SHOCKING TRUTH!!!
Rating:
5 / 5
Being a vegetarian for nine years I thought I knew what ingredients to look for. This book was a shocking truth to exactly what I didn't know what was in my food. The shocking truth about what gelatin is...... you wouldn't think pudding, gummy bears, and other sweet items contain this hidden ingredient. Gelatin is protein obtained by boiling skin, tendons, ligaments, or bones with water from cattle and hogs.This word defined along with many other words that comes from animals are in this book.
I loved how the book is layed out in a guidelined setting. IF you
wonder like I did about what your eating vegetarian or not this book is a great book to have.
Detinately a book to pick up
Rating:
5 / 5
An excellent and very informative resource for any vegan, vegetarian or anyone who's concerned about what exactly it is you're actually eating.I'm an ovo-lacto vegetarian myself and I was surprised at how many things they sneakily put into our food. I was aware of some of the more obvious things (renet, gelatin, etc.), but still stunned at things I would have never thought could contain animal products - such as beer, wine, some waxes used to polish fruits to make them look more fresh - it's astounding! The only contention I have with this book is that it focuses mainly on American products, being written in the States it makes sense, but for a future edition I would love to see more Canadian and maybe European products added to the book. Extremely well researched, using a variety of sources (which can be found at the end of the book) - definately a book to pick up.
an important book for new vegans
Rating:
4 / 5
If you're starting out in veganism, or even just trying to be a strict vegetarian, you probably want to have this book handy, although the first thing it will do is depress you. Did you know that processed sugar is refined using charcoaled animal bones? Surprise! The majority of the book is simply an alphabetical listing of animal-product-containing substances; you use it as a reference when reading ingredient labels in your cupboard or in the grocery store. Often I wished the authors had included more information about what the animal source of an ingredient was -- they don't always include this information, but they always do mention the types of products the ingredient appears in and they usually suggests vegan alternatives. There are some things about the book that make me suspect its reliability in parts, like a tendency to ascribe all sorts of problems to animal ingredients (many people have allergic reactions to wool, etc etc) when it should be enough for the authors to say that consuming such and such a product is bad because it is an animal product -- no one who isn't convinced of the moral superiority of vegetarianism will be looking at this book anyway. They make a number of statements about vitamin B12, some of which contradict each other -- probably the result of compiling the different work of a number of authors into one book. And, of course, there is the fact that none of the authors identify themselves by name. However... a chapter-by-chapter bibliography is supplied in the back, and the EG Smith Collective has also contacted some companies to ask whether their products contain animal products, and in Lipton Tea's case reprints their response. The book is the best (I mean, the only) source I have come across to confirm or repudiate rumors that such and such is an animal-derived product. Certainly worth having if you are a vegan.
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