Meatless Monday and Meat Free Monday are international campaigns that encourage people to not eat meat on Mondays to improve their health and the health of the planet.
In 2003, Meatless Monday, founded by marketing professional Sid Lerner, [1] [2] [3] is a non-profit initiative of The Monday Campaigns Inc. in association with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Center for a Livable Future. The public-facing campaign was designed and piloted by Social Impact Studios, a national creative agency based in Philadelphia that focuses mainstream marketing practices on social issues. Meatless Monday is based in the United States.
In 2009, Meat Free Monday was founded by Paul McCartney, along with his daughters Mary McCartney, and Stella McCartney. [4]
In the Greek island of Crete, the tradition of consuming legumes every Monday is deeply ingrained, with meat traditionally considered inappropriate to eat on this day. This aligns with the religious observance of Clean Monday in Greece, marking the start of Lent and emphasizing purity, including abstinence from meat. Monday was traditionally seen as a day to "purify the body" after the consumption of meat on Sunday, which was traditionally the only day of the week when meat was consumed. This practice fits well with the Meat Free Monday initiative, reflecting Crete's traditional diet where vegetables and legumes dominate (70% of intake), while meat (10%) and fish and seafood (20%) are less commonly consumed. [5] This culinary tradition aligns with cultural and religious practices aimed at improving health and minimising environmental impact.
During World War I, US President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation calling for every Tuesday to be meatless and for one meatless meal to be observed every day, for a total of nine meatless meals each week. [6] The United States Food Administration (USFA) urged families to reduce consumption of key staples to help the war effort and avoid rationing. Conserving food would support U.S. troops as well as feed populations in Europe where food production and distribution had been disrupted by the war. To encourage voluntary rationing, the USFA created the slogan "Food Will Win the War" and coined the terms "Meatless Tuesday" and "Wheatless Wednesday" to remind Americans to reduce intake of those products. [7]
Herbert Hoover was the head of the Food Administration as well as the American Relief Association during Woodrow Wilson's presidency, and played a key role implementing the campaign, which was one of Hoover's many attempts to encourage volunteerism and sacrifice among Americans during the war. The USFA provided a wide variety of materials in addition to advertising, including recipe books and menus found in magazines, newspapers and government-sponsored pamphlets. [8]
The campaign returned with the onset of World War II, calling upon women on the home front to play a role in supporting the war effort. During this time, meat was being rationed, along with other commodities like sugar and gasoline. [9] The Truman administration, through the Citizens Food Committee, encouraged "Meatless Tuesdays" and "Poultryless Thursdays" throughout the autumn of 1947; backlash was swift, noncompliance was rampant, and the poultry lobby responded with the National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation, the forerunner of the modern "turkey pardon." [10]
Meatless Monday is part of the Healthy Monday initiative. [11] The program follows the nutrition guidelines developed by the USDA. [12] Healthy Monday encourages Americans to make healthier decisions at the start of every week. Other Healthy Monday campaigns include: The Kids Cook Monday, Monday 2000, Quit and Stay Quit Monday, Move it Monday, The Monday Mile, and others.[ citation needed ]
Meatless Monday focuses its initiative on Mondays for several reasons. Wednesday and Friday are traditionally days for fasting among Catholic and Orthodox Christians. Monday is typically the beginning of the work week, the day when individuals settle back into their weekly routine. Habits that prevailed over the weekend can be forgotten and replaced by other choices. [13] A weekly reminder to restart healthy habits also encourages success. A 2009 trial published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine provided individuals with weekly health prompts and encouragement. Approximately two thirds of participants responded with improvements in their overall health, eating habits and physical activity levels. [14] Monday was also chosen for being alliterative with "Meatless" (cf. Taco Tuesday and other similar day-specific campaigns). [15]
On April 6, 2010, San Francisco became the first city in the United States to officially declare Mondays to be "meat free", calling it their Vegetarian Day. Several other countries have meat-free days as well, including Canada. [16]
Meat-free Mondays exist in the United Kingdom both as an advertising campaign for Goodlife Foods and as an environmental campaign. [17] On June 15, 2009 Paul McCartney and his daughters Stella and Mary launched a Meat-free Monday campaign.
