thought about this sort of issue because, although I'm not a vegetarian (much less a vegan), I've wondered how vegans would protect themselves from vegetables that were, for example, fertilized by animal dung (or is this even an issue?).

Long comment made shorter, it must be very difficult to have to monitor the food chain, which is what seems to be required, to meet one's dietary standards.

I'm a buddhist, can I come to your next BBQ?

is a parve (non-dairy, non-meat) kosher designation.

Or maybe "citizen" journalism is a better term. I've been vegan for 15 years--only the first year of which I was obsessively diligent. ("No egg in the pasta, right?") I don't eat out that often--but I was really impressed with this fabulous reporting job.

If a place makes a claim of "vegan-ness" then they better damn well be exactly that.

Well. . .I hear ya. I'm a long time (23 years) vegetarian (not vegan) and I do sort of wince when I see the veggie burgers cooked side by side with the hamburgers (or the tofu dogs cooked side-by-side with the meat dogs, like at Top Dog in Berkeley recently). But it's all good; I don't freak out over it. Keep in mind that after not eating meat for so long, one's body loses its ability to handle it well. So a little meat juice might cause some gastronomical indisposition. Be gentle with them/us.

As a side note, my partner's brother made us veggie burgers during a family get-together and he used a separate spatula for them. I found that very impressive indeed.

Kosher marshmallows, for example, often contain gelatin derived from fish, which is decidedly not vegan.

but I do have a separate grill for my vegan and vegetarian friends. There are a lot of vegetarians and vegans in Portland, and it seems like the hospitable thing to do.

As a meat eater, I prefer that the veggie "meats" be cooked on a seperated grill. Biting into what you believe to be a juicy meat burger but isn't sucks.

I heard once that cola(Coke, Pepsi, RC etc.) isn't vegan because the "carmel" color is enhanced with beef boullion. Any one know if this is true?

vegans (i am one) should worry less about what their veggie burger touches on the grill & focus on the intention of their eating habits. i know it may shock some of my vegan comrades to learn this, but it is impossible to conduct one's life without ever harming another living thing. That's just a condition of being living creatures ourselves.

But while we may never be able to completely eliminate the suffering we cause, we can diminish it. Not eating a veggie burger b/c it touched meat on the grill does not diminish suffering - it only increases suffering by pissing off your hosts, who have invited you into their home. Not buying the hamburger to take to the bbq - priceless.

I've always thought that the "inability to handle meat after long vegetarianism" thing was an urban legend. I've often heard vegetarians say it, but have had several doctors tell me that it was hogwash. I'm a long term vegetarian, but on the rare instances I eat meat (once or twice a year), I've never felt the slightest ill effects, and unless one had a food allergy, I don't understand the reasoning behind why one would.

It's funny how people have different definitions of "meat." I went to a restaurant once where the waiter offered chicken as a vegetarian alternative. I guess it was sort of like the Catholic definition of fish as "non-meat."

Suggests that a sincere Buddhist "should" never refuse an invitation or decline an offered meal.

As a frequent nosher of vegan faux meats and seafoods, which I buy from a Chinese wholesaler in Rockville, MD, who in turn gets it from, yes, Taiwan, I can attest to the fact that shenanigans have occurred in this trade, to wit:

For several years we vegans and vegetarians around D.C. would remark on how incredibly realistic a certain vegan shrimp tasted. I would even bring it to my carnivorous relatives, and they would all proclaim it as good as the real thing.

And why not? Turns out those Taiwanese buddhists weren't so devout after all: there was real shrimp powder in those faux shrimp! Once the word got out, my man in Rockville stopped selling the stuff. He sells something else now, but I've chewed on pencil erasers that had more flavor, so I don't buy it. I'll stick with the vegan mutton and vegan salmon, thank you very much. So yes, all hail the vegan inspector general.

P.S. Andrew, if ever I should get invited to one of your barbeques, I'll bring my own hibachi. That's right, I don't want any of yer damn animal scraps messing up my veggie burgers and ruining 26 years of a good thing (with the exception of deception by certain monks whose karma now resides in the toilet; I hope they come back as dung beetles).

I know that as a raw vegan, I'm far outside the mainstream--an understatement! But it's important for those of us who eat only certain foods to know what's in the dishes we're ordering in restaurants.

It will be a while before any municipality has its own "raw vegan" restaurant inspector, but why not? Not so different from Orthodox Jews who opt to eat kosher food, many raw vegans (also known as raw foodies/foodists) want to know such things as that:

--The almonds used in restaurant recipes are unpasteurized (especially since the USDA requires most to be pasteurized and still allows their labels to saw they are "raw"),

--The agave nectar and cashews are really raw,

--The dried fruits have not been dried at temperatures over 117 degrees Fahrenheit (beyond which the foods' digestive enzymes are destroyed),

--The extra virgin olive oil is really extra virgin and really olive oil. (See a New Yorker magazine article from a year or two ago about the Italian olive oil industry if you don't know what I'm referring to.)

Not everyone is a food purist, but there ought to be a highest common denominator to protect those who are. It certainly can't hurt the non-purists among us.

Judy Pokras

editor/founder

RawFoodsNewsMagazine.com

Celebrating the raw vegan lifestyle online since 2001 with breaking news, authoritative info and fun features.