Ins and Outs of 2025

Eat Rooted Podcast Ep 2 | Our opinioned take on the new-ish year | 32:43

PODCASTLIFESTYLE

26 min read

Join us for an episode where, in lieu of New Years' resolutions, we instead talk about all of our ~opinionated~ ins and outs for 2025.

We're talking everything from soy and high protein tofu (get on that if you haven't yet, it's a game changer) to cycle tracking, the fact that humans don't have as many ancestors as we statistically should (cough cough, turns out we're all inbred if you go back far enough) to grounding and why you should take your shoes off outside (turns out we're all just kind of electric grounding rods, or something like that) , the importance of going outside for that and a whole host of other reasons, the different tasting notes of high quality olive oil, and more. This is a bit of a weird one but join us anyway? You might learn something (and maybe you'll have fun).

What are your ins and outs for 2025?

If you enjoy this episode, we'd love if you'd give it a like and a five-star review, subscribe for new updates, and share it with friends. Thanks for being here.

Mairi

Welcome to Rooted, where we talk about food, values, and the environment through a liberation lens. We help you put your values on your plate so you can live a life you love and feel proud of. We're your hosts. I’m Mairi,


Cate

And I'm Cate. We're two sisters who believe both individual and systemic change are needed to change the world. We've spent years living sustainably oriented lifestyles while working towards systemic changes in our careers.

Mairi

Visit us at eatingrooted.com for podcast transcripts, to read the blog, and to learn more about how we can help you with customized design and coaching for your edible and herbal kitchen garden.

(00:00:33): Cate

Okay, so I really feel like I have so many opinions about these things and some of them are hot takes, but ins and outs 2025. I almost want to start with the outs just because I have so many more opinions on the outs. What do you think?


Mairi

You do have so many opinions on the outs… Let's start with the ins. Let's welcome positivity.

(00:00:57): Cate

Okay. All right. Fine.

Mairi

And then we can go with the outs.

Cate

We can do that. First of all, soy is always in, but just had to put it on there because people continuously are misinformed about soy. They think soy is bad for you. They think that it's too high in plant estrogens and blah, blah, blah. And all of that has just been so debunked and it's so nutritious. And soy really is that girl. Like she really does it all. And we love her.

(00:01:26): Mairi

Well, I think one thing that's great about soy, and I think this goes to people really talking about, this is one of your outs. I can see it on the list, but we'll get there about fake food and like calling vegan food fake and fake meat and fake this, that, and the other thing. And I think certain soy products tend to get lumped in because people don't understand that seitan and tempeh and tofu are thousands and thousands of years old and that they have a very long history. Soy gets demonized in its ultra processed form, but there's such a long history of soy being consumed in societies that have high rates of longevity. And also soy is just, I love soy. You can do so much with it. I love tofu, I eat tofu all the time, it's probably my favorite form.

Cate

Yeah I'm kind of torn between being like educational about soy versus being so defensive and yeah just in defense of soy like honestly my real opinion is that if you still think that soy is bad for you and like listen if it's bad for you specifically because you have a sensitivity I'm not talking about that but if you think it's an unhealthy food in general then you really just need to do a little bit more research And it's not a good look to be anti-soy in 2025. And we can leave it at that.

(00:02:44): Mairi

I would say same disclaimer as for all of our episodes. None of this is medical advice. Talk to your doctor. These are opinions. Other ins. Opening windows in all seasons for fresh air. This is so big. There is such bad air quality in the winter inside.

I open my windows every day. And I also have a gas – I live in an apartment. It's rented. It came with a stove. We have a gas stove, which honestly, I know there's a debate gas versus electric for cooking and people are on different sides of this and like induction is really good. [But] I have a gas stove. I enjoy it for cooking, but I do not cook without opening my kitchen window because there are volatile organic compounds, VOCs. And I also just saw… I need to, I haven't really looked further into this, but research that shows that women who are not smokers are twice as likely as men who are not smokers to get lung cancer in certain areas. And they were trying to figure out why and they traced it to cooking oils. So use the fan, open the window to air out your kitchen.

