A New Beginning - Return to Vegetarian Diet.

On January 1, 2011, I became a vegetarian again like I was twenty one years ago. When I was 15 years old, my life took a new direction, I returned home from a trip to Europe, and I became a vegetarian. I also opened my first company that same year, a little plant shop on Pharr Rd called Nature's Way. I remember spending some time with this guy who was a Meher Baba follower who was a macrobiotic. He ate this strange brown rice that was very different from the Uncle Ben's white rice I was raised on. I started eating the rice and then I remember only ordering vegetable plates at the local diner. This was back in the 70s when the first juice bars and vegetarian restaurants started sprouting up. I ate at the Energy Source or the Egg and Lotus everyday where I ordered cashew, cheese & alfalfa sprout sandwiches or humus & sprout sandwiches. They had great lentil or split pea soups. We traded plants with the Egg & Lotus and I would go there and order the special vegetarian delight of the day. Soon the Kundalini's bought the Egg & Lotus and the name changed to the Golden Temple. The Golden Temple served Bajan Specials which was cooked mung beans with lots of spices and they would melt white cheddar on top and cover with a huge mound of sprouts. The local chines restaurant would make vegetarian egg rolls for me and vegetarian rice specials and they called them Tony Specials. Pretty soon both juice bars and Andy's Chinese had Tony's Specials that other people ordered who also wanted vegetarian dishes. I visited every vegetarian restaurant from Atlanta to Miami, from Atlanta to California and anywhere I travel to. I loved the Golden Temple in Georgetown outside of Washington DC. I also went to the Spiral Restaurant in Miami on a monthly basis and ordered huge quantities of food to take with me after dinner for the next day.

Okay, so you get it, I was a devout vegetarian for 18 years. Actually, let me clarify, I ate only vegetables for 3 years only. After that I added seafood back to the diet because I I thought this was such a divine food. I mean how bad could fish, crab, lobster and shrimp be, right?

Well, I am starting this year out on a fairly strict lacto-ovo vegetarian diet. I have never cut ice cream out of my diet so why not eat eggs and drink milk. I like to make waffles also and they typically require eggs and milk. I have only cooked eggs twice in the last 15 days. I do love soy milk but I have been drinking vanilla almond milk lately because it tastes like a milkshake.