Whole30 Day 18: Where’s the Beef?

After several decades of abstaining from beef, I decided to give it a try.

Way back when I was in college, I stopped eating beef for a summer. It was more out of plain old curiosity than over any concerns about heart disease or qualms with the beef industry. I just wanted to see how I would feel. By the end of that summer, I didn’t miss it, and I just didn’t add it back into my diet.

In the years since I first went nouveau vegetarian, all kinds of unpleasant things have come to light about the way our food is processed. I read a book at one point about mad cow disease that had me counting my blessings that I’d sworn off eating any cow at all, mad or otherwise. I felt kind of smart knowing that I’d prevented at least that one malady from wreaking havoc on my life.

Fast forward to a few years ago when a naturopathic doctor told me that my skin was “translucent” and that she could practically see through me. “Beef,” she declared, “will solve everything.”

I’ve mulled that over quite a bit. If the lack of beef in my diet is making me translucent, that could explain a lot. All those times when people have interrupted conversations I’ve been having as if I wasn’t there might not have been the show of rudeness I’ve always assumed. Maybe they just plain couldn’t see me.

Since the Whole30 is a vehicle for dietary change anyway, my girls and I decided to give beef a try. As long as it’s grass fed and from a reputable source, why not? So tonight we made a delicious steak salad, and do you know what? It tasted like chicken.

So I really don’t know if beef is back in my life, but I do like the idea of not being see-through.