I just never liked the taste of meat-- I'd have liked to keep to pesco-lacto vegetarianism, myself, though. Alas, it was not to be.
We're fortunate that DD has been a hardened carnivore her entire life, I suppose. She and her dad have little choice, given their food allergies. They truly lack a lot of means of getting adequate protein intake otherwise, because entire food groups are off-limits to both of them, and some things can't even be in the house at all.
I eat only grass-fed/humanely raised 'red meat' (pork, beef, and rabbit) and poultry as my non-vegetarian protein sources.
I might not be a vegetarian, but anything I'm eating needs to be. LOL.
Oh-- and fish as long as it was caught by someone known to me and I can count on it being uncontaminated by shellfish. I really like fish.
I probably eat four to six servings a week of various animal protein sources.
My advice isn't likely to be very useful re: strict vegetarianism, since mine isn't based in philosophical objections
per se and I have no trouble preparing my meat (such as it is), I suppose. My other feeling is that if I couldn't bring myself to dress it out, I wouldn't eat it. If you have to fool yourself about where it comes from... well, you know what I'm saying, I suppose. There's no meat fairy.
However, along the same lines as Val's recommendation, I encourage others to read not only The Omnivore's Dilemma, but also Pollan's other book
In Defense of Food, and
Just Food, which is far more nuanced in many ways, and does a better job of the
environmental side of food choices. It discusses the ethical considerations of food choice
very intelligently.
My DD read that book when she was about 9 or 10, I think. We had some great family discussions about several of those books.