In 2017, the Casa Rosada of Argentina instituted, for one lunch of the day, meat-free Mondays, serving only vegan options to its approximately 500 employees, including Argentinian President Mauricio Macri. [18]
In May 2009, the city of Ghent, Belgium became the first city with "official" weekly vegetarian days. Veggie Thursday (or "Donderdag Veggiedag" in Dutch) was created by the Ethical Vegetarian Alternative, an organisation partially funded by the Flemish government. [19]
In October 2009, Meatless Monday was launched in São Paulo with government support by the Brazilian Vegetarian Society. [20] In December 2009, Meatless Mondays launched in Australia. [21]
Israeli magazine Al Hashulchan (On the Table) introduced the Sheni Tzimchoni (Vegetarian Monday) initiative in June 2009. Dozens of Israel's top restaurants will create innovative meatless meals on Mondays throughout July and August 2009. [22]
Meatless Mondays is related to efforts to add daily vegetarian and vegan school meals.
Committed engagement in Meatless Mondays has been associated with a higher likelihood of adopting a vegetarian diet. A 2021 study found that one-third of participants who continually partook in Meatless Monday became vegetarian after 5 years. [23] [24]
An attempt by the Greens in Brighton, England, to initiate Meat-Free Mondays, thereby stopping the local council cafeteria selling any meat-based foods, was halted after opposition from council staff. [25]
Linda Louise, Lady McCartney was an American photographer, musician, cookbook author and activist. She was the keyboardist and harmony vocalist in the band Wings that also featured her husband, Paul McCartney of the Beatles.
A meat alternative or meat substitute, is a food product made from vegetarian or vegan ingredients, eaten as a replacement for meat. Meat alternatives typically approximate qualities of specific types of meat, such as mouthfeel, flavor, appearance, or chemical characteristics. Plant- and fungus-based substitutes are frequently made with soy, but may also be made from wheat gluten as in seitan, pea protein as in the Beyond Burger, or mycoprotein as in Quorn. Alternative protein foods can also be made by precision fermentation, where single cell organisms such as yeast produce specific proteins using a carbon source; as well as cultivated or laboratory grown, based on tissue engineering techniques. The ingredients of meat alternative include 50–80% water, 10–25% textured vegetable proteins, 4–20% non-textured proteins, 0–15% fat and oil, 3-10% flavors/spices, 1-5% binding agents and 0-0.5% coloring agents.
A flexitarian diet, also called a semi-vegetarian or fauxtarian diet, is one that is centered on plant foods with limited or occasional inclusion of meat. For example, a flexitarian might eat meat only some days each week. Flexitarian is a portmanteau of the words flexible and vegetarian, signifying its followers' less strict diet pattern when compared to vegetarian pattern diets.
The Vegetarian Society of the United Kingdom (VSUK) is a British registered charity. It campaigns for dietary changes, licenses Vegetarian Society Approved trademarks for vegetarian and vegan products, runs a cookery school and lottery, and organises National Vegetarian Week in the UK.
A veggie burger or meatless burger is a hamburger made with a patty that does not contain meat, or the patty of such a hamburger. The patty may be made from ingredients like beans, nuts, grains, seeds, or fungi such as mushrooms or mycoprotein.
Moosewood Restaurant is an American natural foods restaurant in Ithaca, New York. In 1978, the original founders sold the restaurant to the staff, who became "The Moosewood Collective." In addition to producing a number of cookbooks, The Moosewood Restaurant won the America's Classics award from the James Beard Foundation in 2000, which recognized it as "one of the most popular regional destinations."
Mary Anna McCartney is an English photographer, documentary filmmaker, plant-based and vegetarian cookbook author, and activist. She is the Global Ambassador for Meat Free Monday.
World Vegetarian Day is observed annually around the planet on October 1. It is a day of celebration established by the North American Vegetarian Society in 1977 and endorsed by the International Vegetarian Union in 1978, "To promote the joy, compassion and life-enhancing possibilities of vegetarianism." It brings awareness to the ethical, environmental, health, and humanitarian benefits of a vegetarian lifestyle. World Vegetarian Day initiates the month of October as Vegetarian Awareness Month, which ends with November 1, World Vegan Day, as the end of that month of celebration. Vegetarian Awareness Month has been known variously as "Reverence for Life" month, "Month of Vegetarian Food", and more.
