click this link on the Beauty Without Cruelty, India website. It is a similar story of torture, mutilation, and eventual execution.

Vegan wool or Cruelty-free wool or Alternative wool

When you purchase “pure” wool, it is likely that the wool used for the garment is from the Merino breed of sheep in Australia. Would you want to keep yourself warm after learning about the multiple ways in which the intelligent animals suffered for it and if given a chance would have fled from the humans responsible for mutilating them.

Well, guilty-free, kind woolens are not only possible, they exist. Vegan woolens are warm without being bulky and besides are easy to maintain, less costly, environment-friendly, colorful, and stylish. Vegan warm clothes are made from humane fabrics such as cotton, acrylic, polyester/polar fleece, orlon, gore-tex, polarguard, polartec, thinsulate, and any other wool fabric preceded by the term "synthetic". (Source) The labels clearly indicate which.

Just like when we select edible products, we read the labels; similarly, to ensure that the woolens we buy are cruelty-free, we need to read labels. Gone are the days when there was a stigma attached to the word, “synthetic” as though it were not the “real” thing. With paradigm shifts already happening on Earth, the word “synthetic” is slowly and steadfastly becoming the second name for the words, “compassion” and “justice”.

Where to buy vegan woolens? You can check with any shop or company that sells animal-derived woolens because many of these companies have a “synthetic” wool selection as well. We have preferred to buy from large retail formats such as Westside, Lifestyle, Shopper’s Stop, Globus, and the like because one can find a variety of brands under one roof. This way it also becomes easy to compare both the price and merchandise across brands.

To get some tips on how to buy vegan clothes in general, you can click this link for an informative Wiki article.

To get a glimpse into the breathtaking world of vegan yarns, you can click this link on Fake Sheep, a fantastic website on vegan knitting.

Acknowledgments:

We thank EVOLVE! Campaigns (http://evolvecampaigns.org.uk) for sharing their poster for this story and for their valuable inputs to develop some of the viewpoints.

“This is dreadful! Not only the suffering and death of the animals, but that man suppresses in himself, unnecessarily, the highest spiritual capacity—that of sympathy and pity towards living creatures like himself—and by violating his own feelings become cruel.” ~Leo Tolstoy, Russian Writer and Philosopher~

Sign Up for India's First 21-Day Vegan Kickstart to Lose Weight, Improve Health

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 06:49:30 PDT

An announcement from Vaishali Honawar, Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

The Washington-based Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) is bringing its popular 21-Day Vegan Kickstart program to India on November 7—just in time to lose those Diwali pounds. The program is designed especially for the Indian diet by PCRM president Dr. Neal Barnard, M.D. It is absolutely free for anyone who signs up online. Participants have access to 21 days of dairy-free and meatless Indian recipes that will not only help whittle off the weight but also reduce risks of heart disease, diabetes, and cancer.

Statistics

Obesity: Overweight rates in India increased by 20% between 1998 and 2005, according to a study released last year by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. Another study by the University of Maryland and the National Council of Applied Economic Research found that 22% of Indians living in cities were overweight and 7% were obese.

Type 2 Diabetes: The prevalence of type 2 diabetes in urban India has shot up from 3-4 percent in the mid-1980s to 11-12 percent today. In some parts of south India, experts say, that the number is as high as 18 or 19 percent.

Kickstart coaches

The debut edition of the Kickstart will feature a number of Indian celebrity coaches including Amala Akkineni, Madhavan, Jackie Shroff, Celina Jaitley, and Murali Krishnan among others. They will offer their best nutrition tips and favorite recipes, and you can chat online with PCRM dietitians and ask nutrition questions via an online forum. There is also an interactive restaurant guide for vegans and online cooking demos by Dr. Nandita Shah of SHARAN, one of our Kickstart coaches.

This is a great way to get access to information on making your own vegan diet healthy and to get those reluctant friends and relatives to try out a delicious vegan lifestyle for a few days—chances are they will stick with it.

Signing up

You can sign up for the 21-Day Vegan Kickstart at www.21DayKickstartIndia.org. And, don't forget to “like” it on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/KickstartIndia.

Veganism and Spirituality: A Commentry

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 01:21:53 PDT

Dear Readers, greetings! The festive season is upon us and today is the first day of the Navaratri. The Navaratri period is marked by the theme of the victory of 'good over evil'. This is that time of the year when people worship 'shakti' (the divine power) and embark on a 'purification' drive by consuming 'strictly vegetarian' food. While we believe that self-cleansing is an ongoing process that does not need a special occasion, we do however appreciate the emphasis given in these nine days to live a 'good life' and the willingness of people to accept it. We fervently believe that one day all the evils, whether of thought or of action, will become passé and humankind will be able to completely realize its true spiritual self. This is the self that can give and receive all-pervading love, kindness, and compassion, both towards other humans and non human animals.

To grace this occasion, we are privileged to introduce our guest writer on the blog, Dr. Krishnaiyengar Varadarangan, who will share his thoughts on the topic of 'veganism and spirituality' and comment on how both are interconnected, just like the helices of the DNA. Dr. Varadarangan holds a Ph.D degree in Applied Physics and is currently working as Director – Wireless R&D, Melange Systems, Bengaluru. He is also an accomplished musician and a musicologist, and has several publications to his credit. Needless to say, Dr. Varadarangan follows a vegan lifestyle and is actively involved in the promotion of ethical values and compassion towards animals through his blog 'PREVANKA', Facebook, campaigns, and writings.

Dr. Varadarangan can be reached at kvrangan@yahoo.co.in. We are immensely grateful to Dr. Varadarangan for enriching this space with his pearls of wisdom.

VEGANISM AND SPIRITUALITY

By Dr. K. Varadarangan

At the outset we shall briefly explore the meaning of the terms, ‘veganism’ and ‘spirituality’. The key objective of this article is to demystify spirituality and examine what it involves to lead a spiritual life.

I) Demystifying Spirituality

Veganism: Veganism (pronounced ‘vee-gun-ism’) is a lifestyle based on the core ideal of non-violence and, for that reason, seeks to avoid the use of animal products and products tested on animals. According to Donald Watson, the father of veganism, “Veganism” may be defined “as a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as possible and practical, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose”. We explore more about veganism later in this article.

Spirituality: Spirituality is the process of inner awakening that enables one to realize complete purity of thought, word, and deed. This inward journey takes a person to a higher level of consciousness. Through spiritual practice, one develops the ability to recognize his/her pure, absolute, and unbiased true self. Spiritual practice involves giving up selfishness, greed, arrogance, and cultivating the qualities of composure, inner power, moral strength, love, compassion, and respect for all beings—human and non human. A spiritually-aware person is able to envision that we all are part of a whole and that all forms of life are interconnected. Spirituality inspires a human being to assume responsibility and not run away from life.

For many people, spirituality is synonymous with understanding God. For many others, it is seeking the ‘reality’ or the ‘truth’. Some others see spirituality as reaching out to our inner core or the ‘soul’. Whatever the approach, it should be clear that spirituality is our fundamental nature and may be experienced by all—theists and atheists included.

Spirituality and Ahimsa: Compassion and respect for all beings is the core element of spirituality. Thus, the practice of ahimsa is an essential aspect of spirituality. Ahimsa literally means non injury, not only to humans but to all sentient beings, including animals. In the broader sense, ahimsa implies ‘compassion and respect for all life’. In his book ‘Bliss Divine’, Sri. Swamy Sivananda writes:

“Practice of Ahimsa develops love. Ahimsa is another name for truth or love. Ahimsa is universal love. It is pure love. It is divine Prem. Where there is love, there you will find Ahimsa. Where there is Ahimsa, there you will find love and selfless service. They all go together…..There is one religion—the religion of love, of peace. There is one message, the message of Ahimsa. Ahimsa is a supreme duty of man.....Ahimsa is a great spiritual force.”

A man on the path of spirituality sees no difference between himself and others. He treats every being with equanimity, love, and compassion. He has no ego, no superiority complex. He has rid himself of selfishness, greed, arrogance, and materialistic desires. He sees no difference between himself, a dog, or a cat. He seeks to live in harmony with his fellow humans, animals, and the environment. He seeks to harm no one. He seeks the well being of all life forms, and all his thoughts, words, and actions are directed to achieve that goal.

Spirituality and Liberation: The ultimate goal of spirituality is liberation—liberation of the ‘society at large’, consisting of both humans and animals—from abuse, exploitation, bondage, pain, and suffering. Liberation starts at the individual level and gradually expands to the whole Universe as more and more people make spirituality a way of life. Dr. Will Tuttle, author of the book, ‘World Peace Diet’ regarded as one of the most important books of the 21st century, succinctly puts the idea of spirituality and liberation as follows:

“Spirituality is about liberation, and thus always calls us to awaken to the interconnectedness of all life, and to practice kindness and respect for others. These are both pre-requisites for – and the natural results of – authentically realizing our essential nature as spiritual beings.”

Action and Reaction: We Reap What We Sow: One of the basic laws of nature in general and a law of physics in particular is, ‘action and reaction are equal and opposite’. So every action of ours has an equal and opposite reaction. These laws not only apply to physical entities such as the natural forces but also to every kind of action that occurs in the Universe.

During our lifetimes we indulge in several activities and our actions create an influence on the external world. When we commit brutalities such as cruelty to animals, where will the reaction to such evils go? They can not just vanish. There has to be a reaction to neutralize the action because everything in nature is balanced. This cumulative evil has to react upon us. Conversely, good actions such as acts of compassion and love to fellow beings and animals are sure to bring us everlasting happiness and peace. Thus we reap what we sow.

Most often, the connection between our actions and the results of the actions may not manifest immediately or in ways that we understand. This is primarily because of the limitations of our senses. We understand our external world through the five senses of touch, smell, taste, sound, and sight. Coupled with our ability to think and reason, we are able to understand things that are beyond our senses. However, our sense organs and the ability of the human brain hit a limit to which our perceptions and knowledge can stretch.

By developing a compassionate and loving attitude, we create a win-win situation. We save the animals from enormous pain and suffering, we save our flora and fauna, we save our environment, we save our Earth—our only home, and we save ourselves from the horrific effects of our crimes. Lord Mahavira proclaims:

“Non-violence and kindness to living beings is kindness to oneself. For thereby one's own self is saved from various kinds of sins and resultant sufferings and is able to secure his own welfare.”

II) Why Vegan?

Ethical, personal health, and environmental issues are the three major aspects of a vegan lifestyle. However, the primary reason for people converting to vegan is ethical.

Vegan is Ethical: At the core of a vegan lifestyle is the ideal of ‘ahimsa’ or non injury. Thus vegans avoid all products that are derived from animals. Even milk is avoided as it rightfully belongs to the calf and not to us. Modern dairy practices involve unimaginable cruelty to cows in the form of artificial insemination, killing of male calves, constant cycles of pregnancies leading to shortened lifespans, unethical hormone injections to increase milk yield that leads to diseases, and finally treacherous transportation and brutal murder at the slaughter houses. How can a person with conscience consume milk under such conditions?

Animal sacrifice in the name of God is one of the most heinous, disgusting, and absurd acts that one can ever imagine. Animal sacrifice amounts to murdering and then offering the corpse of the butchered animal to the creator Herself! What an irony! What gross ignorance! What shame! She is the creator, the mother, of every one of us, including the animals. How can we offer a butchered child to its own mother? What will the mother think of us? We call her mother, then kill her own baby and even worse, expect her to consume it!

Sacrifice means surrendering ourselves to the supreme force in all humility. We need to surrender our ego, selfishness, greed, hatred, and arrogance and not the lives of hapless animals over which we have absolutely no right of ownership. Cruelty to animals is indeed a grave crime. In what way is killing an animal different from the murder of a human being? In the words of Sri. Rabindranath Tagore:

“Cruelty (to animals) ... is a fundamental sin, and admits of no arguments or nice distinctions.”

Vegan is Healthy: Innumerable studies have shown that a plant-based diet is healthy and associated with a lowered risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cancer, and mortality. Replacing non-vegetarian food with a diet of whole grains, vegetables, dry fruits, nuts, and fruits, combined with a regular exercise regime helps in greatly lowering blood cholesterol levels, blood pressure, and obesity. Plant-based foods in general have lower saturated fats and cholesterol. They are also rich in soluble fibres that reduce serum cholesterol. Further, a vegetarian diet of fruits and vegetables is rich in antioxidants, potassium, magnesium, flavonoids, folic acid, phytosterols, and caretenoids that provide a good measure of protection against cardiovascular diseases.