(00:03:44): Cate

Yeah, well like cooking is a big one, but just in general too, like especially if you're in a house with other people, we are breathing each other's air backwash in all day long. Germs is a part of it, but also if you never circulate fresh air and you have a lot of people in the house, then you're just building up the levels of carbon dioxide and depleting the oxygen. especially in a house that is maybe newer and doesn't get a lot of airflow and so that's already off gassing because houses do that and I feel like a lot of people live in these new houses with perfect climate control and so they never open their windows and they're the people that need to open their windows the most it really is not ideal and fresh air is so good for you and so just open the windows even just for a few minutes just a few minutes let that air come in you know it's just, that's in super in for 2025.

(00:04:34): Mairi

Catie, I'm looking at your list and I feel like some of these ins and outs really are parallels. So soy is in, but calling vegan food fake is out because it is real food. And that's kind of along with that. But also acting like tofu is bad when you've probably never tried it. That's out. Again, soy is in.

(00:04:52): Cate

We are cooking tofu in different ways.

(00:04:53): Mairi

I just made – I love high protein tofu which has twice the protein of normal tofu typically, it's like 35 grams a block and –

Cate

– I introduced you to that first time you tried that was because I forced you to buy it.

Mairi

Yeah it's great, it just makes life so easy. Nut I just chopped up a block and made some sticks and I rolled them in chickpea flour with nutritional yeast and salt and pepper and maybe I put some onion powder and then I just did a little dry batter and I baked them and then I'm gonna find some kind of sauce to dip them in and it's so easy and that's going to be my mid-morning snack-lunch but they're in the oven kind of cooling off right now.

(00:05:31): Cate

Wow, that sounds almost fry adjacent, like just stuff to dip in sauce.


(00:05:35): Mairi

Air fryer, but without the air fryer because I live in a small apartment and I don't need more devices and everything works.

(00:05:42): Cate

I love things that dip into stuff. I love a vehicle for sauce, which sounds like that could be a great vehicle for sauce.

(00:05:49): Mairi

Vehicles for sauce is good. But wait, I'm going back. So like opening windows in all seasons, that's in. Not going outside all day, out. I have to go outside still today. I haven't done that yet.

(00:05:59): Cate

Well, it's still early. What is it, like 8: 20 a.m.? So, I mean, that's okay. Usually you'll have gone for a walk by now, but you still have plenty of time. I got outside for breakfast.

(00:06:08): Mairi

I have to go down a few different, a few flights of stairs to go outside. So sometimes, yeah, it's a little tricky, but I have some really great parks near me. So I do usually go for multiple walks every day.

(00:06:20): Cate

Yeah okay something else that's in this is a kind of a resolution even though I'm not like super into resolutions but this is a fun one every time I see a fruit that I haven't tried before I'm gonna buy it and try it I want to try all the fruit that i possibly can I don't want to have just like gone through my life only eating the same basic fruits and so that's super in just trying fruits that you've never tried before I think is very in for 2025.

(00:06:48): Mairi

California is really great for that because there's just so much food is grown here compared to the rest of the country in terms of specialty crops and not commodities. And specialty crops are a designation by the U.S. government for basically most of the food that we eat as humans. But yeah, there's so much different produce that's just not accessible or available in smaller towns on the east coast.

(00:07:12): Cate

Yeah, I want that. I live on Long Island, which doesn't have as many specialty fruits. I mean, not that we don't have specialty fruits. Of course we do. But it just seems like so much more abundant in California. And so that's something really fun. You should have that resolution too, Mairi.

(00:07:28): Mairi

I did. I was at a Chinese market the other day and I bought something and I don't know what it is. And then when they rang it up, it said it was a rambutan.

(00:07:36): Cate

Oh, those are good.

(00:07:37): Mairi

But I'm not sure if it's actually a rambutan. So, or if that's just what it got rung up as. I'm going to Google it right now. No, they're not. See, I know what rambutans are and that's not what it is. So… when I try it I'll let you know.

Cate

You'll send me a picture and I'll see if I know it – and listen this one's not always a hit. Like for example, I recently tried cactus pear for the first time and I didn't love it. And I don't know if I just didn't have like a super ripe one or if I actually don't like it, so maybe I'll try it again and see –

(00:08:05): Mairi

I think the thing to do with cactus pear is to juice it for margarita.

