Kate O'Neill and then some

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Reformed mathlete turned analytics geek. Vegan (mainly raw) foodie, cat lover, occasional gardener, songwriter, smartass. Founder and CEO of [meta]marketer, a marketing optimization agency in Nashville.

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Is vegan food healthy, by definition?

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via bonappetit.com

A recent article on BonAppetit.com, "I'm Sick of People Thinking Vegan Food is Healthy," takes issue with the mock cheeses and meats in vegan restaurants that are meant to be palate-pleasers and imitative artistry. The author, Jason Kessler, points out that these items often make liberal use of oils, refined grains, and other less-virtuous ingredients which, while still adhering to the vegan-means-plant-based-and-cruelty-free precept, provide little to no nutritional value.

The article itself isn't inherently condemning of vegan diets, and it's not a bad reminder of what's (not) healthy, but it does conflate a few approaches. The faux meats and cheeses offered in vegan restaurants (and sold in traditionally healthier food stores like Whole Foods) may be nutritionally questionable, but they do serve a purpose. In fact, they're generally there to serve a few purposes: as accommodation for non-vegans dining, perhaps, with vegan friends; as comfort and a reasonable backslide for people just transitioning to a vegan diet; and as an occasional gleeful indulgence for established vegans looking for a decadent treat.

In other words, if you're eating out at a vegan restaurant to be healthy, then by all means, order something healthy. (Where healthy means: plant stuff that is served in a state closest to whole.) Vegan restaurants tend to offer a broader range of plant-based whole food meals than other restaurants, and they can be a great place to experience foods you may have been otherwise unfamiliar with. Many people are still unfamiliar with quinoa, for example, or how to prepare kale at home. Vegan menus often offer variations on these ingredients that may be less superficially gratifying but far more nutritionally rewarding than that heaping bowl of mac-and-quasi-cheese.

If, however, you already follow a generally healthy vegan lifestyle, buffalo-style seitan and other junk food on a vegan restaurant menu can be a welcome splurge, and eating this kind of food once in a while probably does very little long-term damage to one's health, while providing the vegan with a "cheat" option that's still cruelty-free. And in the end, that once-in-a-while indulgence may help vegans stay vegan longer, which is a strategic win for health: there is considerable research to support a good many health benefits to a long-term vegan diet that's based on (not exclusively limited to, but based on) whole-foods-style plant-centric eating.

So while the faux meats and pseudo-cheese on the vegan restaurant menu may not be healthy, per se, as occasional treats they're not completely inconsistent with a healthy lifestyle.

Whatever your diet, your eating choices should be all about finding a balance that keeps you motivated for long-term results. At least that's what I think. Which is why I splurged on a nachos plate and a BLT burger last week during my semi-annual visit to Chicago Diner, and I felt just fine about it the next day as I went right back to munching on super-nutritious (and still delicious) raw food. My dietary balance is heavily skewed toward raw vegan superfoods, but just happens to include a serving of veggie bacon now and then.

Filed under  //  health   raw food   veg*nism  
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Visiting Nashville? Here's the local's guide to what's cool.

In the past year, a few friends from former towns and workplaces have begun to visit Nashville. I couldn't be more delighted, of course - I want to show off my adopted hometown - but invariably, the preparatory emails involve some sort of "what should I plan to do?"-type of question. Eventually, I wrote up a somewhat lengthy answer, and have since re-used it multiple times, and am now sharing it here, with you.

As far as where to stay, I generally find the Hotel Indigo locations are pretty nice, as somewhat higher-end chains go, and in Nashville there are two: one right downtown and one on West End, so parking is easier, but then there's not much within walking distance so you pretty much have to drive everywhere. So whichever you prefer. The downtown one is in a beautiful historic building right around the corner from my office so I meet folks for cocktails there every so often and at least the lobby and lounge have a nice feel.

You HAVE to schedule at least one late night to do a circuit of the honky-tonks on Lower Broadway (which means Broadway between the river and 5th or 6th Avenue), because as cheesy and OMG-touristy as they are, they are uniquely Nashville. Don't miss Robert's Western World, where you can hear some really quality Western swing music (because the music in Nashville is generally, even if you don't like it, at least played incredibly well) in a good old-fashioned dive that serves PBR unironically alongside deep-fried pickles, and shelves cowboy boots along the wall. I shit you not. 

