The making of a vegetarian
Half way through her ham and cheese sandwich today, Rae asks the inevitable.
“Mommy, where does ham come from?”
“Uh…um…er…the farm.”
“The farm? But what is it made of?”
“Erm…meat.”
“Meat?”
“Yes…like, pork.”
“What is pork made of?”
I look away. I blink. I clear my throat.
“Pork is made…from a pig.”
Her little face freezes. A small piece of ham she’s chewing stops its passage into her mouth and hangs off it, slack. A second later, it falls out. Rae does not spit it out. She doesn’t cry. She simply lets the thing drop onto her plate, her eyes resting heavily on me, accusing, shaming, basically stunned in coagulating disbelief that I’d made her eat Babe the last five years or so.
“But pigs…are nice.”
“I know, baby. But they…are good for you.”
“But…that’s painful,” Rae’s eyes start to glisten.
“Well…the pigs are already dead…when they make the ham, baby,” I struggle to explain.
Unable to stomach her lunch – and my treachery – Rae pushes her sandwich away. I sigh pitifully, reflecting on the days ahead. What the heck do I know about cooking vegetarian? I’m already struggling with just…cooking.
I feel like the Meat Grinch.
I look over at Skyler, who’s attacking her slices of slaughtered animal with blissful ignorance. What I will not give for Rae to have that uncaring trust again, that whatever I’ve put on my children’s plates could not, should not, would not have involved bloodshed and carnage.
“Yummy!” Sky declares, chomping gleefully on a leg, as if to reinforce my silent gratitude.
Rae swipes her sleeve over her eyes and bravely picks up a cheese stick.
“And what’s CHEESE made of?” she asks, louder this time, her eyes steadily on mine. It’s as if she’s bracing herself for more ugly, horrific facts about nutrition. I gulp and catch myself. Haplessly turning my daughter into a vegetarian the last five seconds is one thing. I don’t think I can handle turning her into a vegan the next two seconds.
Choose. Your. Words.
“They’re made from milk. From cows. And cows don’t have to die to make cheese,” I answer as seriously as I can.
Rae eyes me warily. She slowly peels a string of cheese, and places it into her mouth. What seems like a century later, she chews. She keeps chewing. She swallows. I exhale.
“I love cows,” she says softly, looking at her string cheese as though it’s a gift from the divine (or should I say, bovine).
My thoughts turn to the 2lb pack of minced beef in my freezer.
And my husband’s shiny new grill.
Time to look up how to bake beef into bread.
Update: So far, Rae is only associating ham with carnage and death. Not pork, chicken or any other meat. And I’m not saying a word until she asks again.
sweetisu
Wow. Yikes. This is serious matter. I’m surprised she’s so determined at such a young age. I’d be interested to know if she continues to be anti-meat.
Sep 16, 2007 @ 1:30 pm
PunditMom
I’ve tried the “some animals were put on the planet to be food” theory. It’s working — for the moment.
Sep 16, 2007 @ 2:17 pm
pelf
While I can see how (grief) your concern is at the moment because kids really do need lots of meat protein to grow up well, I am impressed at Rae’s ability to understand that pigs needed to be slaughtered to make food. And I’m impressed that she understands the cruelty some animals are put through to provide us meat.
Err, I don’t know what to say to you, but GOOD LUCK.
Sep 16, 2007 @ 4:55 pm
jennemede
We had spaghetti sauce with minced meat for dinner. She ate around the meat but when I offered some to her, she ate it, didnt ask what it was. Rae has always been partial to vegetables, never had any problems getting her to eat a salad (she likes the dressing). I dunno. Maybe it’s inevitable!
Sep 16, 2007 @ 5:16 pm
Erna
I second Pelf’s admiration for your child’s precocious awareness.
On one hand, she’s a real smart cookie.
On the other hand, here’s wishing you lots of luck and patience.
Sep 16, 2007 @ 5:58 pm
Lia
This made me smile. She’s one bright girl
Err.. I dont know if its a boy thing or not, the kids dont seem to be bothered (YET) that they r eating meat from cows, pigs, chickens etc. Does she grocery shop with you? Gone to the farmer’s market etc?
Ive done that with them from early on, they seem to accept that sometimes we eat these things, and its part of a balanced diet. We have a food pyramid on display (badly printed one lol) and they study it and seem to be ok.
they will have phases though, dont like this colour of stuff now. LOL
She help u cook?
Sep 16, 2007 @ 6:03 pm
jennemede
Erna: Thanks
Lia: I dunnolah, I was not prepared for this, that’s for sure. Sometimes she watches me cook (the kitchen isn’t big and the stove is those electric ceramic kind so scared she accidentally wants to put her hand on the deceivingly cool looking glass surface) and she helps to wash the veggies or peel carrots, but no she’s never watched me prepare chicken or meat. She’s been asking a lot more questions lately.
