Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays because it revolves so much around food and togetherness. When people think of Thanksgiving the first thing that comes to mind is probably the turkey, which is like a symbol and a decoration for the holiday. What stands out the most to me, however, is the baked mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, biscuits, greens, and pies. Even before I became a vegetarian I thought these dishes outshined the turkey.
This year, as always, I was really excited to eat some good food and I also wanted my family to limit the number of dishes made with meat. Some people might think that there aren’t many options during this holiday for vegetarians, but I think there are plenty. My family used to be one of these people, however, this year we made a variety of dishes that were all vegetarian except for one.
It took a little bit of convincing, but my mom decided to not cook a turkey, which I was really happy about. Although, no one in my family really liked turkey we usually had it because it was a tradition. We all agreed that we should have an alternative, especially, because the turkey was too big and there was always so much leftover. Then we ended up cooking chicken instead, which is relatively smaller and arguably tastes better. It was so much fun helping my family make vegetarian Thanksgiving dishes and we felt good because they were much healthier than dishes made with meat. It was also nice seeing my family try to minimize animal suffering by avoiding meat consumption as much as they could on the holiday.
Lidya, I could only imagine how tempting it was to abandon this project and give into eating meat during the Thanksgiving holiday. Good job on committing to this nonviolent action. I like how you involved your family in your project by getting them to cut down on the amount of meat served at your Thanksgiving meal. I hope that by engaging them in vegetarianism they learned something. Good luck with the rest of your project. Constructively, I think if you continue to expose your family and friends to vegetarian alternative that would be a good addition to your project.
Hey Lidya! I think it is so great that you remained vegetarian during this holiday. Sometimes when you are on break, it is easy to give in to junk food. I really admire that you remained vegetarian, and instead found different ways to still enjoy the holiday. I also loved that you included your family in this practice of being vegetarian, and influenced them to have an impact on our consumption of meat products as well. You have made me think about my holiday traditions and to modify them so I too can have an impact.