But then you have to get away from the tourist façade, too, and check out places like Five Points, the hipster-ish neighborhood in East Nashville, where you can do brunch at Marché and possibly spot Jack White or Ben Folds, or Hillsboro Village, where you can have locally-roasted coffee at Fido and probably see hit songwriters meeting up before or during co-writing sessions, not that you'll recognize them (but with training you can recognize the type), or the more suburban neighborhood of Green Hills, with its slightly upscale mall and new-ish shopping center anchored by Whole Foods, where you might spot Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman. 

And you'll definitely have to come to my neighborhood -- Historic Germantown -- and see some of the beautifully restored antebellum homes and eat at my favorite restaurant in town, City House, where you might spot Robert Plant at the bar, or my second-favorite, Germantown Café, where you might spot country legend Marty Stuart, and buy a truffle or two from The Cocoa Tree. I've never spotted anyone famous at The Cocoa Tree, but that's probably because I'm too fixated on how good the chocolate is. :) 

Other Nashville highlights: 
  • Las Paletas popsicles, in the up-and-coming 12 South neighborhood, where you could also check out Burger Up, a deceptively named gourmet burger joint, Mafiaoza's for pizza, 12 South Taproom for a solid beer selection, or Rumours wine bar for, well, wine. 
  • Our local craft brew favorite, Yazoo, has a taproom that's a local favorite, with the newer Jackalope brewery nearby. They're both very near the neighborhood known as "The Gulch" and there are some fun places to explore there as well. 
  • Speaking of Yazoo, after they moved into their new location, the space they used to occupy was snapped up by the new Corsair Artisan distillery. They're located in the old Marathon Motor Works building, and it's got a great decaying brick factory feel about the place. 
  • Oh, and if you find yourself walking around downtown, you should wander into the Hatch Show Print store. The Hatch style is immediately recognizable as the classic American letterpress poster, and you can browse older prints to buy here. 

There's much, much more, but that's probably enough to get your planning started. :) Feel free to pass along to your traveling buddies, and if any of you have questions, definitely shoot them my way. I'm totally smitten with my adopted hometown. 

Locals: what did I miss that you love? 

Visitors: what did you discover that was really cool that isn't in this list?

Filed under  //  nashville  
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One of those elusive Big City Benefits

People in Nashville seem to be fond of saying that Nashville is a big city with a small town feel. Which is charming enough, except that anyone who's lived in a city that could proportionally be called "big" -- as in, say, over 1 million people within the city limits -- would argue that Nashville is in no way a "big city." And I've sometimes heard recent transplants complain that this town doesn't have enough "big city benefits."

Having grown up in the Chicagoland area, lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, and having spent a great deal of time in L.A. and New York, and having visited cities like Paris and Shanghai, I have some familiarity with big city benefits. And it is with that view that I tell you about one of the most big-city-minded things happening in Nashville lately, which might sound decidedly small-town American: a buffet.

Mind you, it's not just any buffet: it's a vegan buffet. A vegan buffet that takes place once a week on the one day when the only vegan restaurant in town is normally closed. A vegan buffet with a rotating themed cuisine style. A vegan buffet where a percentage of the proceeds go to progressive and socially conscious charities. 

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If you're still not connecting with what makes this such a big city phenomenon, allow me to explain. In my experience, making use of idle resources is a decidedly urban characteristic. From raves in the '80s and '90s to pop-up shops in the '10s, when prime spaces in crowded areas go unused, people find ways to use them. 

Combine that with the Millenial instinct towards social good and unconventional commerce, and, well, we've got a pretty progressive thing happening here. 

And the kicker is, it's good. So far I've tried the Asian, BBQ, St. Paddy's, and Mexican nights. I was out of town for the Thai night, and I hated to miss it. I'm looking forward to breakfast for dinner next week.

If you're new to town from somewhere with more of this kind of mixed-up cool stuff going on, you should definitely check it out, and don't worry: more like this will be happening soon, I'm sure. This may not exactly be a "big" city, but it's one of the most creative cities I've ever encountered. Once people catch on to the ways we can make greater use of our existing resources, you'll be seeing more and more creative options come to life. In the meantime, eat up. It's for a good cause.

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How Quitting Smoking Works

It's been my experience that people don't describe things very well. 

Karsten has mentioned this phenomenon, too. When he was getting ready to use a jackhammer for the first time, he asked several people who said they'd used a jackhammer what the experience was like. Consistently, they were unable to give very compelling descriptions beyond single-word statements like "powerful" or they might say it was indescribable. 

