Lacto Vegetarians

Sanjeev posted this in Definitions on February 19th, 2009

Lacto Vegetarians are vegetarians who do not eat flesh or eggs of any kind – animal, fish or bird. They however consume dairy products such as milk, vegetarian cheese (without animal rennet), yogurt (without gelatin), butter, curd and cream. The origin of “lacto” is the Latin word for milk, [lac, lactis].

I belong to this category of vegetarians.

This egg-less diet is adopted by vegetarians for some or all of the following reasons:

1.     It is felt that egg contains life which in due course will transform into an animal and hence from the religious point of view one should not eat it. This is also the primary reason why most lacto-vegetarians do not consume egg.

2.     They refrain from eating eggs to protest cruelty in the poultry industry.

3.     The other reason could be that a health-conscious person who wishes to lower his cholesterol levels does not consume eggs because of the high amount of cholesterol contained in egg yolks. This is also the reason why even non-vegetarians, and especially body builders, eat only the egg while and throw away the yolk. The egg white is supposed to have all the proteins and the fat is in the yolk.

Lacto-vegetarian diets are popular with many followers of Eastern religious traditions such as Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism.

In India vegetarianism is usually synonymous with lacto vegetarianism, although lacto-ovo vegetarianism is practiced as well. Most restaurants in India indicate whether they are “Non-Vegetarian”, “Vegetarian” or “Pure Vegetarian” (lacto vegetarian), and market themselves accordingly. Vegetarian restaurants abound which do not serve any kind of meat or eggs, but vegan options maybe very limited. This is because a Vegan would not like to eat anything which is of animal origin and a lot of restaurants use dairy cheese and ghee (coking oil made from milk).

According to a survey done in 2006, 31% of Indians are vegetarians, while another 9% consumes eggs. Among the various communities, vegetarianism was most common among Jains and Brahmins at 55%, and less frequent among Muslims (3%) and residents of coastal states respectively. Other surveys cited by FAO, and USDA  estimate 20%-42% of the Indian population as being vegetarian. These surveys indicate that even Indians who do eat meat do so infrequently, with less than 30% consuming it regularly, although this is often for economic rather than religious or other reasons.

India has devised a system of marking edible products made only of plant products, with a green dot in a green square. A brown dot in a brown square indicates some animal based ingredients were used. Even medicines are similarly marked: a well-known Omega-3 capsule made from flax seeds is marked with a red dot as the capsule uses non-vegetarian ingredients.

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What Are the Various Types of Vegetarians?

Sanjeev posted this in Definitions on February 18th, 2009

I think I should have made this post before I wrote about Vegans. However, as they say better late than never. So here it goes.

Vegetarianism is not a religion, but a way of life. However, like Hinduism, Christianity, Islam or other religions of the world, Vegetarianism too has many shades. They come in as many flavors as there are cuisines.

We will first try to understand the various types of vegetarians that walk the earth. We will also try to understand their likes, dislikes and if possible their motivations.

Who is a Vegetarian: Before we understand the various vegetarian sects, we need to understand who is a Vegetarian in the broadest sense of the term – a Christian is a follower of Christ, a Muslim follows Prophet Mohammad, and likewise a Vegetarian is one who does not eat the following:

·         Meat (any kind of land animal / eggs thereof),

·         Fish (any kind of water animal or their eggs), and

·         Poultry (any kind of bird or their eggs).

A vegetarian, therefore, is not someone who sometimes eats vegetables, maybe as a side dish; he always eats vegetables. Some kinds of vegetarians might, however, sometimes eat the above food items as side dish! But can they be called vegetarians? Or do they fit into one of the various classes of vegetarians?

Vegetarians can be classified into two broad categories:

1.     Vegans (covered in my previous post), and

2.     Lacto Vegetarians (the category that I belong to)

Some people also classify the following as vegetarians, though their inclusion in the tribe is highly debatable because their diet contains some kind of meat or eggs.

1.     Ovo-Vegetarians – These are people who do not eat meat in any form but do consume eggs.

2.     Pesco-Vegetarians or Pescatarians – They abstain from eating all meat and animal flesh with the exception of fish.

3.     Pollo-Vegetarians – They eat vegetarian diet and also poultry such as chicken, turkey, and duck but no other type of animal flesh and meat.

4.     Flexitarian or Semi-vegetarian – It is a term used for people who mostly eat vegetarian diet, but eat meat once a while.

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