vegetarian pizza place?

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

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

Comments

[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.

[m00n.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?

Not inherently, no. Basically I'm questioning the logic of choosing a more factory farmed cheese over a small-farm cheese simply on the grounds that the factory farmed cheese uses a synthetic rennet alternative where the small-farm cheese uses real calf rennet. So far as I know, most of the synthetic rennet cheeses are not produced by small local farms, although there may be some that I am unaware of.

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.

If you can indeed find a small-farm cheese that is made using animal rennet then I'd say go for it. But if I were you I'd think twice about the number of animal lives truly at stake if you have to decide between a small-farmed calf rennet cheese and a mass produced synthetic rennet alternative. You may ultimately be saving more lives with the small farm cheese AND you'd be helping the environment at the same time.

[foosidiarian.livejournal.com]

Lots of small cheese makers use non-animal rennets. There are a few I know of specifically:

- Fiore Di Nonno
- Maplebrook Farm
- Shelburne Farmstead

Of course there are some big cheese makers like Cabot who only use non-animal rennet, too.

Again though, I never said I was vegetarian to save animal lives, or to help save the environment. While those are good reasons to be vegetarian, they were not my motivation for becoming vegetarian years ago, and I don't think they're the main reasons I'm still vegetarian today.

[mihmo.livejournal.com]

that's quite a conclusion you've drawn here in this thread.

there are plenty of small artisan cheesemakers that do not use non-vegetarian rennet. most of the ones I have experience with do. And fwiw all non-imported Cabot cheeses (most of which are made right here in New England) are also rennet-free.

[mihmo.livejournal.com]

er most of the ones i have experience with do use vegetarian rennet that is.