Cate

Okay yeah see I just ate it and see that's something that would have been good to know but see that's the thing like you're just you're learning and you're trying new things and, like this is what I want to do with my grown-up money is try all the fruit I possibly can. Here's another thing that's super in on the vein of trying new things and spicing up your food, growing an edible flower garden super in in 2025, like there's just so many edible flowers and they are beautiful and nutritious and some of them are medicinal and they're just they're gorgeous in the garden they're gorgeous on your plate and it just adds so much whimsy, it adds a touch of beauty to your every day and I think it's so in. I love having edible flowers.

(00:08:55): Mairi

We used to work at a place where we would order them to put on different catering trays that we would do. And yeah, they're just fun. It's also super easy. If you have lavender, that's really nice to cut and cut herbs to to put on your trays and just they they kind of add a nice touch.

But also, and I'm kind of grouping some things that are in together now, “having a magic garden with the longest growing season ever with veggies and herbs in winter.” I'm quoting from Catie's list, but it is, I think, one of the benefits to having, well, one of the tricks to having a long growing season is to live on a peninsula of an island so that you have a super moderate climate. It's a little bit trickier when you're further inland, but there are ways you can extend the growing season with cold frames, with greenhouse covers with straw bales, different different trips and tricks, and yeah it's just nice to have fresh produce longer into the season. But along with having a magic garden is soluble fiber because, who doesn't love fiber?

(00:09:54): Cate

Yeah, soluble fiber. Well, okay, I want to address both of those points. I do feel like I have a magic garden and partially it is climate change. Like I have a longer growing season than I used to because we have milder winters than we used to. But at the same time, I look around at my neighbors and they don't have lavender blooming late into the fall the way I do, you know. Sometimes like you can just really put an extra special oomph into your garden that makes it feel like magic and it's just super in. And we can teach you how to do that, check out eatingrooted.com and reach out if you're interested in edible or herbal kitchen garden design or coaching for the coming growing season.

(00:10:34): Mairi

So back to soluble fiber,

Cate

Yeah, we didn't really touch on soluble fiber and we're gonna have a whole other episode about this so like I'll just say that but soluble fiber is really important for your health and it's a really big component of your detox pathways it's like the nutrient that you need the most in order to detox and it's just super in like we're eating our soluble fiber in 2025.

Mairi

Yeah I think going along with having a magic garden and everything we've said so far is also romanticizing your life. I'm not going super in order on the list here.

(00:11:09): Cate

That's okay.

(00:11:10): Mairi

I'm a little bit skippy, but yeah, just enjoying everything and not taking it for granted. That's really all I have to say.

(00:11:19): Cate

Yeah all of these things can help you romanticize your life, like I romanticize my life all the time, that's the reason why I own a picnic basket. It’s because when I go and have dinner outside and I put it in a picnic basket like it's so whimsical it just makes me feel like a main character in a gorgeous cinematic film and it just can really add a lot to the quality of your life and it can be free, so we are romanticizing our lives.

(00:11:48): Mairi

The next couple things, I'm going to say all these altogether because I feel like they go under the umbrella of just… self-care as self-love and taking care of yourself now and in the future, but daily walks and stretches, also getting outside, super important, fermented food –

I love fermented foods, I think they're so important. I don't think i've never really been a probiotics fan in terms of supplements because I think you could just make sauerkraut and then you get all of those benefits and also savory breakfast and fermented food is a great thing to have with your savory breakfast because then you're nourishing your gut. And like I just said, making chickpea battered tofu sticks, protein and savory breakfast in the morning are really, really great. Just to stabilize your blood sugar throughout the day and make sure you're not getting that high in that crash.

(00:12:36): Cate

Let me tell you, it has been a revelation having a really balanced diet. Filling savory breakfast how much better I feel for the rest of the day has been just one of the biggest revelations of 2024 and we're carrying that into 2025 and we're sticking with it.

Mairi

Okay we got a couple other ins, you want to go through them?

(00:12:57): Cate

Yeah, sure. Reading for pleasure, that's always in, but just want to drive that home we should all be reading for pleasure more not everything has to be productive and you can really just read the romantic books and just have fun and not feel bad about it

(00:13:10): Mairi

Yeah I think you sent me a meme, it was something about reading for pleasure and they're like, is there something not reading for pleasure? And it was “I think they call it a PhD” (laughs) But I enjoy most of the reading that I do. Do I always want to do it? No. But yeah, for the most part, I'm doing it because I want to. What?