Vegan is Environment Friendly: As several large-scale scientific studies have confirmed, severe environmental degradation is taking place due to animal farming. Animal farming for meat, leather, and milk is depleting our natural resources at an alarming rate. This depletion rate is estimated to be anywhere between 10 to 1000 times. Green-house gas emissions from animal farms are a major contributor to global warming. Enormous amounts of water and plant food is required to produce meat. It is estimated that about 100,000 litres of water, 100 kilogram of hay, and 4 kilogram of grain is required to produce just one kilogram of meat. Another serious issue is managing the waste produced in these animal farms. Such wastes are becoming potential threats and causing air, soil, and water pollution. Referring to the practice of animal farming Keith Akers in his well researched and highly popular book, ‘A Vegetarian Sourcebook’ (1989) notes that:

“This is a matter of historical record. Most of the world's soil, erosion, groundwater depletion, and deforestation—factors now threatening the very basis of our food system—are the result of this particularly destructive form of food production."

All of Us are Born Vegans: All of us are born impeccably pure. The food that a new born child needs is only the mother’s milk and nothing else. Nourished by the mother’s milk, her love, and care, the child develops to become a pure and perfect human being. It opens its eyes to the beautiful world around with awe and joy. It makes an instant connection with the beautiful animals around and wishes to befriend them and play with them. There is no discrimination, no superiority. Only love, that is unconditional, pure, and absolute. This love is our essential being.

The human being is created to be an herbivorous animal. Thus, we are all born vegans. But what happens over our socialization with the world is a profoundly saddening process of corruption of our pure being. Cow’s milk is poured into our mouths in the name of nutrition. Flesh is thrust upon us in the name of food. The lesson of ‘might is right’ is taught. We are assured that God has sanctioned all this. We are made to believe that all is well with this utterly heinous, tragic, and nonsensical stuff. We are told that it is our habit, culture, and tradition. After years of brainwashing we turn ourselves in to the kind of unthinking adults that we are. We start advocating all the negative conditioning we inherited. Thus the cycle of crime goes on and on.

III) Veganism at the Core of Spirituality

With the ideal of non-violence being the core, veganism and spirituality are inseparable from each other. The practice of ahimsa in thought, word, and deed automatically purifies our mind and elevates our consciousness. We become sensitive to the consequences of our actions. Our diet changes to a plant-based one because we can never hurt an animal for the purpose of eating. We are unable to tolerate violence and so, animal products such as leather, silk, fur, wool, and so on get eliminated. We stop traveling or transporting our goods by animal driven carts. We boycott the use of animals for entertainment. We stop using products tested on animals. We abhor the use of animals for medical experimentation. We never abuse and exploit an animal for any purpose, whatsoever. We always weigh our words before we speak to others and be kind and polite to them. Our very thought process becomes pure, lofty, and noble.

We Are what We Eat: As the saying ‘sound mind in a sound body’ goes, a healthy body is essential to have a sound mind. However, many foods influence our mind directly and in this context, a vegan diet is most appropriate for a spiritual life. A vegan diet helps to develop a healthy body, mind, and spirit. Most plant-based foods are gentle as they emit positive vibrations. Animal protein is a potent carcinogen. Many animal products are found to influence our mind adversely. Most importantly, when flesh is consumed, there is a tremendous amount of negative vibration, because the animal had died in pain, agony, and horror. Toxins are also produced in animal bodies during slaughter. Such food is simply incompatible with the practice of spirituality.

Veganism as Spirituality: For most vegans who choose to be so on ethical grounds, veganism is no different from spirituality. At the core of veganism is the recognition that all life forms are interconnected. In the words of Isaac Bashevis Singer, author and Nobel laureate:

“When one becomes a vegetarian, it purifies the soul."

A vegan diet promotes good health and creates positive thoughts. The philosophy of veganism is all-encompassing and promotes the harmonious coexistence of humans and animals on this planet. Veganism has enormous potential to conserve our plants, save the animals from pain and suffering, conserve our environment, and reverse global warming and climate change. What more can we ask for? Simply by changing our attitude towards life we can accomplish so much! Let us create a world that is cruelty free. Human sufferings will melt like snow when we end cruelty to animals. Our planet will breathe easy. Let us celebrate Freedom!

~ ~ ~

One Year of Pony Love: A Commitment to the Cause and Care of "Working Animals"

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:21:08 PST

Animal rights NGO, Samabhava organizes annual function, a Vegan India! report.

Bangalore, Rotary Club Auditorium, Lavalle Road, 17-Sept-2011: The plight of "working animals" in our country is comparable to the plight of the human workers in the unorganized sector. In the absence of adequate legislations or in the presence of poorly enforced legislations combined with the lack of will on the part of influential human counterparts, both suffer numerous injustices that have direct bearing on their health and safety. The next time you see a pony pulling a cart on the streets of Bangalore, do spare a few moments and think about this “working animal” that transports load, mostly pipes and other construction materials, from the core commercial areas of the city to destinations within the city to aid human economic activities. It is only just reasonable that these working ponies are treated fairly: treated for wounds that they are highly susceptible to and given old age care as opposed to being abandoned.

An organized effort to bring about change in the status of working animals

It requires organized efforts to bring about change in the status of working animals and Samabhava in the first year of its existence has made this change possible. Samabhava has brought together trained veterinarians, donors, NGOs, horse lovers, and pony caretakers above all on the same platform to think and act to better the status of the working ponies of Bangalore. The result is something for all to be proud of and the result gives us hope: hope, that human compassion is not lost; it only needs to be kindled.

A working pony

In the first year of Samabhava’s existence, 442 ponies have been treated as part of curative care for a range of conditions such as external injuries, respiratory disorders, musculoskeletal disorders (lameness), gastro-intestinal disorders, eye problems, skin diseases, hoof ailments, and infections. Lameness (153 cases) and wounds (101 cases) were found to be among the dominant conditions that afflicted working ponies. Preventive care has been rendered to 275 ponies, to many in the form of vaccinations against tetanus, a deadly disease that when once sets in, can be fatal to the ponies. Besides this, donors with space, resources, and the mindset have come forward to rescue and adopt 5 ponies who for various reasons such as accidental electrocution, emotional trauma, being differentially-abled, and abandonment are not fit to pull loads. Today, these ponies are leading lives of dignity amidst compassionate human beings in the farms and shelters in and around Bangalore.

Identifying the core causes of discomfort for working animals: Dialogue with farriery or horse shoe makers and experts

What is exceptional about Samabhava’s work that this Vegan India! blogger found is their attention to detail. This attention to detail translates to the identification of the prime areas of concern in the working lives of ponies that happens to be 1) lameness and 2) external injuries. Lameness in ponies largely stem from the ignorance of the caretakers about the biomechanics of a pony’s feet and the result is the animal ends up working with badly designed shoes. To bridge this gap, Samabhava has networked with experts from abroad to train farriery and horse-shoe makers in Bangalore to produce shoes that are comfortable for the ponies and will help prevent lameness and wounds in the long run.

A holistic approach to animal welfare and animal rights

Another exceptional aspect of Samabhava’s intervention is the organization’s holistic approach to animal welfare and animal rights—that is, by integrating the concept of a vegan lifestyle and helping people to make the connection between animal suffering, human suffering, and the degradation of the Planet due to human choices. Veganism is the ultimate goal in any animal rights movement because the philosophy seeks to ameliorate animal suffering. All of Samabhava’s founder members are vegan (you can click here to get introduced to them), including the chief guest at the function, the soft-spoken, Mrs. Amala Akkineni. Mrs. Akkineni, former film actor and now at the helm of affairs at the Blue Cross of Hyderabad, is one of the loveliest celebrity animal rights activists and supporter of a host of human rights work as well. Icons such as her demonstrate that human rights and animal rights go hand-in-hand, one is incomplete without the other, and “compassion” is an over-arching philosophy towards “life” in general, be it that of a human or an animal.

Future plans

Where does Samabhava go from here, we ask Sandesh Raju, Founder Trustee and Managing Trustee of the organization. Sandesh explains:

"We hope to train the caretakers of the ponies in better preventive management as well as in measures, which will help alleviate the day-to-day 'working' lives of the ponies. We know that this change will not be an overnight phenomenon and we hope to continue to work for this cause for as long it takes. On similar lines we hope to continue and expand "Project Atonement" (rescue and adoption of old, abandoned, and injured equines) so that more and more equines can live out the rest of their lives in comfort and dignity".

There are other aspects to Samabhava’s work that you can explore by visiting the organization’s website at: http://samabhava.org. You can also read in detail about the five freedoms of animals that Samabhava seeks to work for by clicking this link on the website.

In conclusion

What is life without food? What is life without good, nutritious, healthy, and most importantly vegan food?! The celebration of Samabhava’s first year was commemorated by a lovely vegan lunch sponsored by In The Pink organic-vegetarian bazaar and restaurant based in Bangalore. The highlight of the platter was delicious peanut-curd rice and ragi payasam sprinkled with cashew nuts. We leave you here to enjoy a photograph of this appetizing platter!

Vegan Bengaluru Potluck, Sept. 24, 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 11:59:42 PDT

An announcement from the Vegan Benglauru team

The official Vegan Bengaluru potluck for this month will be held at Jaaga on Lalbagh KH Road on the 24-Sept-2011. It is a lunch potluck from 2 p.m. until 5 p.m.

The address for Jaaga's new location is:

No. 68, Lalbagh KH Road
Opp. Vijaya Bank & Next to HDFC Bank
Bangalore – 560027
INDIA

Check out Jaaga's website for a map by clicking this link.

Here's some information about the Vegan Bengaluru potlucks:

1. *All* are welcome! :) You don't necessarily have to be vegan to attend the potluck event. Even if you're just curious about a vegan lifestyle or interested to learn about veganism you can join us.

2. You *MUST* bring a 100% vegan dish to share. Everyone brings something so it won't be fair if you walk in empty handed.

3. It would be nice if you bring a vegan dish that is prepared by yourself; however, if you are unable to cook then feel free to carry food which you have purchased.

4. If you've purchased the food, then make sure there's an ingredients list on the package so we can be assured that it is vegan. Particularly if you're a first time attendee who is not vegan, please don't expect us to take your word for it that the food you've purchased is completely vegan.

5. If you're unsure about what to bring then the best bet is fresh fruits or fruit juices. Everyone appreciates fruits. :)

6. Please bring plates, bowls, forks, spoons, serving spoons, and glasses for yourself. Everyone brings their own.

7. Come, relax, and enjoy the food, and conversation! :)

Please do drop in and RSVP on the Facebook event page if you get a chance by pasting this link on your browser.
You are also welcome to join us at the Vegan Bangalore facebook group or follow the Vegan Bengaluru blog to get updates about all the latest vegan-related happenings in Namma Bengaluru. :)

Looking forward to meeting everyone. :)

– The Vegan Benglauru Team

Seven Vegan Recipes from Orissa on Ganesh Chaturthi

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 10:33:59 PDT

http://m.wikitravel.org/en/India

Welcome to the second post in the state vegan recipe series! This time we bring you recipes of seven vegan dishes from the state of Orissa in east India. Similar to Bengal, Oriya vegetarian cuisine is mostly vegan and offers a large variety of dishes cooked in numerous styles. Each style represents a particular region in Orissa. We bring you a sample selection that particularly represents the coastal-cooking style of Orissa. The recipes have been contributed by Smt. Minati Mishra, resident of Keonjhar in Orissa. We are grateful to Smt. Mishra for sharing the recipes of these Oriya dishes that are not only easy to make but very tasty and nutritious too. The last dish on our menu is the “Chuda Ghasa”, a sweet creation that is offered to Lord Ganesha on Ganesh Chaturthi day. Chuda Ghasa is a concoction of nutritious ingredients that does not require any cooking, and therefore is a raw-vegan preparation!

As mentioned in our Bengal post, in all our recipes, we have used the cold-pressed versions of cooking oils obtained from organic stores and organically-grown raw ingredients to ensure that we are offering the healthiest food to our bodies. However, if you have difficulty procuring organically grown raw materials, please do not let that hinder your trial with the recipes.