But after the first day Karsten used one, he could describe it concisely: "It has the force to break ground and move downwards all by itself. But you have to use your whole body to pull it back up and reposition it to let it go down again."

In the same way, I find that when I read accounts of people attempting to quit smoking, there is a similar shortage of precision and specificity about what to expect. I smoked. I started when I was very young and quit when I was in my early 20s. It was difficult to quit, and it took several attempts before I could do it.

My friend Beth just celebrated a year of being smoke-free. I've seen folks comment on her Facebook wall that she's inspired them to try to quit. So for the sake of anyone who might be thinking about quitting, I would like to share my explanation of how quitting works: very simply, you make a plan not to smoke. And then you encounter some situation -- your commute, after sex, when you're stressed, whatever -- where you would normally smoke that you weren't prepared to handle. So maybe you go ahead and light one up. But you think about alternatives. You make another plan, only this time you've accounted for the situation you encountered. Maybe you carry carrot sticks. Maybe you have a stress ball to squeeze. Maybe you have a friend on speed dial. And maybe you encounter another context, and you smoke another one, and you make another plan. And you do this until you don't encounter any more situations you aren't prepared for.

And when that happens, you're a non-smoker.

Let me know in the comments if your experience differs. I'd love to hear alternative approaches that have worked.

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Carnism and the social rejection of conscious eating

Not only that, but many of them get angry if you try to shed light on where their meat originates—just telling people you're vegan can sometimes inspire hostility. That’s because people know, on some level, that animal agriculture is horrific but support it anyway. By raising awareness of the reality of animal agriculture, you shed light on that moral discomfort that most people feel at the idea of eating animals.
via good.is

Had an interesting discussion over lunch with a friend who experienced backlash while on vacation with friends when she casually stated that she wasn't interested in eating much meat because she was cutting back. Their chilly reaction and subsequent efforts to tempt her into eating various hunks of seared flesh left her puzzled. But longtime vegetarians and vegans will no doubt recognize this reaction, and Dr. Melanie Joy describes the phenomenon in this linked article on GOOD. She has coined the term "carnism" to refer to the systemic cultural belief that eating meat is right, healthy, and required, rather than the choice it truly represents. She highlights the fact that it is a choice by pointing out the wild inconsistencies in our attitudes and assumptions towards different kinds of animals.

I've found it to go beyond that, too. In my experience, any behavior (the deviation doesn't even have to be verbalized) that demonstrates an effort to make conscious choices about food and diet becomes suspect. It is as if my desire to eat a salad impinges on your ability to eat a steak.

The trouble with that is that my chosen diet is pretty non-mainstream. I am vegan and have been since 1998. Being vegan is as much an ethical choice as a health-conscious one, but I realize that ethical ideals are impossible so I try to respect everyone's ability to arrive at their own ethical compromises, within reason, and I try not to force my values onto anyone else. I'm also learning more and more about raw food and other optimized nutrition, and that has to do with improving my health: I'm not overly concerned about the welfare of carrots. But uttering the word "vegan" can stop a cocktail party conversation cold. Everyone is waiting for the other non-leather shoe to drop, I suppose, and for the lectures to begin.

I'm not a lecturing kind of person. (Not usually, anyway.) But I think this article presents some valuable new vocabulary and food (ha!) for thought, so whether you choose to eat meat or choose to abstain, you may find it valuable to read this whole article and possibly see some of the nearly-invisible constructs we're surrounded by in a new light.

Let me know your thoughts.

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How I keep my iPhone charger cable handy on my nightstand.

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After seeing a similar setup shown on Pinterest, I thought I'd show how I have my iPhone charger cable set up on my nightstand. The other version was clipped directly onto the nightstand; by clipping mine onto a handkerchief (which is then secured under the stack of whatever books I'm reading at the time) it doesn't risk damaging the nightstand.

Plus? Pretty green binder clip + pretty handkerchief = double win.

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Mona Simpson’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs

Over at nytimes.com.

I hate to seem morbid, but as I was reading this, it occurred to me that I genuinely think there's no finer piece of writing or oratory than a well-written, well-delivered eulogy.

When it's right, it evokes an aspect of the deceased that feels intimate and revealing, and yet familiar. And at the same time, it tells volumes about the grieving loved one delivering the eulogy, about what she values, about what she is evolved enough to appreciate in the deceased.

It's a lovely piece of art, and Mona Simpson's eulogy for her brother Steve Jobs is one of the finest I've read. It's making the rounds so you may have seen the link, but if you haven't actually clicked over to read it, you should.

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