The Toronto Vegetarian Association (TVA), also known as VegTO, is a volunteer-driven, charitable organization based in Toronto, Ontario. Founded in 1945, its mission is to inspire people to choose a healthier, greener, more compassionate lifestyle through plant-based eating.
A vegetarian hot dog is a hot dog produced completely from non-meat products. Unlike traditional home-made meat sausages, the casing is not made of intestine, but of cellulose or other plant-based ingredients. The filling is usually based on some sort of soy protein, wheat gluten, or pea protein. Some may contain egg whites, which would make them unsuitable for a lacto-vegetarian or vegan diet.
Kathy Freston is an American author and promoter of plant-based nutrition. Her books include The Lean, Veganist, Quantum Wellness, Clean Protein and 72 Reasons to Be Vegan.
Meat-free days or veggiedays are declared to discourage or prohibit the consumption of meat on certain days of the week. Mondays and Fridays are the most popular days. There are also movements encouraging people giving up meat on a weekly, monthly, or permanent basis.
Gardein is a line of meat-free foods produced by Conagra Brands. In 2003, the company was founded by Yves Potvin, who remained as the CEO of Gardein until 2016. In November 2014, Pinnacle Foods purchased Gardein for $154 million. Pinnacle was acquired by Conagra in 2018.
Vegetarian bacon, also referred to as veggie bacon, vegan bacon, vegan rashers, vacon, or facon, is a plant-based imitation of bacon.
Linda McCartney Foods is a British food brand specializing in vegetarian and vegan food. Available in the UK, as well as Norway, Ireland, Austria, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, the range includes chilled and frozen meat analogues in the form of burgers, sausages, sausage rolls, meatballs, stir-fry dishes and pastas.
Farm Animal Rights Movement (FARM) is an international nonprofit organization working to promote a vegan lifestyle and animal rights through public education and grass roots outreach. It operates ten national and international programs from its headquarters in Bethesda, Maryland. FARM has the abolitionist vision of a world where animals are free from all forms of human exploitation, including, food and clothing, research and testing, entertainment and hunting. FARM's mission is to spare the largest number of animals from being bred, abused, and slaughtered for food, as this accounts for 98% of all animal abuse and slaughter.
Veganuary is an annual challenge run by a UK nonprofit organisation that promotes and educates about the vegan lifestyle by encouraging people to follow a vegan diet for the month of January. Since the event began in 2014, participation has increased each year. 400,000 people signed up to the 2020 campaign. The campaign estimated this represented the carbon dioxide equivalent of 450,000 flights and the lives of more than a million animals. Veganuary can also refer to the event itself.
A vegan school meal or vegan school lunch or vegan school dinner or vegan hot lunch is a vegan option provided as a school meal. A small number of schools around the world serve vegan food or are vegan schools, serving exclusively vegan food.
In both homes and public eating places, in order to reduce the consumption of beef, pork, and sheep products, Tuesday should be observed as meatless day in each week, one meatless meal should be observed in each day, while, in addition, Saturday in each week should further be observed as a day upon which there should be no consumption of pork products.
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: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)Health promotions at the beginning of the week have the potential to reduce negative health events. There's a spike in heart problems, occupational injuries, strokes, suicides and referrals to secondary care on Monday, which researchers believe is caused by stress, unhealthy weekend behaviors and disruption of sleep cycles.
Try Meatless Mondays
Institute Meatless Mondays in City Schools
In the wake of a successful introduction of the Meatless Monday initiative to more than 900 hospitals nationwide, Sodexo is now extending it to more than 2000 corporate and government client locations in North America, including Toyota, Northern Trust Bank and the U.S. Department of the Interior.
In June 2011, ... Aspen, CO, became the nation's first true Meatless Monday community
Awareness of the 'Meatless Monday' campaign has reached more than half of Americans, according to an online tracking survey conducted by FGI Research. The poll found that 50.22 percent of 2,000 American adults in a nationally representative sample were aware of the campaign ... up from 30 percent awareness six months ago.