The Recipes

1) Brinjal Paga (Brinjal Garnishing)

For four servings, you will need:
Brinjal – 5, as big as medium sized tomatoes
Tomato – 2, medium sized
Mustard oil – 1 tsp+
Onion – 1, medium sized
Garlic – 6-10, medium sized pods
Coriander leaves – As per need
Green chilli – 1-2, as per taste
Salt – As per taste

Preparation: Piece the brinjals into two longitudinal halves and tomatoes into four longitudinal parts. Heat 1 tsp mustard oil. Sauté the vegetables in high flame for 3-5 minutes or until they are 80% cooked. Remove from fire and keep covered for 20-30 minutes. Finely piece the onion, garlic, coriander leaves, and green chilli. Mash coarsely the sautéed brinjals and tomatoes, and add the finely pieced ingredients, salt, and a few drops of mustard oil as per the pungency you want. Brinjal Paga is ready to be served. Very similar in idea to the North Indian “Baigan ka Bharta”, Brinjal Paga is a dish that is relished across Orissa from the rural to the urban areas.

In fact, Paga can be prepared with different vegetables such as okra, ridge gourd, potato, and tomato as well. The okra and ridge gourd needs to be roasted while the potato and tomato needs to be boiled. The rest of the method is the same.

2) Mushroom Haldi Pani (Mushroom in Turmeric Water)

For three servings, you will need:
Mushroom – 200 gram, as available in one packet
Onion – 1, medium sized
Garlic – 6, medium sized pods
Mustard oil – 1 tsp+
Mustard seeds – ½ tsp
Turmeric – Two pinches
Salt – As per taste
Amchur powder or Tomato – 1 tsp or one small, respectively

Preparation: Piece the mushrooms and onions into small cubes. Crush the garlic. Heat 1 tsp mustard oil. Add mustard seeds and let them splutter. Add the onion, garlic, one pinch turmeric, salt, and mushrooms. Cover and sauté until all ingredients are soft. Add two cups of water and bring to boil. Add another pinch of turmeric and amchur powder (or finely chopped tomato). Boil for 5 minutes. Add a few drops of mustard oil as per taste and remove from fire. Mushroom Haldi Pani is ready. You can serve it either as a standalone soup, and/or with steamed rice or toasts to make a full meal. Mushroom Haldi Pani originates from the Puri district in Orissa.

3) Saaga Mooga (Green Leaves in Green Gram de-skinned and split)

For four servings, you will need:
Drumstick or Methi (fenugreek) or Mooli (radish) leaves – Two bundles
Garlic – 6, medium sized pods
Moong dal – ¼ cup
Salt – As per taste
Mustard oil – 1 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp (Please check the Bengali vegan recipe post for notes on the panch phoron by clicking here.
Green chilli – 1-2, as per taste

Preparation: Clean methi leaves and keep aside. Boil the moong dal with salt in a pressure cooker removing from fire just before the first whistle and keep aside. Heat mustard oil. Add panch phoron, crushed garlic, and green chilli. Add the methi leaves and cook until it is 75% done. Add the boiled moong dal and cook fully. Saaga Mooga is ready to be served. This dish is relished across Orissa. You can make the same recipe with drumstick or radish leaves; however, the natives swear by the drumstick leaf preparation!

4) Chawala Chuna Bhaja (Shallow Fried Vegetables in Rice Powder)

For four servings, you will need:
Kantola – 5, medium sized
Turmeric – ½ tsp
Salt – As per taste
Any white oil – 2 tbsp
Rice + jeera + dry red chilli mix – 2 tbsp (In proportion of 50:25:25. You can make this mixture in a slightly larger quantity and store for at least 6 months.)

Preparation: Piece the kantola into thin disc-shaped slices. Steam kantola with turmeric and salt in half cup water until it is 50% cooked and keep aside. Soak and dry the rice (you can soak the rice and keep it to dry overnight). Coarsely grind the rice with roasted jeera and dry red chilli. Heat any white oil. Shallow-fry the kantola. Add the rice + jeera + dry red chilli mixture. Remove from fire when the preparation turns slightly red and the texture is crispy. Chawala Chuna Bhaja is ready. This dish represents the Puri-Bhubneswar style of cooking. Kantola can also be substituted with karela (bitter gourd).

5) Khatta (Translated means “sour”)

For five servings, you will need:
Tomato – 6, medium sized
Any white oil – 1 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp
Green chilli – 1
Dry red chilli – 1
Asafoetida – 1 pinch
Curry leaves – As per taste
Dates – 10
Green peas – ¼ cup
Jaggery – 100 grams

Preparation: Piece the tomatoes into medium-sized cubes and keep aside. Heat any white oil. Add panch phoron, green chilli, dry red chilli, asafoetida, and curry leaves. Add the tomato, dates, and green peas. Cook until all ingredients are soft. Add jaggery and cook until each ingredient has blended with the other. Add one cup water and simmer for 5 minutes. Khatta is ready to be served. Khatta is a universal phenomenon in Orissa.

6) Dalma (Oriya Dal)

For six servings, you will need:
Arbi (colocasia) – 4, medium sized
Potato – 1, medium sized
Parval (pointed gourd) – 2, medium sized
Barbati (long beans) – 4
Mooli (radish) – 1, medium sized
Raw banana – ½ of a medium sized one
Arhar (thoor) dal – ½ cup
Salt – As per taste
Turmeric – ½ tsp
Grated fresh coconut – 3 tbsp or as per taste
Any white oil – 1 tbsp
Jeera – ½ tsp
Dry red chilli – 1

Preparation: Piece the vegetables: arbi, potato, parval, barbati, mooli, and raw banana in long, big parts. Pressure cook the vegetables with arhar dal, salt, and turmeric with 2 whistles. Keep until all the steam is out. Add the grated coconut into the pressure cooker and keep aside. Heat any white oil. Add jeera and dry red chilli. Let them splutter. Add the boiled vegetables and dal. Dalma is ready to be served. Dalma is the traditional Oriya dal recipe. You can include kathal (jackfruit) too.

7) Chuda Ghasa (Powdered Rice Flakes Mixture)

You will need:
Rice flakes – 1 kg, thick variety
Grated fresh coconut – 2, big sized
Powdered jaggery – ½ kg
Camphor – 1 pinch
Cardamom – 2
Black pepper – 8

Preparation: Coarsely grind the rice flakes and add the following ingredients to it: grated fresh coconut, powdered jaggery, and camphor. Mix, rubbing all ingredients together until you get a homogenous consistency, or until you can no longer tell individual ingredients apart. Coarsely powder the cardamom and black pepper and lightly add them to the mixture. Chuda Ghasa is ready. Chuda Ghasa is a preparation that originates from the coastal area of Orissa. Traditionally, Chuda Ghasa preparation is a community activity where many women sit around banana leaves mixing the concoction to perfection. It is made in large quantities and offered to the Gods because the preparation is raw or uncooked and nutritious as well. Chuda Ghasa is offered to Lord Ganesha on this holy day in Orissa.

Happy Ganesh Chaturthi, Everyone!

“Humanity’s true moral test, its fundamental test, consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals. And in this respect humankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it.” ~Milan Kundera, Author, The Unbearable Lightness of Being~

Seven Vegan Recipes from the State of Bengal on Janmashtami Eve

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 08:33:33 PST

http://m.wikitravel.org/en/India

The soil of Bengal bears the essence of the three great rivers, Ganga, Yamuna, and Brahmaputra, along with their myriad tributaries. This remarkably fertile soil provides nourishment to an incredible variety of flora. Bengal is one place in the country where along with the vegetables and fruits, the stalks, leaves, as well as the flowers of the plants are made into tasty dishes. Did you know that fritters made from kumro phool (pumpkin flowers) and shojne phool (drumstick flowers) are relished with great indulgence. Well, so much for the infinite variety of Bengali cuisine.

Most people know Bengal as the “fish-eating” state of the country; however, what many people do not know, is the fact that Bengal offers the richest variety in vegetarian cuisine in the world, most of which are vegan! Not only this, the vegan cuisine of Bengal is extremely healthy, cooked with minimal oil and spices, and very tasty because the method of preparation elicits the best flavors from all the ingredients in the dish. The USP of Bengali cuisine is that all tastes are blended beautifully – tok (sour), mishti (sweet), nonta (salty), and jhaal (chilli hot).

Today, on the eve of Janmashtami, the birthday of Lord Krishna, we take the opportunity to launch the State recipe series on Vegan India! blog. We are very grateful to Smt. Sanchita Paul (Pal), resident of Shillong, for contributing all the six main course recipes in the Bengal series. Smt. Paul originally hails from “East Bengal”, now Bangladesh, and therefore brings the taste of “opar Bangla” into her preparations.

The last dish on our menu is “Tal er Bora”, a sweet dish recipe contributed by Smt. Urmila Dutta, resident of Gurgaon, with ancestry rooted in West Bengal. The Tal (Toddy Palm) fruit is available in the monsoon season; so in Bengali homes, Tal er Bora (Toddy Palm fritters) is prepared on Janmashtami day and offered to Lord Krishna as bhog (offering made to the Gods). “Tal er bora kheye Nondo nache re!!” are famous lines in Bangla that roughly translated means Lord Krishna dances in ecstasy as He pops Tal er bora in His mouth!! However, as you will learn from the recipe, just in case you are unable to find the toddy palm fruit in your city, you may well substitute with ripe bananas. Details in the recipe.

A note about spices in Bengali cooking: Before we get on with the recipes, it is fair that we introduce you to the “panch phoron”, the ubiquitous spice mixture used in most Bengali recipes. Panch phoron meaning ‘five spices’ is a mixture of the following spices: jeera (cumin), kalojeera (black cumin), methi (fenugreek), sorsae (mustard), and saunf (fennel). It may not be too easy to find the ready-made panch phoron mixture in shops outside Bengal. However, you can prepare the mixture in your own kitchens. You will need to lightly roast each of the spices separately, then combine them, allow the mixture to cool, and finally bottle the mixture. This now becomes your panch phoron.

Another noteworthy feature of Bengali cooking is the usage of sugar. Most recipes use between one pinch to ½ teaspoon of sugar—not to make the end product sweet, but to balance out the flavors of the different ingredients and unify them.

Suggestions for healthy cooking: Finally, this may not be specific to Bengali cooking but important for overall healthy eating: In all the recipes, we have used the cold-pressed varieties of cooking oils obtained from organic stores and used organically-grown raw ingredients to ensure that we are offering the healthiest food to our bodies. However, if you have difficulty procuring organically grown raw materials, please do not let that hinder your trial with the recipes. And, if you do manage to procure the organically grown counterparts of the vegetables especially, please do not remove the skins entirely, for example, from the ridge gourd, potato, pumpkin, pointed gourd, or any other such vegetable. Most of the goodies are sitting just below the skins of the vegetables. Since organically grown vegetables are pesticide-free, you can enjoy the goodies to your heart’s content eating them with much of the skin.

The recipes!

1) Jhinga Posto (Ridge Gourd with Poppy Seeds)

For three servings, you will need:
Jhinge – 1, medium sized and tender, light green variety
Posto – 1 tbsp, soaked for 10 minutes
Mustard powder – 1 tsp (can use by Weikfield)
Green chilli – 1 or 2 as per taste, 2 for garnishing
Mustard oil – 2 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp
Salt – As per taste
Turmeric – ½ tsp
Sugar – Less than ½ tsp

Preparation: Piece jhinge into small cubes and keep aside. Prepare a paste of posto, mustard powder, and green chilli in a mixie and keep aside. Heat mustard oil. Add panch phoron and let it splutter. Add jhinge, salt, and turmeric. Cover and fry until jhinge is soft. Add the paste. Sauté for a minute or two. Add little water if too tight. Cook until mushy, add sugar, and remove from fire. Keep covered for 30 minutes for all the flavors to come together. Garnish with split green chillies and serve.