(00:13:30): Cate

No one forced you to do a PhD.

(00:13:32): Mairi

No, no one forced me.

(00:13:33): Cate

So. Okay, another in for just decolonizing from Christianity and reclaiming pagan traditions. This is especially relevant if maybe, like us, you have European ancestry that is more recently Christian or Catholic, but obviously before Christianity was around, they had different religions and beliefs and traditions, and just trying to reclaim that and examine what the Catholic Church did to specifically the people of Ireland, which is where a lot of our ancestors are from.

Mairi

I would say, too, I think there's a lot of discourse around whether white people can use the term decolonization or not. And I think that's absolutely valid in the context of settler colonialism in the Americas and Australia and other areas that have been colonized more recently by Europeans. The context that we're using it in is that our ancestors, who were white people, were also colonized by other Europeans, by other white people.

(00:14:31): Cate

Yeah, like Ireland was, I'm pretty sure Ireland was the first colony.

(00:14:36): Mairi

Yes, Ireland was colonized for about 800 years, starting around 1200.

And then the 1600s at the same time that the Caribbean was being colonized with sugar plantations, the plantation system was also being pioneered in Ireland so absolutely decolonization in this context we're talking about decolonizing our religion that was forced upon our ancestors that they then adopted but that hasn't necessarily served our family throughout history in a way – or we don't necessarily view it that way, some of our relatives might disagree.

Okay, cycle tracking, also super in for 2025.

(00:15:11): Cate

Yeah, for people who have a menstrual cycle, just keeping track. It is the fifth vital sign and I think a lot of people don't necessarily track their cycle and it can tell you a lot about your overall health status and just – We're cycle tracking, we're taking care of our cycles and we're paying attention to our fifth vital sign.

(00:15:33): Mairi

Okay, so other things that are in swimming in natural bodies of water, I think also walking barefoot goes along with this. And this is the analogy that I use that people think is kind of ridiculous when, you know, there is scientific research about grounding and the importance of just allowing – I’m gonna say it wrong but there are free radicals in your body just free electrons

then they need to be neutralized so the ocean this is one of Catie's favorite things to say is the largest source of free electrons in the world, you can also do that by being barefoot on the ground. And I know people think it sounds crazy, but every single house that has electricity has a grounding rod. Lightning rods on lighthouses. I don't know if you didn't grow up around lighthouses. We learned in elementary school they all have lightning rods on them so that if they get struck by lightning, it just goes straight through and into the ground.

So… We understand that electricity conduits that way. And I know that we're not the same as lightning, but it's kind of the same premise. So if you can picture a grounding rod for electricity, that extra energy needs to be absorbed or get, you know, electrons somehow. I'm not a physicist or a chemist, but...

(00:16:43): Cate

Yeah, one thing about this is that it sounds like woo-woo to an average person, but to people who actually study electrons and atoms, scientists, like what's the scientist called that studies that? I'm not even sure.

(00:16:55): Mairi

Particle physicist, maybe?

(00:16:57): Cate

Yeah, physicist. It is not really new to them. It's not woo-woo to them. Like you are made up of molecules and atoms and you have electrons and protons inside of you and you do need them in order for your nervous system and everything else to work. That's just what everything is made out of. So yeah, electrons are really good for you.

And just the last in, we're just starting the new year hydrated, rested, nourished, moisturized, and for us not staying out too late or going out at all necessarily, especially because I was sick.

(00:17:28): Mairi

So going out is fun. I wish I didn't fall asleep at 9pm.

(00:17:32): Cate

So this is just an in for me. This is not necessarily an in for Mairi. I was awake at midnight and I was writing my intentions in my bed as the clock struck midnight. And then literally just after midnight, thunder crashed, which timing wise, it felt like significant and very interesting. And I wasn't sure what point to make of it, like if it was a good omen or a bad. But just starting the new year for me, like waking up and being rested and well nourished and not hungover for me, that felt very in, but maybe somebody else listening is in their party era and that's okay too.

(00:18:04): Mairi

I was very rested and nourished. I had a great dinner the night before.

(00:18:09): Cate

And you didn't want to be rested and nourished.