Like yesterday, watching Little Mermaid for the millionth time, she asked me “why Ariel’s bag doesn’t fill up with water when she swims.”
She’s definitely growing up
Sep 16, 2007 @ 6:43 pm
YvonneO
Hee hee… sorry but I had also had this conversation with my son but I guess boys don’t feel the same way about “how meat gets to the fork”. In fact, many boys think they are dinosaurs or some other canivorous creature so it adds to the cool factor!
You have to put it frankly to children, that if they want to eat meat, they are eating those chickies, baa lambs and moo cows that they see on the farm. And if they decide that’s not what they want to do…
Well, I have a good vegetarian lasagne recipe and a simple dhal recipe I can pass along to you.
Sep 16, 2007 @ 11:13 pm
tutiger
Yikes, now it is really good to be really prepared it seems (I need to get myself prepared early!!)……. Your girl is really brave and personally I think you are even braver……!
Sep 17, 2007 @ 6:55 am
Kristy
Dude! Ham comes from the grocery store.
Sep 17, 2007 @ 6:00 pm
jennemede
Kristy: Oh crap. Now you tell me.
Tutiger: She’s scaring me!
Yvonne: I dunno u know. Teaching kids about the facts of like is like…administering drugs u know. You need to make sure the combination is right, and the delivery is smooth. An overdose may not be fatal but the effects long lasting and most of the time, irreversible. Finding the right delivery is my struggle.
Sep 17, 2007 @ 6:51 pm
AbsolutelyBananas
Ok this is just too funny. I love that your first response was “from a farm”… AS IF she’d be content with that answer!
Sep 17, 2007 @ 9:43 pm
Josh Highland
there isnt anything wring with being vegan or vegetarian . As a child I always favored vegetables. My parents pushed meats on me saying i needed them to grow up. At 20 I went vegan and I haven’t looked back. I guess what I’m saying is, your kids will end up eating how they want in the long run. There are worse things they could grown up to be then vegetarian.
Sep 19, 2007 @ 2:01 pm
jennemede
AB: The next time she asks me something hard, I’m just going to pretend I’m sleeping.
Josh: Not sayin there’s anything wrong. Just wasnt prepared for that conversation. She’s five!
Sep 19, 2007 @ 3:46 pm
Lian
Wow, such higher thinking. I’m glad I didn’t get that response when I told my kids about pork and pigs. Guess they are just violent in nature. Hahahah. Anyway, been reading your vent about ‘that’ lady. Just wanna say “ditto” to all that have been written by others.
Hey, gave you an award.
http://mamasbagoftricks.blogspot.com/2007/09/nice-award.html
Sep 20, 2007 @ 12:38 am
YvonneO
Dear Jen,
You are right about taking a cautious approach. My summary trivialised how important these talks are… and they’re not trivial at all!
I remember being keenly aware of the words I chose and even, how pronounced them, because I didn’t want my son to think I was someone who supported mass murder of Old MacDonald’s farm animals.
At the same time, I knew how much information he could accept … as I mentioned, boys do have a different outlook. For now, we are OK with the origins-of-meat matter. But as a claw-and-fang animal fan, my son has declared that sharks are off the menu… so no more sharks fin soup.
Sep 21, 2007 @ 12:21 am
Mr.Sato
She certainly is SMART! My daughter is also 5 now and is asking similar questions, much like the water in Ariel’s bag one. We covered where all food comes from about a year ago. She asked what a meat we were eating was and I said that’s pork. Contrary to the norm, she asked what pork was. That’s when it started – she wanted to know what everything REALLY was. She was set back a bit at the idea that the animals were killed for us, and my answer was that “although it seems cruel, we are at the top of the food chain”. Of course she didn’t understand that in words, so I started showing her some videos, like National Geographic stuff, depicting one animal preying on other animals, and even went all the way down to insects, bacteria, etc. I said that something we all hope is that our lives have meaning, and that every farm animal’s life has meaning because they help us live. The end result was that after contemplation she doesn’t want to WASTE food. She insists we save everything we can’t eat and have it for left-overs. What a deal! LOL
5 is truly an age of awakening.
Nov 05, 2007 @ 11:03 am
Vee
Don’t freak out, there a a ton of healthy Veggie kids out there. Do a little research! It’s not bad that a child feels compassion for living creatures, you know. Some people are just wired that way- I’m one of them.
Dec 27, 2007 @ 11:16 am