2) Green Tomatoes in Mustard Paste

For three servings, you will need:
Green tomatoes – 3, medium sized
Potatoes – 2, medium sized
Mustard powder – 1 tbsp (can use by Weikfield)
Green chilli – 1 or 2 as per taste
Mustard oil – 2 tbsp
Panch poron – ½ tsp
Dry red chilli – 1, small
Salt – As per taste
Turmeric – One pinch
Sugar – ½ tsp

Preparation: Piece green tomatoes and potatoes longitudinally, and keep aside. Prepare a paste of mustard powder and green chilli, and keep aside. Heat mustard oil. Add panch poron and dry red chilli, and let them splutter. Add potatoes, salt, and turmeric. Cover and fry until potato is soft. Add the green tomatoes and the paste. Cook until tomatoes are soft, adding water if required. Add sugar and remove from fire. Keep covered for 30 minutes for all the flavors to come together and then serve.

3) Tok-misti Kumro (Sweet and Sour Pumpkin)

For three servings, you will need:
Kumro – ½ kg
Tamarind – 1 lemon-sized ball, soaked for an hour
Green chilli – 1 or 2 as per taste
Mustard oil – 2 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp
Salt – As per taste
Turmeric – ½ tsp
Sugar – ½ tsp
Coriander leaves for garnishing

Preparation: Piece kumro into medium-sized cubes and keep aside. Prepare a paste of tamarind and green chilli in a mixie and keep aside. Heat mustard oil. Add panch phoron and let it splutter. Add kumro, salt, and turmeric. Cover and fry until kumro is soft. Add the paste. Cover for 2 minutes. Add water, as required. Cook until mushy, add sugar, and remove from fire. Ensure the proportion of tok (sour), jhal (chilli hot), and misti (sweet) is as per your taste. Keep covered for 30 minutes for all the flavors to come together. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve.

4) Pineapple Potol (Pointed Gourd with Pineapple)

For three servings, you will need:
Potol – 3, medium sized
Potato – 2, medium sized
Pineapple – 1, two-inch slice
Mustard oil – 2 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp
Turmeric – 1 pinch
Chilli powder – 1 pinch
Salt – As per taste
Sugar – Less ½ tsp to ½ tsp (The amount of sugar will depend on the sweetness of the pineapple.)

Preparation: Piece potol and potato into medium-sized cubes and keep aside. Grate the pineapple and keep aside. Heat mustard oil. Add panch phoron and let it splutter. Add potol and potato. Cover and fry until the vegetables are soft. Add water, as required. Add the grated pineapple, turmeric, chilli powder, and salt. Cook until mushy, add sugar, and remove from fire. Keep covered for 30 minutes for all the flavors to come together and then serve.

5) Mocha Ghonto (Banana Flower Curry)

For five servings, you will need:
Banana Flower – 1
Potato – 2, medium sized
Cumin powder – 1 tsp
Chilli powder – 1 pinch
Turmeric – 2 pinch
Ginger paste – 1 tsp
Bay leaves – 2
Salt – As per taste
Mustard oil – 4 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp
Dry red chilli – 2
Sugar – ½ tsp
Garam masala powder – ½ tsp
Cashew butter – As per taste
Coriander leaves for garnishing

Preparation: Apply a layer of mustard oil on your palms and knife, and mince the banana flowers into very tiny pieces making sure that you remove the hard stick-like portion from each flower. You must grease your palms because banana flower tends to leave them black in color since it is rich in iron (greasing can reduce the blackening considerably, although not completely rule it out). Parboil the banana flowers with one whistle in the pressure cooker. Strain the water from the boiled banana flowers and keep aside. Piece the potatoes into small cubes and keep aside. Make a paste of cumin powder, chilli powder, one pinch turmeric, ginger paste, bay leaves, and salt, and keep aside. Heat mustard oil. Fry potato pieces with one pinch turmeric and salt until soft and keep aside. Add panch phoron and dry red chillis in the left-over oil. Add the paste. Sauté for 2 minutes. Add the boiled banana flower and potatoes, and cook until mushy. Add water, as required. Add salt, sugar, garam masala powder, and cashew butter before removing from fire. Keep covered for 30 minutes for all the flavors to come together. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve.

6) Moong Dal (Green gram de-skinned and split)

For three servings, you will need:
Moong dal – ½ cup
Salt – As per taste
Turmeric – ½ tsp
Ginger – 1 inch piece, cubed
Mustard oil – 2 tbsp
Panch phoron – ½ tsp
Dry red chilli – 1
Bay leaf – 1
Green chilli – 1 or 2 as per taste
Sugar – Less than ½ tsp
Coriander leaves for garnishing

Preparation: Roast the dry moong dal and then clean with water. Boil the dal with salt, turmeric powder, and ginger cubes in a pressure cooker with four whistles. Heat mustard oil. Add panch phoron, whole dry red chilli, and let the spices splutter. Add the bay leaf and green chilli, wait till aroma comes out. Add the boiled dal and water (if required) to bring the preparation to the consistency you want. Add sugar and remove from fire. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve.

7) Tal er Bora (Toddy Palm Fruit Fritters): As said earlier, Tal er Bora is a sweet delicacy that is offered to Lord Krishna on Janamastami day. If you have difficulty finding the Toddy Palm fruit in your city, you can substitute with ripe bananas. Our contributor has tweaked the original recipe a bit to make it healthy, for example substitute whole wheat for maida, introduce sesame seeds, and use cold-pressed canola oil for any other. There is another purpose to using canola oil: it does not have a taste of its own, therefore will not interfere with the tastes of the other ingredients.

You will need:
Tal fruit – 1 or 5 big ripe bananas
Whole wheat – 1 cup
Coconut – 2 cups, grated
Sugar – 1 cup
Fennel seeds – 1 tsp
Cardamom powder – 1 tsp
Sesame seeds – 2 tbsp
Canola oil – As per deep fry

Preparation: Extract the sap from the tal kernals and keep aside. You can take tips from My Saffron Kitchen to find out how to extract the sap from the Tal kernels by clicking here. If using bananas, mash them in a mixie and keep aside. Dry roast the grated coconut in an oven or tawa. Add the roasted coconut, sugar, fennel seeds, cardamom powder, and sesame seeds to the fruit mixture and combine well. Heat canola oil. Wet your hands in water, form small lumps from the mixture with your hands, and lightly drop them in the oil, one by one. Fry until golden brown and serve hot.

Happy Janmashtami, Everyone!

“We manage to swallow flesh only because we do not think of the cruel and sinful thing that we do. Cruelty... is a fundamental sin, and admits of no arguments or nice distinctions. If only we do not allow our heart to grow callous, it protests against cruelty, is always clearly heard; and yet we go on perpetrating cruelties easily, merrily, all of us—in fact, anyone who does not join in is dubbed a crank.” Rabindranath Tagore, in 1894 at the age of 33, in Glimpses of Bengal Letters, a selection of his letters.”

Who Pays For Your Leather Shoes? (Non Leather Shoes and Accessories in India)

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 07:16:07 PST

We pay with currency. They pay with their lives.

Each time you enter a leather store, remember somebody paid with their lives for that beautiful bag/shoe/belt/wallet/purse/jacket perched on the snazzy shelf of the jazzy store and the way they had to die was not beautiful at all, and to describe their death as "gory" would be an understatement.

There are two common myths about leather and the leather industry:

1. Leather items are made from animals who have died of natural causes.

2. The leather industry does a great “service” by recycling the skins of dead animals into leather.

The caption in the poster is upsetting, while these myths do prevail, but then, what is the truth?

Consider this. The website of the Council of Leather Exports boasts of increasing leather exports from India. The same website declares that the Government of India has identified the “leather sector” as a “focus Sector” in the Foreign Trade Policy of 2010-2014. (Source). Do you think such lofty targets would have been set based on the expectation of raw material supply from animals who would die of natural causes?

The reality is that animals—cows, pigs, buffaloes, sheep, goats, and you name it—are being and will be especially slaughtered to meet the "target" set by the leather sector. Each time some body declares that leather sales or exports will increase by a certain percentage, it means that a proportionate number of animals will be slaughtered.

Consider this too. The companies that manufacture merchandise made from animal leather register constant production month after month. Would it be prudent to assume that production, sales, and profits depend on animals that die a natural death? The fact is that animals do not die naturally at the same rate to meet the “demand” of the burgeoning leather market. They are killed for the purpose.

To learn about the detailed truth, you can read an India-specific research on the leather industry by the organization, Beauty Without Cruelty (BWC), India titled, Commercially available leather is always from animals that are killed. Please click the title of the research to learn more.

If this is the truth, how does the leather industry thrive?

Sadly, the leather industry thrives on mass ignorance, and a misinformed and artificially created “demand” for leather. “Misinformed” because most people who buy "genuine" leather are unaware of the brutality based on which which the industry operates. Or, people are not aware of the availability of cruelty-free non-leather. The leather industry hoodwinks people into thinking that “leather” is durable and lasts longer. What they do not advertise is how the raw material is procured. The truth might turn off many buyers.

Also, the numerous processes involved in converting animal skin to an item for human use makes animal-derived leather cost more than non-leather. The society is conditioned to believe that costly items are better. Which is not always the case. Not in this case, at least.

Yet another aspect that the leather industry does not tell us about is the "human" concerns around leather production in terms of the occupational health hazards of the tannery workers. A study published in the Indian Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine on the leather tannery workers in the city of Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh revealed a significantly higher prevalence of morbidity among them. Further, the study observes:

"Leather production includes many operations with different exposures, which can be harmful for the health of the workers, and particularly be carcinogenic. Some compounds in the tanning process are considered as probably being carcinogenic to humans (some benzene-based dyes and formaldehyde). Besides these, scores of other chemicals and organic solvents such as chromate and bichromate salts, aniline, butyl acetate, ethanol, benzene, toluene, sulfuric acid and ammonium hydrogen sulfide are used in the tannery industry."

You can read the study in detail by clicking this link on the Journal site.

This is so unfortunate but what is being done to halt the killing of animals for leather?

You can well guess by now that signing on a leather deal translates to signing the death warrant of thousands of animals. It also means destroying the lives of many human beings and their families. However, sustained campaigns led by organizations such as People For Animals (PFA), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and others have borne fruits. Some of the recent gains have been to ban the production of leather shoes for army soldiers that would have involved the killing of four lakh cows, ban in animal leather shoes in the schools of Punjab and Himachal Pradesh, decision of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) to phase out the use of leather shoes and belts and replace them with non-leather, an overall ban on leather shoes in Indian schools, and so on. Each of these success stories are linked to their respective reports on the internet, you can click the links to learn more.

I want to know how to identify non-leather, can you help?

You can train yourself to distinguish animal leather from non-leather. Below is a note courtesy BWC, India on how to do the same:

Leather or non-leather?: A reliable way to check if the material in question is leather or not is to smell it; if still in doubt and if possible try to inspect its back surface by prying it open slightly: if it is not leather, it will have a material like texture, otherwise it will be very smooth. Or else, burn a corner: leather will burn without a flame and give a flesh burning odour, whereas all ‘synthetics’ will quickly catch fire because they are polymer based. Another way to check is by applying a bit of saliva since animal leather absorbs moisture – on faux leather it will not ‘disappear’. ‘Synthetics’ have an unbroken uniformity in pattern over their entire surface whereas animal leather varies in patches. In the case of Pleather/Bicast leather which consists of a thick layer of plastic or PU (Poly-Urethane) applied to bonded/reconstituted leather, if the material is very stiff, bubbles are visible, or looks like it will crack, it is leather. Courtesy: BWC, India (http://www.bwcindia.org)

Where can I shop for non-leather merchandise?

Here is the good news at long last! Non-leather shoes are readily available in India and yes, maybe in the shopping complex next to you! Today we present a compilation of some prominent companies that sell non-leather shoes in India. We say “some” because there are many more companies—local and otherwise. The compilation is a glimpse to convey that non-leather shoes, bags, belts, and wallets do exist and can be very stylish and offer a variety as well. Most importantly, they are ethical. All we need to do is to make our needs felt and ask for them.

Please note that the compilation appears in the descending order of the Company’s spread in the country. You can click the name of each company to locate a store near you. Most importantly, please involve the salespeople in the store and ask them to guide you to the non-leather section. This sends out a signal in the market that non-leather is being actively sought. At the same time, do arm yourself with know-how on how to distinguish non-leather from leather and vice versa.

1. Bata: Everybody in India has worn a Bata shoe at some stage in their lives. They are omnipresent with the widest spread of showrooms in India. Although not all the merchandise at Bata is non-leather; the Company offers a very fine range of non-leather shoes and bags. The non-leather selection includes formal/informal/sports shoes for men, women, and children, and handbags for women.