(00:18:12): Mairi

We went to Wild Seed, which is a, I don't know if they call themselves vegan or plant-based. It's a restaurant in San Francisco. It was amazing. Absolutely loved it. And I wanted to stay awake, but I was on a plane that morning, basically. I had woken up at the equivalent of 11:30 p.m Pacific time the night before and gotten a few hours of sleep on a plane, after sleeping maybe the equivalent of three hours the night before, so I was very, very, exhausted and I fell asleep at 9 p.m Pacific but in my defense, that maybe 9:30, that's about 12:30 a.m. eastern which is where I was coming from so New Year's was a little bit of a whirlwind. It was good. I was hydrated. I was rested. I would be okay with being a little bit less. So, but I just got to stop falling asleep so early.

(00:18:58): Cate

All right.

(00:19:01): Mairi

Yeah. Moving on to the outs because we have to wrap this up.

(00:19:04): Cate

One thing, I think this is so out. I hate this. I get so annoyed every time I see this on social media. People are taking shots of olive oil for health reasons and olive oil can like be very healthy, but I don't understand why people are taking a shot of it. Like just drizzle it on your food. That's going to be so much more enjoyable and you're still getting it into your body. It's still good for you. Like why on earth would you take a shot of it rather than just putting it on your food? I don't get it.

(00:19:30): Mairi

I would also go with – I used to work for a business that had a counter in an olive oil store, the kind where you can go and like taste the different infused olive oils. And first of all, those olive oils, I think this is there's a lot of those stores that popped up like maybe 10 to 15 years ago, and some of them are still around. Those olive oils may or may not be the best quality. I'm not speaking for all of them, but a lot of times infused products like that are not the high shelf.

It's really cool if you do have a lot of high quality natural olive oils to do a taste test and they do have different flavors. And it's crazy when you say one can be buttery and one can be peppery and green, but they really, really are. And I think tasting those natural flavors is really cool, like dipping bread in them, not necessarily doing a shot, but the infused flavors, one, tend to be lower quality. And two, people would go and taste the olive oils to buy and they would put them into a little shot glass and taste them and take a sip. And I'm just like, that's… gross. That's gross, I don't want to drink oil yeah, like I don't want to drink oil.

(00:20:33): Cate

Yeah like I want to put it on my food.

Mairi

Yeah like bullet coffee is a thing though too. That's, you have, bullet coffee is like you mix basically like, you froth I think –

Cate

That's coconut oil people usually do –

Mairi

But it's still oil.

Cate

Yeah.

Mairi

It can balance out your blood sugar, I suppose. But anyway.

Cate

Anyway, that's out. Put it on your food. Just don't get a shot of it. Like, you don't need to do that.

Okay, so we already talked about this. Calling vegan food fake. It's real food. Literally food. Like, it's not made out of plastic.

Mairi

It's an out. Not going outside all day is out. And acting like tofu is bad is out. Next out. Those are out.

(00:21:11): Cate

Being dismissive of herbal or traditional medicine, that's out. That's just disrespectful to so many different cultures, oral histories and traditions and beliefs and empirical knowledge. And just being dismissive of it is disrespectful and uneducated. And we're being respectful of herbal and traditional medicine systems in 2025.

(00:21:31): Mairi

Yeah, Western science a lot of times seeks to validate traditional or indigenous knowledge. And I think it's really cool when systems can co-create and come to similar understandings, but other forms of knowledge are valid without western scientific validation.

Next out, carnivore diets, you are a human not a lion. People love to say that humans were really designed to eat meat, I will say from a biological perspective we're omnivores really is you know I would say we can digest both meat and plants. Therefore that makes us omnivores, regardless of what you want to say about our teeth, or our canines or anything, I choose to eat plants because I don't want to eat animals. And I just am not interested, but just eating meat, guys.

(00:22:15): Cate

Well, here's the thing is, like, I so hate to break it to you, but you need to eat fiber. You need to eat fiber. It's a really important nutrient. And...Some people feel like they feel better when they don't eat fiber.

And that's not because you're not supposed to have it. It's because your gut is not healthy enough to actually break it down properly. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't eat it. It's that you should try to heal your digestive system so that you can actually eat the fiber.

Yeah, I don't know. The hospitals are not full of people dying from protein deficiency. It's full of people dying from preventable things like heart disease and cancer and diabetes and fiber intake does correlate to a lot of these diseases of the Western world.

