Wednesday evening roundup

Forgive me if I've already blogged about the McDonald's Twitter backlash; it's so awesome, it's worth posting twice.

Meat and processed food are bad for the planet. So is industrial agriculture, and that's manifesting itself locally.

Josh Ozersky is wrong. I can see what he means: all things being equal, a cook not limiting him or herself according to health considerations has more options; but that doesn't mean he/she will necessarily come up with tastier food. I make very healthy, very tasty food all the time. Furthermore, sugar, fat, and salt are addictive; people who are used to a plethora of the three will not immediately appreciate foods that have less of them, but that's not to say they can't come to appreciate such food with time.

Now then, on nutrition--first of all, a disclaimer: I haven't read this whole thing because it's long-winded, but she makes some good points and some questionable points. I agree that we shouldn't broadly extrapolate our own health experiences (within reason). I roll my eyes when people go on about how everyone would benefit from giving up wheat and/or gluten; I know that I feel worse when I give up wheat. I'm Russian; my people eat wheat. I have to be careful about my quinoa consumption. I know one is an ancient grain and one has had the $hit modified out of it over the centuries, but I've never had any problems with it. And this is why I don't argue that veganism is dietarily ideal for everyone; I didn't go vegan to feel better, and I was almost surprised when I did. I went vegan for environmental/animal cruelty reasons (see above), which was huge in the adjustment period before I reached the point where I naturally didn't want dairy or eggs. Also huge was focusing on all the great food I'd never thought of before, rather than on the things I "couldn't" eat. But you've heard this all before. The take-away here is, what works magic for you isn't necessarily a panacea for everyone.

On the topic of Trader Joe's: it would be three strikes, but I've nowhere else to go. I discovered that one of the lemons in the bag I bought on Saturday had gone completely moldy, and one of the apples in the bag of organic Pink Ladies turned out to be a conventional, waxy Braeburn (you really could taste the pesticides); and, weeks ago, my boyfriend was mislead by store employees into buying non-vegan "soy" cheese with casein in it. Sigh.