2. Liberty Shoes Ltd.: Also has a large spread of showrooms in India. Similar to Bata, Liberty does not exclusively manufacture non-leather, but has a range of non-leather formal/informal/ shoes for men, women, and children, and belts and wallets for men.

3. Adidas/Fila/Nike/PUMA/Reebok: We have clubbed these companies together because they primarily sell casual and athletic shoes for men, women, and children. They also sell bags. Please note that some athletic/sports shoes stocked by these companies are of animal-derived leather, or in other words, not all shoes are of canvas and synthetic leather material. Therefore, you need to ask and ensure.

4. Metro Shoes: Although does not exclusively manufacture non-leather items, but is sensitive to the needs of people who ask for non-leather. The proof is in their website. If you go to the Metro Shoes website and from the first drop down select “Shoe For”, then click the second drop down, “Shoe Category”, you will find the sub-category “Vegetarian”. A spokesperson from the company informed us that in case you are not shopping online, you can take help from the salespeople at the stores to help you seek the “100% non-leather” shoes. Metro Shoes has a range of non-leather formal/informal/ shoes for men, women, and children, and bags for women. We recommend that you make a note of the “vegetarian” shoes from the online list before going to the store.

5. Lifestyle Stores: Offers a range of non-leather formal shoes for men with a starting price of Rs.600/-. We found a reasonable variety at the Koramangla Lifestyle store in Bangalore. However, when we wrote to Lifestyle for further enquiries, they did not respond. Nevertheless, the pairs we bought were definitely non-leather as the salespeople vouched for them and they passed the above mentioned leather test as well.

6. Crocs: The beautiful Crocs shoes are primarily crafted from a material called croslite. Croslite is a proprietary resin substance made from a polymer by the name of ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA). EVA is sometimes more popularly known as “foam rubber” or “expanded leather”. We were told that the women’s and children’s selections are made of the croslite material; however a few designs in the men’s range use a strip of animal-derived leather. It is easy to bypass these designs with non-vegan strips. The salespersons guide you at the stores. We have reviewed Crocs in this blog; you can click here for the review.

7. Baggit: This is a brand that you can completely trust because they sell non-leather merchandise only. Baggit is the recipient of the PETA Proggy Award for the year 2007. Baggit offers a stylish selection of formal/informal shoes, bags, belts, wallets, purses, pouches, and mobile phone holders for women. For men, Baggit offers good looking and well-designed wallets. We have reviewed Baggit in this blog in the past; you can click here for the review.

8. Compassion Avenue: This is also a company that you can completely trust because they sell non-leather merchandise only. The selection includes formal shoes, belts, and wallets for men, and informal shoes for women. However, Compassion Avenue products are available in Pune only. You can even order by post by contacting the proprietor. We have reviewed Compassion Avenue in this blog in the past; you can click here for the review.

*~*

It has been Vegan India's endeavor to find vegan parallels of most things in life and share the information with whoever is willing or wants to listen. We do not claim to be 100% accurate nor claim to be the ultimate database on vegan-related matters. We are simply vegan bloggers, here to celebrate each day of our vegan existence with lots of color, photographs, food, compassion, positive stories, and our companion animals. Anybody is only too welcome to join in the celebration. Please feel free to add on to this list or any other list/story in any page in this blog. You can simply pull down a comment box and post your inputs. Thank you.

Acknowledgements:
We thank Swosti Mishra, our ideator friend, for spontaneously translating ideas into visuals. We also thank Amruta Ubale, vegan comrade from Pune, for sharing her valuable inputs to develop some of the viewpoints in this story.

“As long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seeds of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love.” ~Genius Mathematician, Pythagoras, over two thousand years ago in ancient Greece~

‘LebMex’ Vegetarian Lebanese-Mexican Restaurant, Bangalore and Mumbai

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 08:29:38 PST

For more vegan-friendly restaurants in India reviewed in this blog, you can click here.

We had come across an article titled, “LebMex Initiates Meatless Mondays among Bangaloreans” in this link recently. Super excited by it, we had followed up and here we are today, with the story!

“Meatless Mondays” is the name of an international campaign that has roots in World War I. During the time, the U.S. Food Administration had appealed to the people of the nation to stay away from consuming meat one day in the week—with the aim to conserve resources that could be diverted to war-affected areas. (Source). In the year 2003, Meatless Mondays was re-launched by a division of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and several other public health schools; and this time with a larger aim: to help conserve the Planet by saying NO to meat consumption. Here is the official website of the "Meat Free Mondays" international campaign that you can click to learn more.

Not only the Mondays, LebMex is vegetarian all seven days of the week! Explains Mr. Dhaval Udeshi, the Director of LebMex:

“Being an avid food lover, I saw that in India, the choice in the vegetarian palate is limited to local food. We wanted to create a chain of restaurants all over India where people can enjoy fresh, healthy, and extremely tasty food. Lebanese and Mexican cuisines are regarded among the top five cuisines in the world and in our country, options to savor these cuisines are limited. With rising pressures at the work place, it is very important to lead a healthy lifestyle and eat right. Vegetarian food not only makes you live longer but also keeps you fit and helps control lots of diseases.”

Hummus with Whole-wheat Pita Bread

And, what about the vegans, we turn to Corporate Chef, Hiren Kumar for the answer. Mr. Kumar has worked in the U.S. for over a decade and is very familiar with vegan cooking. Says Chef Hiren:

Tangy Vegetable Salad

“Many dishes in the menu are already vegan. The rest can be customized as per requirement. Our store managers are equipped to help you select the vegan dishes or customize them accordingly.”

We found that to be true indeed. The whole-wheat hummus, pita bread, Mexican rice, salad, and fajita that we ordered were naturally occurring vegan dishes in the menu. How were they, you may ask. They say that the proof of the pudding lies in the eating. And, we are definitely going back again for more helpings of the hummus and pita bread!

Mexican Rice

But hey, what is this with Lebanese and Mexican food available under the same roof—when the two countries are separated by the Atlantic with a distance of 10,000 miles between them?! While both are among the top cuisines in the world, according to Chef Hiren, Lebanese and Mexican food are also diametrically opposite to eachother. Lebanese food is low on spices and with lots of vegetables, fruits, and herbs; oftentimes the ingredients are raw. On the other hand, Mexican cuisine is spicy with sharp flavors. Together, they bring varied choices to the table.

However, here’s our opinion on why Lebanese and Mexican food go together: As you may be aware, there has been a constant influx of immigrants into Mexico from many Arabic nations, particularly Lebanon. According to this blogsite, as we speak, there are hundreds of thousands of people in Mexico of Lebanese descent. Therefore, over the course of the second/third generation, the immigrants from the middle-east started identifying Mexico as their home and blending with the local Mexican cultures and customs. It was natural that the immigrants would slowly mix-n-match the locally available ingredients and this food experimentation lend a great taste to the fusion dishes that encompassed the best of Mexican and Mediterranean flavors.

So we are not surprized when we found a good crowd on the day we visited the Koramangala outlet. The atmosphere is vibrant with colorful murals adorning the walls. The interior of the restaurant boldly displays spectacular Mexican themes, a treat for the eyes. The colors are literally bursting all over the place as you can see from the photographs. This is a fast food restaurant with a difference, certainly!

The choice of business is a reflection of where the society is today and where its potential lies to reach in the future. With more and more people graduating towards a “healthy” lifestyle that is beneficial for the self, for the animals, and for the Planet, businesses such as LebMex is a commendable step in the right direction. Outlining the expansion plans, Mr. Udeshi points out:

“We plan to expand the LebMex chain all over India in the coming years as after starting in Bangalore in 2010, we have received an overwhelming response. We are glad to see all kinds of people trying out our food and enjoying it. Today when people are finally realizing the value of eating vegetarian food and living a healthy lifestyle without compromising on food quality, we will be proud if our chain of restaurants serves in spreading awareness about the benefits of eating vegetarian food. Our company, DAI Foods Pvt. Ltd., plans to roll out more brands in the future that will include yet more international cuisine and will be vegetarian at the same time."

Amen to that!

LebMex contact and food order details: LebMex has several outlets in Bangalore and Mumbai. For the contact number, address, and other details of the outlets, you can click this link in the LebMex website.

Cost factor: The best part of the LebMex experience is that the prices in the menu are extremely affordable for these cuisines which are hardly available or only available at five star hotels.

“Human beings are not natural carnivores. When we kill animals to eat them, they end up killing us because their flesh, which contains cholesterol and saturated fat, was never intended for human beings, who are natural herbivores” ~Dr. William C. Roberts, M.D., Editor of the 'American Journal of Cardiology'~

Vegan-friendly ‘Nanee Suites’ Hotel, Delhi

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 10:21:31 PDT

For more vegan-friendly hotels in India reviewed in this blog, you can click here.

The Nanee Suites is a boutique business hotel in South Delhi having all the amenities which a hotel in that category can offer. The one thing that makes Nanee Suites stand out is its all-vegetarian, no alcohol, and no smoke policy. Not only this, the Nanee Suites is vegan-friendly as well. The staff is aware of what “vegan” means. Now, isn’t that exciting!?

Accommodation cum conference facilities

The hotel has 20 spacious guest suites of the deluxe, premium, and luxury varieties. You can learn more about the accommodation offered by clicking this link in the hotel website. The hotel offers conference facilities and a business center as well. You can click the links to learn more.

Eating at “Jihva” restaurant in Nanee Suites

Jihva is the in-house restaurant at Nanee Suites, which is open to resident guests only. Jihva promises to “offer a world of vegetarianism”. As we have indicated above, the staff is aware of what not to serve you if you are vegan.

Contact

To explore staying at Nanee Suites, you can contact Mr. Sanjeev Kumar at 09911792843 for details about a vegan stay.

“Researchers found that as the amount of animal foods increased in the diet, even in relatively small increments, so did the emergence of the cancers that are common in the west. Most cancers occurred in direct proportion to the quantity of animal foods consumed.” ~Joel Fuhrman, M.D., Author of Eat to Live~

Vegan-friendly ‘Green Hotel’, McLeod Ganj

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 09:57:30 PDT

For more vegan-friendly hotels in India and vegan-friendly restaurants in McLeod Ganj reviewed in this blog, you can click the linked words.

In the last post of our McLeod Ganj trilogy, we will write about Green Hotel. Green Hotel has been highly recommended by the Lonely Planet and Rough Guide as a place to stay and eat at McLeod Ganj. According to the backpacker community, vegetarian Green Hotel serves the best breakfast in town. We definitely wanted to stay at this place and verify this information.

Green Hotel as a place to eat

According to the Green Hotel website, it is a family-run business operating since 1978. Strategically located, Green Hotel is not smack in the middle of the McLeod Ganj township, neither too far from it—it is a 10-minute jaunt from the city center. Whether you want to go uphill to trek or visit the Bhagsunath temple, this is where your ascent begins and there is nothing better than beginning your ascent with the delicious breakfast on offer in the warmly decorated hotel restaurant. Often tourists make a beeline in the morning for a hearty breakfast before they get on with their day.

Green Hotel Restaurant

Tofu-cheese Momo

Green Hotel restaurant serves great Tibetan breakfasts as well as green teas, tofu chips, cereals, pancakes, tofu-cheese momos, soups, salads, and fresh fruit juice to name a few. Although we spotted some lacto-ovo dishes, it is very easy to avoid them. We found that tofu has been used in many of the preparations and the Tibetan dishes especially, were largely vegan.

Like most eateries in McLeod Ganj, the Green Hotel restaurant at the basement has a well-stocked multilingual library.

Green Hotel as a place to stay

We were told that Green Hotel has a diverse selection of rooms catering to all types of travelers. Rooms have their own private shower with hot water available 24/7. The rates are highly flexible but we found they would generally vary between Rs.300/- to Rs.800/- depending on the seasons or whether weekday/weekend. It is better to book in advance during festival times to avoid the last minute rush and eventual disappointment. The rooms at the top floors are easily the best and present a magnificent view of the Himalayan peaks.