(00:22:58): Mairi

You know what else does? Is dental health. Because the plaque on your teeth is the same plaque that goes to your brain and it's the same plaque that goes to your heart. So brush your teeth and floss. Any kind of bleeding of your gums is gingivitis. And I would also say, yeah, brush your teeth.

And just quick tips. If you're having a hard time eating raw veggies, cook them, cook your broccoli, cook your carrots. They are going to be easier to digest that way.

(00:23:20): Cate

Yeah, carnivore diets are out. Fiber is in.

Also, just for me, iced drinks in the winter, out. I like a cozy beverage. I like a warm beverage warming me up in the winter, iced drinks are for when I'm hot. And that's just how I feel.

(00:23:33): Mairi

I think from a western scientific perspective winter is actually the best time to eat ice cream calorically speaking.

Cate

Well I'm not opposed to eating ice cream all year round but iced drinks is not for me in the winter.

Mairi

All right so also outs joining a book club and not reading. This is personal, Catie and I had a book club a few years ago and we were the only ones who read, so she's a little over it. I also want to do a book club on this podcast, Catie is not so into it, but maybe that'll change. But we could also just do I read a book and I tell you all about the book. That could be book club. So we'll see.

Next out, plastic in the kitchen. This has already been out. This has been out for decades, but get rid of it, especially your black plastic.

Cate

Anyway, all clothing that doesn't have pockets. I don't want a single clothing item that doesn't have a pocket in it. It bothers me. I just like pockets. I want a place to put my keys and my phone. Like, why are people making clothing that doesn't have pockets? I don't get it. That's out. Peeling vegetables that don't need to be peeled.

Mairi and I have some disagreements about this. Because Mairi thinks that sometimes it's relevant to peel potato for mashed potatoes. But personally, I am not peeling anything that has an edible peel. So that includes potatoes, that includes apples, that includes carrots. Nutrients are concentrated in the peel and they're good for you. And I'm not peeling things unless it's a banana.

(00:24:55): Mairi

See, this is where I don't think you have to peel things I don't if I don't feel like it but this is where you know, you can separate like food is not there's this group of people who are food is just nutrients and it's nothing else and food is just fuel and that's all it is. I think that's kind of maybe where the soylent crowd is is like I just need this to keep me going and it's nothing else. Food is also culture, and food is art and creativity. And sometimes that art and creativity does not include a peel. And sometimes if I don't want an apple peel or a potato peel, I am going to peel my produce. But I don't think that you need to, but I can see where I would want to do it.

Next out, this is yours. I'm just a girl. I'm actually a bog witch. I'm a woman. I'm not a girl.

(00:25:38): Cate

Yeah, I don't like this trend of saying like, oh, I'm just a girl. I feel like it's infantilizing to women. I just don't like it. It doesn't sit right with me. I think that's out, and I'm just embracing my inner bog witch. Like, I'm not just a girl. I'm a witch.

Also, this kind of goes along with some of the things that we've said before, but saying that you're eating ancestrally when it's literally just dairy and dead cows… Your ancestors ate other things. I promise you they did not only eat dairy and dead cows. They might have eaten dairy and dead cows, but also like plenty of plants and also probably not dead cows every single day.

(00:26:10): Mairi

Yeah, you can see in a lot of places, there are some cultures and cuisines that are very heavily reliant on meat. And these tend to be places where it's hard to grow plants a lot of the year, like maybe in the north. Ancestral humans, which one fun fact is that if you look at the math, humans should have a lot more ancestors than we actually do because we were all just… Very, very inbred for most of human history, to be honest. Across the whole world, there just weren't that many people. Not everybody, but in general, we all have fewer ancestors than we should.


Side note, though, those ancestors that are fewer than they should, they ate plants in addition to maybe some non-plants as well.

Cate

I'm especially thinking too of hunter-gatherers. They didn't just go out and have meat every single day. It was more of a rarity necessarily to get a big kill and to fill in the gaps. They were eating plants. And then beyond hunter-gatherer ancestors, it's thinking more specifically like the ancestors that many carnivore people are European of European descent. And they also didn't slaughter animals every single day or every single week. They would slaughter an animal and it would last them a long time and they would have to make it last because they just couldn't eat the quantity of meat that people are eating today. And so in order to fill in the gaps, they were very likely to be eating things that they grew in their gardens.

