Meat: It isn’t for dinner

For reasons detailed elsewhere on this site, I’m transitioning into vegetarianism with an intermediary stop in pescetarianism. I stopped eating land-based meats entirely, and I’ve been weaning myself off of fish  to the point where I no longer desire it or order it when given the choice. I haven’t had much desire to eat meat. It’s still gross to me as a food and a concept.

But meat has always seemed as somewhat of a forbidden fruit. The smell, the fond memories, and the taste were all hyped up in my mind: sort of a culinary version of “distance makes the heart grow fonder” sort of thing.

Before the Scandinavia trip which I recently wrote about, Tracey and I were discussing if we were going to eat meat while we were travelling. I wasn’t too thrilled about the idea, but she made some pretty good points about the travelling experience and tasting new foods, so I was won over to the idea to eat some while abroad.

She started eating small amounts two weeks before we left. I did it cold (warm?) turkey and didn’t have any until we arrived. Prior to the trip, the last hotdog I had was in October 2010, and before that it was early summer 2010. Remember, of course, that I was occasionally eating fish.

I consumed pølser in Copenhagen.

I ate part of a Swedish meatball in Stockholm.

I digested reindeer in Helsinki.

And it wasn’t all that I had cracked it up to be. If anything, vegetarian foods focus on spices and tastes other than meat. But meat-based foods just kind of view veggies and spices as a bit of an afterthought.

Surprisingly, meat just wasn’t that good.

Hunh.

I’m still glad I tried it, but if anything it almost reaffirmed that I made the right decision in choosing to cut it out of my diet.

Fish is all that remains between me and true vegetarianism. I’m stopping my once-a-month allowance of fish and just consuming it on special family occasions that happen once a quarter or so.