Green Hotel and Restaurant contact and food order details

Website for more information and hotel booking: http://www.greenhotel.biz
Telephone: 01892-221200/221479
E-mail: greenhotel@gmail.com
Address: Bhagsu Road, McLeod Ganj
Timings: 7am to 10pm, every day of the week
Cost factor: A hearty meal for two costs around Rs.250/-.
Caution: This is a lacto-ovo vegetarian place; at the time of placing the order, please put in a word to ensure that your preparation is dairy-and-egg free.

“If one is trying to practice meditation and is still eating meat, he would be like a man closing his ears and shouting loudly, and then asserting that he heard nothing.” ~Ancient Buddhist Text by Surangama Sutra~

Vegan-friendly ‘Lung Ta’ Restaurant, McLeod Ganj

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 20:30:23 PDT

For more vegan-friendly restaurants in McLeod Ganj reviewed in this blog, you can click here.

The literal meaning of the word ‘lungta’ is ‘wind horse’, a mythical creature in Tibetan folklore. Lungta symbolizes positive life energy. In places of Buddhist significance, the lungta symbol is found depicted on ‘prayer flags’. Those of us who have visited a Tibetan Buddhist monastery would have noticed the magnificent sight of colorful flags strung in the air. It is believed that each time these flags with texts and symbols on them flutter, they disseminate goodness in the air and bless the surroundings.

Continuing from our last post on Namgyal Café, McLeod Ganj is a place that attracts people from every corner of the world. Some of these visitors follow the Buddhist faith; some come enchanted by the Buddhist way of life. Buddhists (the religion that The Buddha propagated) all over the world follow a basic code of ethics commonly known as “The Precepts”. The very first precept in Buddhism is “Pāṇātipātā veramaṇī sikkhāpadaṃ samādiyāmi” that translated means, “I will abstain from taking any form of life until the end of my life”. This led us to believe that McLeod Ganj is perhaps a place where we shall find something interesting. We sure did and how?

A casual chit-chat with a group of backpackers led us to Lung Ta, a vegetarian Japanese restaurant. Wait a minute! Vegetarian and Japanese? That sounded incongruous. We double-checked whether what they said was right? They chuckled and said “Yes!”

Lung Ta Japanese Vegetarian Restaurant

Lung Ta is close to downtown and on entering the restaurant, it looked like a little Japan in itself. Now, part of the fun in eating at Lung Ta is in finding an empty table. The chances of getting one at first entry is next to none. However, people are welcoming to share their table with strangers. A bunch of Japanese travelers who had come to meet His Holiness, The Dalai Lama, happily offered to share their table with us. They informed us that the food at Lung Ta is authentic Japanese and most Japanese tourists at McLeod Ganj come here regularly as they find it a home away from home. There are no quiet souls in this restaurant; everybody is a tourist here and eating is accompanied by the happy exchange of myriad stories with virtual strangers you may say. Even as strangers, we felt connected by the common human spirit of inquiry and friendliness.

Udon

We quickly skimmed through the menu. Surprise! Almost every dish listed in the menu was Vegan. Dishes with cheese, there were none! Tofu is used in many of the preparations. We ordered for Udon, which is thick flattened wheat noodles in a delicious soy-based soup. We also ordered Miso Soup made by first grinding cooked soya beans, rice or barley, and salt, and finally fermenting the mixture. The dishes arrived in no time and tasted heavenly. Our Japanese friends wanted to check whether we liked the food. We loved it! We wished we could sample every dish in the menu!

We were told that the menu changes everyday. Although there are daily specials, the main course remains a constant and consists of vegetarian Miso Soup, Sushi, Tempura, and Vegetable and Tofu Steak. With such great company and tremendous food, time just flew.

We could not resist ourselves and walked up to the proprietor of the restaurant who introduced himself as Mr. Sonam. We asked what made him serve vegetarian foods when Japanese food all over the world is known for being otherwise. He explained that his is a second-generation Tibetan family in India and they follow Buddhism in its truest form. In a country like India which is so well endowed with vegetables, fruits, and grains, there is absolutely no "excuse" to eat otherwise, he said. He candidly added that the sum total of all human religions is ‘respect for all life forms’ in any case.

Later we found out that the proceeds from Lung Ta go to an NGO that helps rehabilitate ex-political prisoners from Tibet.

Lung Ta restaurant contact and food order details

Address: Jogibara Road , McLeod Ganj
Timings: 12noon to 8:30pm
Cost factor: A hearty meal for two costs around Rs.200/-.
Caution: This is a lacto-ovo vegetarian eatery; at the time of placing the order, please put in a word to ensure that your preparation is free of dairy and eggs.

“May all beings everywhere plagued with sufferings of body and mind quickly be freed from their pain. May those frightened cease to be afraid, and may those bound be free. May the powerless find power, and may people befriend all life. May those of all species who find themselves lost, the young, the aged, the unprotected, be guarded by beneficent celestials, and may they swiftly attain Buddhahood.” ~Buddhist Prayer for Peace~

Vegan-friendly 'Namgyal Café', McLeod Ganj

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 19:56:20 PDT

Many Indian and foreign tourists who travel to see the Indian Himalayas make it a point to visit McLeod Ganj. For the uninitiated, McLeod Ganj is situated in the state of Himachal Pradesh on the Dhauladhar Range of the Himalayas. This picturesque, dainty little township is best known as the secretariat of the Government in Exile of Tibet and the home of His Holiness, the fourteenth Dalai Lama. For more on traveling to McLeod Ganj, you can click this link on the India Travel Blog.

A visit to Namgyal monastery in McLeod Ganj is a must in every visitor's itinerary. Besides other attractions at the monastery, there is an exotic vegetarian café tucked right inside the monastery complex called the Namgyal café. This laidback cafe is tastefully decorated in hues of blue and green and has an elementary multilingual library in the corner. There are five tables inside the café that can altogether accommodate 20 people at a time. A window seat in the café offers a spectacular view of the valley.

The Namgyal Café

Namgyal café is popular for its delicious selection of thin crust vegetarian and vegan pizzas. The “Pizza Vegan” in the menu immediately caught our eye and very soon, we had it served piping hot at our table. Pizza Vegan at Namgyal café is a brilliant-looking, lip-smacking ensemble of fresh tofu, vegetables, and herbs. The other vegan items on offer are seasonal fruit juices, herb teas, salads, quiche, crepes, noodles, rice, and soups. The system of taking orders for food is unique—you need to write your selections on a piece of paper and hand it over to the owner.

The "Vegan Pizza"

Namgyal café announces its daily specials on a board at the entrance. The staff informed us that they frequently change the menu depending upon the fresh produce available in the local villages. The staff appeared courteous and flexible. Namgyal café is vegan-friendly for sure!! Besides the enchanting views, the chants and hymns emanating from the monastery makes eating there an extraordinary experience.

Namgyal Café contact and food order details

Telephone: 01892-221040, 9816150562, and 9418287668
E-mail: shirap_gyamtso@yahoo.com
Address: Namgyal Monastery, Temple Road, McLeod Ganj
Timings: 10am to 10pm
Cost factor: A hearty meal for two costs around Rs.250/-.
Caution: This is a lacto-ovo vegetarian eatery; at the time of placing the order, please put in a word to ensure that your preparation is free of dairy and eggs.

“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” ~Lord Buddha in the Lankavatara Sutra~

An Interview with Mohan Santhanam, a Vegan Vocalist

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:25:18 PST

This interview with Mohan Santhanam, a Carnatic music vocalist, was originally published in the Indian Vegan Society’s (www.indianvegansociety.com) Apr-Jun, 2011 newsletter, ‘VeganVegetarian’. Mohan Santhanam is an award-winning musician who also performs on stage. Mohan Santhanam is a happy and healthy vegan, and in conversation with Shankar Narayan, President of the Indian Vegan Society, describes his rewarding journey as a practicing vegan.

This interview has been reproduced here with permission from the Indian Vegan Society.

Mohan Santhanam (www.mohansanthanam.com), a Chennai-based Carnatic vocalist, answering the questions posed by ‘VeganVegetarian’

Q 1: Since when are you vegan? Before becoming vegan, how was your lifestyle? What is the experience after being vegan? Any benefits? Any difficulties?

Mohan: I became a vegan in April 2008. So that makes it three years! Before that I was a lacto-vegetarian (I didn’t know the term before) and as with most Indians, I quite thought that I was a “pure” vegetarian and it was all right to have milk and dairy products.

Since I am a practicing Carnatic vocalist, it was ingrained into me by my surroundings that milk was/is absolutely essential. Hence I used to take the routine glass of milk every night and things like that. For me, it wasn’t very difficult to turn vegan. Of course, when I told my wife not to pack the customary curd rice for office lunch, my wife just clicked in exasperation thinking that it was “one of my fads”. However somewhat even to my surprise I realized I really was serious and hence the ordeal of giving up dairy wasn’t all that difficult.

The first thing I realized that I lost weight within the first three months itself. I used to routinely be afflicted with colds which have also stopped. Overall, I can emphatically say that the health benefits have been immense.

Q 2: What does it mean to be vegan to you? Is it just not eating animal products or anything more than that? If it is more, how?

Mohan: Initially for me, it was “just giving up dairy products”. However, with time, the whole concept of not using animal products grew on me. And one by one, I started giving up leather items, silk and honey. I somehow personally feel that becoming vegan will ultimately make me more tranquil, less impatient and less fuming-and-fretting and learn to take disappointments in stride. I am confident that I will achieve that with the passage of time!

Q 3: You are a Carnatic vocal singer. What is the effect of stopping consuming animal products on your voice, career and life?

Mohan: I can’t say that stopping the consuming of animal products has directly had an effect on my voice per se. Perhaps this could be a subject for research! I think my *endurance* levels have definitely increased. Career wise, well, it hasn’t had a direct impact though I have been very comfortable and happy with my choice of becoming vegan!

Mohan Santhanam performing at a concert at Krishna Gana Sabha, Chennai

Q 4: I heard that both your wife and son have followed your suit. How did you convince them about the virtues of vegan lifestyle and how did you cope with the issues of veganism both at home and office when your family was not vegan?

Mohan: My son used to simply HATE milk. It used to be such an ordeal to give him that supposedly necessary glass of milk/Bournvita/Horlicks/Boost every morning and evening and I could see that he eventually just resigned himself to being pumped with animal fluids. It didn’t occur to us that he had a sort-of lacto-intolerance that was somehow naturally built into his constitution. My wife and I were just doing what most other parents do – pump children with lacto fluids.

However I always used to point out to my wife that maybe our son was a natural vegan! It took her sometime to accept that and we have now COMPLETELY stopped milk and milk products for him and he certainly hasn’t complained. I also feel certain that my son is definitely better health-wise.

My wife has also followed suit by turning vegan though she for her part says that she hasn’t experienced any positive. In all fairness, for a tea-lover like her, she’s been badly hit by turning vegan because she just detests tea made with soya-milk. I have tried making her ginger tea with soya milk but all she could declare on sipping that was intention to throw up if I continued to insist that she drink it! She now drinks green tea but it’s been a massive compromise for her.

My parents, especially my mother still thinks that I’m being very stupid by giving up milk. We argue about it consistently even now and I’m quite unable to make her see my point of view, I’m afraid. My office people think I’m some kind of a weirdo and some of them tease me about my being vegan (shows the lack of awareness unfortunately) but that doesn’t bother me at all!

Q 5: If the whole world listens to you, what would you say one thing most important to you?

Mohan: Go vegan – it’s the only solution to end all suffering, global warming and the evils that society seems to be alarmingly afflicted with today.

“The future is Vegan!”

Non Leather Cricket Balls

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 05:48:49 PST

For non leather/cruelty-free leather/synthetic leather/alternative leather/faux leather/non-animal leather/vegetarian/vegan shoes and accessories in India reviewed in this blog, you can click the story "Who Pays For Your Leather Shoes?".

The recently concluded cricket World Cup tournament saw animal rights organization PETA, highlight the issue of cricket balls made from animal skin. As part of this advocacy campaign, PETA made a plea to the International Cricket Council to ban ‘leather’ balls and replace them with synthetic ones. The nation had an opportunity to gain awareness about the reality of leather cricket balls that are made from the skins of cows and bulls by subjecting them to inconceivable torture. Is this the land of the “holy cow”, “sacred cow”, or “gau mata”, we may ask?