(00:27:32): Mairi

Yeah, the increase in meat consumption really is, you know, we see it as a Western phenomenon, whereas wealth accrues in countries across the globe, there is this transition to more processed foods, and more meat heavy diets. Where meat might have been eaten maybe frequently before, but in much lower quantities and used more as a seasoning or something like that.


But moving on to the last couple of outs, and this goes along with it, is menus that are just different variations of meat and cheese stop being boring. This is true, is that I tend to have the opinion, and this is for restaurants, right, that consider themselves to be inventive or interesting or in any way doing something that's slightly different if you aren't able to make vegetables taste good and you can make raw vegetables taste good but if you are just doing something really boring with vegetables I don't know Dirt Candy is the standard anything I, just, Dirt Candy is the standard.

So Dirt Candy is a Michelin-starred vegetable restaurant in New York City and that changes their menu seasonally, and they are incredible. They're so, so good. I would eat there all the time if I could afford to, and I cannot, but that's what I want to see.

(00:28:42):Cate

Yeah. Well, like, yeah, this is the thing. Like, I think sometimes menus literally, like, sometimes we can go somewhere that has meat and cheese on the menu,but we could still have a meal, like a taco, if you remove the meat and cheese and there's, like, veggies left. And that's not ideal. But then what's really lame is if you take out the meat and cheese when there's, like, nothing left but a tortilla...that's when it's just different variations of meat and cheese it's not creative, it's not cool and then if the veg option is just a couple of like grilled vegetables that's also not cool.

Mairi

I did go to a restaurant with my partner and his mom a few weeks ago and we picked it because it said that they had a vegetarian and slash vegan option and they had a vegetarian option but when we went and we asked if it could be made vegan which said it could on the menu the vegan option was to just remove half of the dish so that all that was left was was the vegetables. And you know, the restaurant was fine, I think the non- the , the meat options were fine as well, but it was just kind of funny it's like okay, you don't say you have a vegan option if the vegan option is removing half of the dish.

(00:29:45): Cate

If you're saying you have if you can veganize something at the restaurant that means that you are replacing whatever that protein was with a vegan protein you are making a version of that dish vegan you're not just taking away half of it so that's, also just super out. And just acting like you're a creative, or like progressive chef, and then not doing anything interesting at all with vegetables, that's out. And I think we need to hold people to a higher standard.

(00:30:13): Mairi

Yeah, there are so many cool chefs doing really cool things with vegetables. So it's, I want to see more of that.

Cate

And lastly, this kind of goes along with some of the things we were saying about carnivore. Just jumping on every health trend instead of eating according to your values and morals. And I say health like in quotation marks because there's a lot of quote unquote health trends that, really are not necessarily healthy, like carnivore, and also might not be relevant to you yourself and what is going to work well for your life and jumping on every health trend instead of just finding something that actually – Find something that you believe in, and eat according to that value system. Like you should be living your values every day especially if you can afford to do so and it can be more affordable than you think.

And like you should care about things. You should care about humans -

Mairi

Not caring is out.

(00:31:05): Cate

Yeah, you should care about farm workers, you should care about the environment, you should care about pollution, you should care about the well-being of people up and down the entire supply chain, and what you eat can either contribute or not contribute to all of these systems that cause harm. And people should, yeah, people should care about things and you should do your best to eat according to your values instead of just jumping on what seems like a health trend or a way to get skinny that's just out it's out cool.

Mairi

So I think that was the whole list. A little out of order, a little rambly, but all the ins and outs, I'm sure we'll have more but I think this is a good place to wrap it up for today.. And if you didn't know, you can visit us at eatingrooted.com where we will have a transcript with the show notes and probably some links to support some of the claims we've made.

You can also check out the blog and learn more about how you can work with us for edible and herbal kitchen garden design and coaching. If you are looking to integrate your values with what you do in the kitchen and what you do in the garden, take a look at the website and reach out. It's eatingrooted.com.

We will work with you to figure out what the best fit is for your lifestyle and really put together a plan and support you with a design for your garden, whether you're in an apartment or a small space or you have a larger space outdoors. And putting you through figuring out what your first season looks like and how you can actually build a garden that doesn't take over your life, but that complements your life and that you can integrate into the kitchen. So that's eatingrooted.com. And don’t forget,

Cate

To put your values on your plate.

Mairi

We'll see you next time.