vegetarian pizza place?

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

Does anyone know if there's a pizza place in the area that uses rennet-free mozzerella?

Comments

[stellasirius.livejournal.com]

Veggie planet in Harvard Sq uses cheese made with vegetable rennet. Also there's TJ Scallywaggle's all-vegan pizza in Allston if you'd like to avoid the dairy issue altogether.

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

Do they do "normal" mozzerella pizzas? I thought they were mostly like curries and things served on a pizza crust.

[stellasirius.livejournal.com]

well, they make gourmet pizzas, so the crust is not your typical pizza crust (it's more like flat bread). but they do have a couple on their menu that are a fairly classic tomato-mozzarella combo.

[makoshark.livejournal.com]

Normal enough, sure.

[whaler.livejournal.com]

1) Cheap mozarella cheese often isn't made with rennet but with some kind of citric acid and it's just curdled, versus cultured.

2)I am a nerd and this got me reading on the issue according to wikipedia In 1999, about 60% of U.S. hard cheese was made with genetically engineered chymosin[3] and it has up to 80% of the global market share for rennet[4]. By 2008, approximately 80 - 90% of commercially made cheeses in the United States and Great Britain are made utilizing GMO-based rennet. One example of a commercially available genetically engineered rennet is Chymax, created by Pfizer.

Today the most widely used genetically engineered rennet is produced by the fungus Aspergillus niger.

So GMO rennet doesn't come from baby cow stomachs, but from a delightfully modified fungus...however this of course could get you out of the frying pan and into the GMO fire if you are also avoiding those foods as well!

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

I eat so much soy already I guess I'm already in the GMO fire. Still I don't really want to eat cheese that has a 10-20% chance of being non-vegetarian.

[m00n.livejournal.com]

You'd rather support the pro-deforestation, anti-environment Monsanto empire than harm a calf even if it's in the most painless way possible?

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

We're getting a bit off topic here, but...

I don't like Monsanto any more than anyone else. I buy organic tofu, etc, but GMO soy and corn is snuck into everything. It's pretty hard to avoid.

The rennet thing is more about the thought of eating calf guts grossing me out than anything to do with the calf itself. Even if an animal lives a good life and gets killed "humanely" or whatever it still grosses me out to think about eating it.

The smell of meat cooking makes me gag a little, too. I don't know exactly why, but eating dead animals just seems wrong for me, so I try to avoid it wherever I can (again though it's snuck into everything so it's hard to avoid completely). I realize everyone is different though.

[m00n.livejournal.com]

Not to be overly dramatic, but if hundreds of animals die as a result of the habitat destruction associated with the cheeses that do not contain rennet, is that really preferable?

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

Not sure I follow. You're saying that rennetless cheese destroys more habitat than cheese with rennet? Are you talking about cheese curds made from fungus and milk, or soy cheese?

Note, I never said I was a vegetarian for ethical reasons. To be honest I don't know that I have a rational reason for being vegetarian. It's just what feels "right" for me.

The thought of eating animals grosses me out in the pit of my stomach. It wasn't always true, but it's definitely true now. I couldn't tell you why.

[makoshark.livejournal.com]

That seems a little unrealistic. Especially in a world where cheap vegetarian rennet is readily available, animal rennet seems to mostly be a matter of tradition and readily available calf stomachs. Calfs aren't being killed to make rennet.

[findingthegirl.livejournal.com]

TJ Scallywaggles is a completely vegan pizza place, but they're in Allston.
http://www.scallywaggles.com/index2.php

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

thanks. I've been to TJ's a few times. I like it okay, although usually if I'm in allston union sq and want food I can't resist going to Yoma's

[turil.livejournal.com]

Cows milk isn't a vegetable.

I'll second TJ Scallywaggles and Veggie Planet for their vegetarian (plants only, herbivore) selections.

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

It's true that cows milk isn't a vegetable, but I do consider it vegetarian. I realize vegetarian means different things to different people, and for you it may have a stricter definition than the ovo-lacto one I go by.

I ended up going to veggie planet tonight and getting the oddlot. It was really busy though.

[turil.livejournal.com]

Yeah, someone really needs to come up with a term that refers to people who "don't eat things that require killing animals to get". :-)

I try to stick to the scientific definitions of things, to keep things clear, which is why I consider vegetarian to mean "one who eats vegetation".

The lack of clarity makes it really difficult when I ask for a vegetarian meal and I end up with people thinking that all sorts of things are plants, as you can imagine...

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

Well the prefix "veget" in vegetarian actually comes from "vegetus" not "vegetation". Vegetus is latin word that has nothing to do with plants. It means "lively" as in "full of energy and life" and "not killed"

Anyway, as we all know, words are defined by the people who speak them not their etymology (the whole prescriptive versus descriptive language debate). I think at this point most people generally mean ovo-lacto-vegetarian when they say vegetarian and most people would call your definition "vegan" or "strict vegetarian"

[turil.livejournal.com]

If we went with what "most people" think of when they hear the word "vegetarian" the dictionary would define the term as something like: starving hippy freak. Thankfully words aren't always defined by the people who speak them, and are sometimes defined by the people who care most about what they mean.

As you probably already figured out, the term "vegetation" is also derived from the word "vegetus" which means "full of life" or "lively" as you pointed out, which is what people who eat vegetation become... :-)

As for processed cooked cow's milk, I don't think anyone would equate it with being "full of energy and life". It's damn dead, and stolen from a baby who is taken from his or her mother at birth and fed with synthetic "milk" formula so that you can have your pizza.

[m00n.livejournal.com]

What I really want is a term for people who will only eat things produced in the most ecological way possible, whether of plant *or* animal origins.

How about "healthy"?

[turil.livejournal.com]

I've been working on a political philosophy that starts from a concept of "existential rights", in which the two platforms are something like:

1. If something exists it has a right to exist (by universal law!), and has a right to try to do whatever it needs to do to stay existing.

2. As an individual, take only what is necessary for you to continue to exist in the most good, true, and beautiful way, whenever possible.

This political approach would allow for carnivores, omnivores, and herbivores of all species to be most ecological, sustainable, healthy, and compassionate to themselves and their environment.

I don't, however, have a name for a person who practices this philosophy. "Existentialist" isn't quite right, I'm afraid... :-)

[makoshark.livejournal.com]

Coming up with an idiosyncratic definition of "vegetarian" that other people don't share isn't helping anybody. The word for people that do not eat animal products is "vegan."

Redefining "vegetarians" reminds me of pescatarians who call themselves vegetarian. I don't really care what they call themselves but convincing already confused waitstaffs about what it is that vegetarians or vegans can and can't eat doesn't help anyone.

Idiosynchratic? Try the dictionary...

[turil.livejournal.com]

Um, I'm going by Websters (dictionary) here:

1veg·e·tar·i·an
Pronunciation:
\ˌve-jə-ˈter-ē-ən\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
2vegetable + -arian
Date:
1839

1 : one who believes in or practices vegetarianism
2 : herbivore

[ron_newman]

I am confused by this discussion, because in my experience "vegetarian" always means "non-meat-eater" while "vegan" means "also doesn't eat dairy products or eggs".

[mihmo.livejournal.com]

don't be confused. your understanding of the terms is very much in line with how the words are interpreted in reality.

[pureacrylic.livejournal.com]

haha great debate. why rennet would be a big deal and commercially produced cheese wouldnt, kinda blows my mind