The campaign made people aware that cricket is not fun for these animals; for them, it means a slow, agonizing death. Not only are the animals made to undergo suffering, the human hands (tannery workers) in the murky leather goods industry, are, every minute, exposed to increased risks of respiratory infections and cancer. Besides, tanneries cause considerable environmental pollution.

This news report from The Times of India newspaper summarizes the appalling conditions under which leather balls are produced. You can also learn in-depth about the process of manufacturing leather cricket balls and other sports equipments containing animal products in this research report from the organization, Beauty Without Cruelty – India.

The alternative: Non leather cricket balls

The good news is that non leather cricket balls are not only possible, they are available at almost every sports store in the country. These balls are made of synthetic materials such as Poly Vinyl Chloride (PVC) and Poly Urethane (PU). A search on the internet reveals considerable information about non leather cricket balls. You can click here at tradeindia.com for a representative list of synthetic cricket ball manufacturers and exporters.

Usually, people use synthetic balls for day-to-day play because they are affordable and serve the purpose of a casual game. For tournaments, the International Cricket Council needs to revisit the need for leather balls. Why can’t we play with synthetic cricket balls—whether it be international, domestic, or roadside cricket? It only requires the will to stop destroying lives for the sake of human entertainment.

“As the so-called ‘gentleman’s game’, cricket should be gentle on animals and the environment by making a switch to synthetic balls. You are in a unique position to create a change. Won’t you please step up to bat for animals and the environment, by using your influence to ban leather balls?” ~PETA in a letter to the International Cricket Council~

Vegan Cosmetics from ‘Surya Brasil’, All India

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 07:35:48 PST

For more vegan/cruelty-free cosmetics in India reviewed in this blog, you can click here.

Surya Brasil is a Brazilian cosmetic brand that offers an organic line of 100% Vegan products. The company “brings together Nature, the science of Ayurveda, and technology thus harmonizing people with the environment while respecting the animal and plant kingdoms for the purpose of preserving a better world – one that is ecologically sustainable and socially just.”

Surya Brasil is certified Vegan by PETA and Vegan Action. A Vegan certification from these two organizations confirms that Surya Brasil products have not been tested on animals and are completely free of animal ingredients. For more information on the certifications, you can click here.

Surya Brasil has been in India for some time now (since 2005); the products are retailed through various stores and home deliveries on order. Details below.

Surya Brasil range available in India

The following range is available in India:

1. Amazonia Preciosa Line (100% organic)
Shampoo (five varieties)
Conditioner (five varieties)
Mask (five varieties)

2. Color Fixation Line (six varieties)

3. Fruit Line
Conditioner (six varieties)
Shampoo (six varieties)

4. Hair Color – Henna (seven varieties)

5. Hand Sanitizer and Moisturizer (one product)

6. Men’s Range – Sapien (four products)

Placing an order (for individual consumers)

Surya Brasil has presence in stores at Delhi, Chandigarh, Hyderabad, and Mumbai. However, placing an online order and getting them delivered at home is currently the best way to avail the products. Steps to order the products:

First, you need to select the product by visiting the links provided for each from the section, ‘Surya Brasil range available in India’ above. Simultaneously, you can check the list of products available in India by clicking the image on the right. This list is from 'IndiaBras', Surya Brasil’s partner in India and contains the price in Indian rupees.

Next, after you have selected the product you want to purchase, you can contact Ms. Priyanka Suryavanshi at the customer care number 09871139937 in New Delhi or write to her at rajsuryavanshi88@gmail.com/indiabras@psbedi.com to place your order. You should be able to receive your purchase 2-3 days after the company has received the payment.

Surya Brasil operations in India (for interested retail outlet owners)

Surya Brasil is currently operating through their India partner ‘IndiaBras Impex Pvt. Ltd.’ in India. If you are running a store and are interested in stocking Surya Brasil products, you can get in touch with Mr. Anil Bhutani at e-mail: anilbhutani@indiabras.com/surya@indiabras.com and at telephone numbers: 011-46055200/09891028877.

“I had bought two male chimps from a primate colony in Holland. They lived next to each other in separate cages for several months before I used one as a (heart) donor. When we put him to sleep in his cage in preparation for the operation, he chattered and cried incessantly. We attached no significance to this, but it must have made a great impression on his companion, for when we removed the body to the operating room, the other chimp wept bitterly and was inconsolable for days. The incident made a deep impression on me. I vowed never again to experiment with such sensitive creatures.” ~Christian Barnard, South African Cardiac Surgeon who performed the world’s first successful human-to-human heart transplant~

Non Leather Shoes and Accessories from 'Compassion Avenue'

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 06:47:58 PST

For more non leather/cruelty-free leather/synthetic leather/alternative leather/faux leather/non-animal leather/vegetarian/vegan shoes and accessories in India reviewed in this blog, you can click the story, "Who Pays For Your Leather Shoes?".

Some people are fortunate to experience their moment of epiphany. Such moments change their lives altogether and positively influence those of the others around them. Pradeep Taneja had his epiphany in 2004 when he, the former proprietor of a leather footwear and accessories business in Pune, listened to a divine calling and gave up animal-derived leather. He embraced cruelty-free, imported micro leather as the raw material for his venture. He christened his newly oriented business, ‘Compassion Avenue–A brand with a cause’.

As somebody who has seen the dark truths of the “genuine” leather industry, Mr.Taneja reveals:

“There are many animals, especially cows, slaughtered for leather. Meat is secondary. This ‘profitable’ industry runs on the large-scale ignorance of consumers. When we use “genuine” leather, we contribute to the killing of cows and other animals. If we stop using cruelty leather, the demand for it will decrease and so will the killing.”

According to one PETA estimation, most of the animal-derived leather is procured from developing countries such as China and India where animal protection laws are non-existent. You can read the exposé here. We have also pulled up a list of articles that have appeared in popular media carrying reports on the deadly leather industry in India. You can find the list at the bottom of this story.

Mr. Taneja envisions Compassion Avenue to grow into a popular brand with a chain of retail outlets selling cruelty-free products related to fashion and style. He elaborates:

“Compassion Avenue is just not another brand for making profit, it is an institution creating awareness against animal killing. I wish to offer cruelty-free counterparts for everything related to fashion without compromising on quality, style, and durability. I want to show that it is absolutely unnecessary to kill and torture animals for fashion. Along with making cruelty-free products available, Compassion Avenue will also create awareness amongst people to convert from a cruelty lifestyle to compassion towards all living beings.”

Compassion Avenue products

For men, Compassion Avenue offers footwear (costing Rs.550/- to Rs.650/-), belts (costing Rs.150/- to Rs.200/-), and wallets (costing Rs.150/-).

For women, Compassion Avenue offers footwear costing Rs.200/- to Rs.400/-. The women's footwear range will include more designs very soon. The forthcoming months will also see purses in the offering for women.

All the photographs in this story are of products from Compassion Avenue.

Compassion avenue business model, availability, and business opportunities

Mr. Pradeep Taneja’s business model is based on the manufacture and wholesale as well as direct retail of cruelty-free leather footwear and accessories. As a wholesaler, Mr. Taneja supplies the goods he manufacturers to different outlets in and around Pune at wholesale rates. As a direct retailer, Mr. Taneja runs an exclusive Compassion Avenue shop in Pune where retail customers can purchase the goods at a wholesale price.

If you are in Pune, you can visit Compassion Avenue at the following address: Shop No. 9, Ground Floor, Kumar Place, Near Corporation Bank, East Street, Camp.

If you are looking for business opportunities with Compassion Avenue anywhere in India, you can contact Mr. Taneja at his email compassionavenue@gmail.com or cellphone 09822604582 to carry it forward.

Media reports on the leather industry in India

Here are some reports on the cruel leather industry in India.You can click the titles for the respective articles.

A campaign to protect animals, Frontline

A feeling for native skins, Outlook

Compassion in fashion, NDTV Good Times

Global animal rights group pulls up India for barbaric cow slaughter, Indian Express

Action for our Planet

Retailers boycott Indian leather goods, CNN

There is no holy cow, Deccan Chronicle

“All beings are fond of life, like pleasure, hate pain, shun destruction, like life, long to live. To all life is dear.” ~Jain Acharanga Sutra at 1.2.3.~

Instant Non-GM Soy Milk Powder from ‘Bio Nutrients’ and a GIVEAWAY! (All India)

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 22:04:06 PDT

Many of us vegans like to have our tea or coffee with vegan milk. We tend to use nut milk prepared at home or soymilk available commercially in cardboard containers. How would it be if we were given the choice of a non GM, gluten-free, sugar-free, cholesterol-free, and preservatives-free instant soy milk powder!?

Well, we have this choice with us now! For the first time in India, all the goodness of non-GM soybean is now available in the convenient form of instant soy milk powder from Bio Nutrients. This spray dried soy milk powder called SuperFit is made from the choicest non GMO, whole soybeans grown in the soy heart land of Madhya Pradesh. The ingredient list includes nothing but soybeans.

The taste of SuperFit and how to use SuperFit instant soy milk powder

SuperFit soy milk powder has a very light taste, no beany aroma at all. In fact, our non vegan guests were surprised when they were casually informed that they just had tea with soy milk powder. They simply could not tell the difference!

SuperFit soy milk powder is also free flowing and easily dispersible in water. There is no lump formation. You must simply follow the directions on how to mix the powder indicated on the packet.

If you are the one who likes to have soy milk as a health drink, you can also use SuperFit to prepare a glassful of the beverage that could be anything from having it plain to whipping it up to make a delicious milkshake!

You can also use SuperFit soy milk powder to prepare bakery items, yoghurt, ice cream, and in any other milk application.

Please click the thumbnail image on the right to learn more about SuperFit soy milk powder in this brochure provided to us by the company.

Announcing the GIVEAWAY!

SuperFit is being positioned in the market gradually. As part of the introductory phase, the Company is offering a giveaway to all vegans who would like to sample the product before committing to regular use! If you want to avail the giveaway offer (free of cost) of a 200gm SuperFit pack, you can write to Mr. Abhijeet at info@bionutrients.in with your contact details. The giveaway offer is valid until April 30, 2011. Hurry!

Ordering SuperFit

Monthly subscription: After the giveaway is over, you can easily procure your stock of SuperFit on mail order on monthly subscription basis delivered at your doorstep from the latest batch of production. You can write at info@bionutrients.in or call at 07480-233855 to place your order. SuperFit is available in 200gm and 500gm packs with MRP of Rs.125/- and Rs.290/-, respectively.

Annual subscription offer: For regular customers, Bio Nutrients is also promoting an annual subscription offer wherein SuperFit is being made available through a bi-monthly courier of a 2 x 500gm pack. This serves a person's normal daily requirement for two months and you get SuperFit soy milk powder from the fresh lot each time. This facility is available throughout India that is serviced by couriers. The cost comes out to be Rs.2,700/- per year only, including courier charges.

To order SuperFit, you can fill the subscription form by clicking the thumbnail image on the right and sending the completed form at the postal address mentioned in the form alongwith the bank demand draft or cheque.

Direct purchase: SuperFit is also available at health stores in INA Market, Khan Market, and Le Marche Stores of Saket, Vasant Kunj, and Vasant Vihar in New Delhi. You will gradually find SuperFit in Bangalore at Spar outlets and later at Big Bazaar and More.

Another product from Bio Nutrient: Fresh Soy Tofu

Bio Nutrient has also launched fresh soy tofu. It is being made available in 200gm packs in stores through franchising. For more information, please direct your queries to info@bionutrients.in.

Endnote

Vegans shun animal milk primarily because of the inexplicable cruelty associated with its production. You can read a report by PETA titled Inside the Indian Dairy Industry to learn the truth behind cow's milk by clicking here. The health benefits of a no-animal-milk diet is backed by an impressive body of research that you can find out all about at the extensive site on the subject titled ‘Not Milk’. You can also click here to find out about the top five substitutes of animal milk.

“The unquestionable cruelty associated with the production of dairy produce has made it clear that lacto-vegetarianism is but a half-way house between flesh-eating and a truly humane, civilized diet, and we think, therefore, that during our life on earth we should try to evolve sufficiently to make the 'full journey'.” ~Donald Watson, Inventor of the word “Vegan” and Founder of the Vegan Society~

Blissfully and Deliciously Vegan: 'Fry's Vegetarian', Nine cities

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 09:23:03 PDT

What does it take for vegans to add on to their list of food options?

