November 14, 2007

Vegan MoFo Day 14 - Eggs

I get a lot of questions about veganism, but my favorites by far have to do with eggs. For some reason, it's very easy for people to understand the whole "no milk or cheese" thing, but eggs are a whole different story. Usually the conversation goes something like this:

"So you don't eat any meat, right? Like a regular vegetarian?"

"Right."

"And no fish or chicken?"

"Right, I don't eat fish or chicken meat."

"Ok, so what about cheese, do you eat cheese?"

"Nope, no cheese."

"No cheese! Wow. I don't think I could give up cheese. But what about milk?"

"No milk, either. I never drank milk, not even as a kid. The only thing I used to use milk for was cereal, so..."

"Ok so basically nothing from the cow, right?!?"

"Yes, that's exactly right."

"So you eat eggs though, don't you, like, for protein?"

"No, no eggs. I don't eat eggs."

"Wait. No eggs? Why not? What do eggs have in them?"

What do eggs have in them is my favorite question of all time.

"Well, they're kind of like baby chickens, so that's meat, which I don't eat."

Usually people get mad at me at this point for saying 'baby chickens.'

"No eggs. Hmph. No eggs."

"Yeah. Think of it like this. I don't eat anything that pees or poops, and I don't eat anything that comes from anything that pees or poops."

Pee and poop usually makes them forget the whole 'baby chickens' thing.

"Oh! Hahahahaha! Ok, I get it now! No eggs! Hahahahaha!"

"Right. No eggs."

What about caviar? Do you eat caviar?

haha. I love fish eggs! In fact, I love fish.

I was vegetarian for many years (not now) and I tried veganism for maybe 3 days. I could not adapt to no dairy. I love cheese, butter, cheesy butter, butter covered with cheese, double cheesy butter cheese, etc. And chocolate milk. And Ben and Jerry's.

Eggs I can live without. Wait. Not really. Souffle! OMG, I love souffles. Is there anyway to have a vegan souffle? What about quiche? No vegan quiche either.

Good god woman, how do you live?!! :) I am enjoying this series though - I've learned a lot.

Well, they aren't really baby chickens most of the time. No roosters=no babies. (Something like Balut is entirely different, but just seeing that makes me wanna puke, and I'm a full on omnivore.) Not that this changes the validity of your whole argument. I'm just being a bit of a pedant.

"So you don't eat any meat, right? Like a regular vegetarian?"

"Right."

"And no fish or chicken?"

"Right, I don't eat fish or chicken meat."

Ah, you've hit on one of my big pet peeves. I do not understand why people don't seem to classify chicken and fish as meat. How is it different than beef or pork?

Even worse, how does someone not get that when you don't eat anything that comes from an animal that includes milk and eggs. Do these people really not get where they come from? It's not that complicated. (Now when you have to start explaining Jell-O and food colorings and all sorts of other things like that, I can see how it might get complicated.)

Trix - Oh, you should see me. Just wasting away to nothing. Ha! I kind of wish they'd start putting like fish oil or something in Jujubes because I can eat a whole box of those mofos in one day!

Craig - OH MY GOD I had never heard of balut before! I just looked it up, and EWWWWWWWWW! Who the hell would EAT THAT?

Oh, the Jell-O thing! AHAHAHAHA! I'd almost forgotten about that!

I used to tell people that eggs are chicken ovaries but the baby chickens comment gets a much funnier reaction. :)