What does it take for vegetarians to eat delicious and nutritious egg-free, meat-free, and dairy-free protein-rich food?

What does it take for non-vegetarians to make an ethical, earth-friendly, healthy, and delicious food choice?

The answer to all the above is Fry’s. Fry’s represents a range of healthy, non GM, cholesterol free, artificial colorants free, added preservatives free, hydrogenated and trans fats free frozen foods made primarily from vegetable protein, wheat protein, wheat flour, and flavored with spices extracted from plant-based sources. Fry’s products are blissfully and deliciously Vegan!

The roots

Fry’ is an acclaimed international brand for a range of cruelty-free frozen foods started by Wally and Debbie Fry in South Africa in the year 1992. For more information on how Fry's was set up, you can click here. Fry’s has recently been introduced in India by Mr. Gurpreet Singh and his wife, Beena Kaur, entrepreneurs of Indian origin who lived in South Africa for over a decade.

Mr. Singh, who discontinued non-vegetarian food four years ago and naturally shed 18 kilos of unhealthy body weight as a result, has never felt healthier before. Responding to what motivated him to get Fry’s to India he says,

“When I was in South Africa, I became aware of the vast tracts of land that were being destroyed in the Amazon rainforests to make way for growing GM grains to feed factory farmed animals. It became clear to me that the destruction of the ‘lungs of the world’ is the number one cause for global warming.

I wanted to reduce my carbon footprint at any cost and stop contributing my bit towards global warming. Fry’s products gave me and my family a new life and helped us make the switch very easily. We are now healthier with a clearer conscience than before. I felt I could help others too to ‘see’ that what we eat impacts the environment. Being a businessman, bringing Fry’s to India was a logical step to take. Through Fry’s I wish to appeal to people’s compassion.

I feel that any intelligent person should stop and take a moment to think about what they are putting in their mouths. Consuming factory farmed animals harms everyone and cutting back or stopping altogether is good for animal rights, the environment, and especially health.”

We couldn’t agree more with that. Mr. Singh’s associate Srishti Handa who stopped consuming meat more than a year ago after reading blogs describing the treatment of animals in slaughterhouses, feels that there couldn’t have been a better job for her in India than to contribute in popularizing Fry’s. She explains,

“As an animal lover, giving up meat for me was a natural extension of my love for animals, there was no reason for me to think twice.”

Fry’s is not mock meat

While Fry’s products have provided a plant-based analogue to meat and may have assisted many non-vegetarians to eat ethically, it is not “mock-meat”.

Braai

“It is simply a healthy, wholesome, and delicious plant-based food in its own right that can be enjoyed by all,” says Mr. Gurpreet Singh.

In fact, we too were in for a pleasant surprise. As vegans who are certain that we can never enjoy a meat analogue, the texture nor the taste of Fry’s felt offensive. It is not like mock-meat products sold in the West where a lot of effort is put into replicating the texture of processed animal flesh and in its wake use food additives harmful for the body.

Rolls

Fry's lays more emphasis on the taste. In fact, Fry’s products help drive home an important point: that animal flesh does not have a taste of its own. It is only when the flesh is combined with plant-based food-stuffs such as different spices, onions, ginger, garlic, and tomatoes that it acquires the taste of “non-veg” food. The same taste can be replicated with plant-based foods. The taste is not an exclusive non-veg taste!

Fry’s products can mean different things to different people who have decided to eat ethically and responsibly. We leave you to try them!

Fry’s range available in India

Eleven products from Fry’s are available in India. They are as follows with brief cooking instructions from Fry’s. You can also click the product names for more information.

Strips

1. Fry’s Vegetarian Braai Flavour Country Herb Sausages: All Fry’s foods are winners for the barbeque, but this traditional boerewors-seasoned sausage brings home the taste and aroma of the true South African braai.

Nuggets

2. Fry’s Vegetarian Chicken Style Burgers: Tasty burgers made with Fry's famous protein, Protam, authentically spiced and flavoured, coated in crisp, golden crumbs.

Cottage Pie

3. Fry’s Vegetarian Chicken Style Nuggets: Each delicious Fry’s Vegetarian Protam Golden Crumbed Nugget is carefully shaped into a bite sized chunk, evenly coated with crumbs before pre-cooking.

4. Fry’s Vegetarian Chicken Style Strips: Slender cut strips made from famous protein Protam and authentically flavoured. Ideal for wraps, salads, and oriental dishes.

5. Fry’s Vegetarian Chunky Style Strips: Take a wok on the wild side, splash in and sizzle up some sesame oil, exotic vegetables and throw in a handful of these wonderful Strips—toss in some even wilder rice (pre-cooked of course), mix through and serve on a large palm leaf.

6. Fry’s Vegetarian Golden Crumbed Schnitzel: Each delicious Fry’s Vegetarian Golden Crumbed Schnitzel is carefully formed before being evenly and generously sprinkled with tasty crumbs.

7. Fry’s Vegetarian Original Hot Dogs: These Hot Dog Viennas are so close to the real thing, just put them in a roll, drizzle on your favourite sauce, and see for yourself!

8. Fry’s Vegetarian Polony/Slicing Sausage: Fry’s Vegetarian Polony is so versatile and delicious! Use it in sandwiches, pizzas or by itself, the possibilities are endless!

9. Fry’s Vegetarian Spiced Burgers: Delicious Fry’s Vegetarian Spiced Burgers have a truly unique and subtle South Indian flavour created with a complex blend of spices.

10. Veg Express Cottage Pie: A perfectly nutritionally balanced, low fat, mouth watering meal! A traditional pie topped with light, fluffy mash potato and filled with hearty Fry’s Vegetarian Mince, lentils, peas, carrots, and rich onion gravy.

11. Veg Express Sausage Rolls: Absolutely delicious! These special crisp puff pastry encases a delicious Fry’s Vegetarian Sausage with wholegrain mustard.

Where available?

Below is the list of stores in the different cities where Fry’s products are available.

Bangalore

Hypercity
Namdhari's
Spar
Subway: Seven Subway stores where you will find Fry’s in the menu by the name ‘Veggie Supreme’.
Total

Chandigarh

Punjab Stores

Chennai

All areas: Splendid Fine Foods Outlets
All areas: Tanny’s Outlets
Besant Nagar: Mercado Gourmet Store, Nilgiri’s Super Market (Whitefield)
Chamier’s Rd: Amma Naan
Chetpet: Vitaan Super Market
Gandhi Nagar: Nilgiri’s Super Market (Suhail Enterprises)
Gemini: Elite Bazaar Convenio Store
Harrington Road: Mercado Gourmet Store
Kellys: Hot Chops Cold Storage
Kilpauk: Nilgiri’s (Limras Enterprises)
Moolakadai: Essen Store
T. Nagar Super Market: Hot Chops Cold Storage

Delhi

All areas: Modern Bazaar
All areas: Nature's Basket
Alaknanda: Green Chick Chop, Honey Money Top
Ashok Vihar: Sardar Meat Shop
Chanakya Puri: Kishan Sons
Chattarpur: Chick 'n' Salsa
Civil Lines: Exchange Store
Defence Colony: Green Chick Chop, The Taste
Greater Kailash M Block Market: HM Morning Store
Jor Bagh: Steak House
Kailash Colony: Fresh & Frozen
Khan Market: Meat by Blanco, Sugar & Spice
New Friends Colony: BNW Hospitality
Rajouri Garden: Soni Bakers
Rohini: More
Saket: Chick 'n' Salsa, Le Marche
Subhash Nagar: Spar
Vasant Kunj: Green Chick Chop, Le Marche

Gurgaon

Green Chick Chop
Modern Bazaar
Nature’s Basket
Picasso: Central Arcade, Galleria

Hyderabad

Hypercity
Q-mart
Ruchi Idoni
Spar

Mumbai

All areas: Nature's Basket
Hypercity
Tata Star Bazaar

Noida

Debon
Levenere
R&R

Pune

All areas: Nature’s Basket
All areas: Spar
Dorabjee’s

Fry’s for a cause

From our conversation with Mr. Gurpreet Singh, it becomes increasingly clear that he has helped bring Fry’s to India with a vision. He explains,

“Our school contact program will get underway very soon where we take the opportunity to make young minds aware of the issue of global warming and how our food habits contribute towards it. We are open to teaming up with any group or individual who feel about the issue.”

You can read more about Fry’s business position in the context of global warming by clicking here and Fry’s commitment to Mother Earth by clicking here. You can also get connected to Fry’s page on Facebook for updates, activities, etc. by clicking here and on the Twitter page by clicking here.

Some tips to use Fry’s products

All Fry’s products are pre-cooked and require minimal effort to produce mouthwatering concoctions. These extremely versatile products can be grilled, baked, steamed, barbequed, or even fried. However, we recommend that you avoid cooking in a microwave oven as microwave cooking compromises on the taste.
You can also combine them in curries especially using the strip. A simple concoction with ginger, garlic, onions, tomatoes, vegan yoghurt, garam masala, potatoes, and fresh coriander leaves produces a finger licking curry all set to go great with hot steamed rice.
You can also take inspiration from the numerous recipes on the Fry’s website by clicking here.
Try the Veg. Express Cocktail Sausage Rolls and watch them as they puff up in the oven, an absolute delight to watch as well as to eat!

Endnote

Fry’s is one product of its kind in India. It exists on the shelves of stores with other similar if not same products that are neither vegan nor from 100% ethical companies. Fry’s represents a brand that is Vegetarian/Vegan, conveying the larger message that in this age of globalization and capitalism, an ethical large-scale business is possible.

Prices will drop considerably after Fry's factory comes up in Asia (coming months). Cheers to Fry’s!

Did you know?

A 2006 United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report entitled Livestock’s Long Shadow concludes that global animal agriculture contributes more greenhouse gas emissions (in CO2 equivalents), an astonishing 18 percent of the total, more than all forms of transportation. Furthermore, the global warming potential and effect of these gases is more striking since methane and nitrous oxide are 23 and 296 times more harmful than carbon dioxide.

Organic-Vegan Peanut Butter from ‘Timbaktu Organic’, (Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Mysore, Pondicherry, & Puttaparthy)

noreply@blogger.com (Vegan India!) — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 21:21:51 PDT

This organic-vegan peanut butter is the outcome of a budding producer-owned co-operative called Timbaktu Organic. Timbaktu Organic is a project of The Timbaktu Collective, an organization that has been working to respond to the agrarian crisis in the 140 villages of Anantapur District in Andhra Pradesh since 1990. Timbaktu Organic believes that organic food benefits the farmer (especially the landless and marginalized), the land (that is subject to chronic drought), and us, the consumer.

The Timbaktu Organic co-operative called Dharani FaM Co-operative Society grows to market a range of organic produce such as millet, rice, pulse, and peanuts. While some of the peanuts are used to make peanut powder, oil, and laddus, some are used to make yummy peanut butter. Alongwith the organically grown peanuts, this peanut butter also contains a little organic sugar and salt.

Availability

The peanut butter from Timbaktu Organic is available in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Mysore, Pondicherry, and Puttaparthy. The stores that stock them in the cities mentioned is something you can find out by communicating at the contact details given here. We got this peanut butter from the Mother Earth store in Domlur in Bangalore.

Important points to remember about organically grown food

To understand why organic, you can read a short note from Timbaktu Organic by clicking here. As vegans who believe in eating responsibly, ethically, and healthy, we are big fans of organic products. Some key takeaways from the note by Timbaktu Organic is presented below.

Organic farming is sustainable—this means food can be produced indefinitely, benefitting the farmer while at the same time not causing any irreversible damage to the health of the ecosystem.

Organic food is nutritious and tasty. Organic farming involves selection of crop varieties for nutrition and taste rather than for size, appearance, and shipping characteristics. Organic food is richer in vitamins, minerals and fibre, and retains nutrient levels for much longer.

Organic food helps your body develop resistance to disease as it has higher levels of the essential nutrients that your body requires to fight infection. You will also have more energy because you consume lower levels of toxins and chemicals that slow down your body.

“Every food purchase supports the system that delivers it; if large-scale chemical production methods are damaging to the environment, then purchasing these foods supports the damage. One main goal of organic farming is minimizing impact to the environment.” ~Timbaktu Organic~