<\/p>\n

One of the hardest things to give up when I became vegan was cheese.\u00a0 I think that goes for most vegans I have talked with and most vegetarians name cheese as the one thing keeping them from being vegan.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Begin a “strict-vegetarian” and eating cheese must be met with reading labels and investigating for cheeses that do not contain animal rennet.\u00a0 Most brands now use vegetable rennet as a coagulant but some smaller companies still employ the calf-intestine enzyme to set their cheeses.\u00a0 You’ll find it in almost every hard cheese such as parmesan.<\/p>\n

What is rennet and how is it produced?<\/p>\n

From Wikipedia:<\/p>\n

Traditional method<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dried and cleaned stomachs of young calves are sliced into small pieces and then put into saltwater or whey, together with some vinegar or wine to lower the pH of the solution. After some time (overnight or several days), the solution is filtered. The crude rennet that remains in the filtered solution can then be used to coagulate milk. About 1 gram of this solution can normally coagulate 2000 to 4000 grams of milk.<\/p>\n

Modern method<\/strong><\/p>\n

Deep-frozen stomachs are milled and put into an enzyme-extracting solution. The crude rennet extract is then activated by adding acid; the enzymes in the stomach are produced in an inactive preform and are activated by the stomach acid. After neutralization of the acid, the rennet extract is filtered in several stages and concentrated until reaching the required potency: about 1:15000 (1 kg of rennet would have the ability to coagulate 15000 litres of milk).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Calf stomachs used for rennet production<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So, you may be enjoying a bit of calf-stomach scrapings with that hunk of cheddar.\u00a0\u00a0 Considering that and the fact you’re just eating dried, moldy bovine-secretions why keep on eating it?\u00a0 There are some good soy and rice cheeses on the market.\u00a0 True, some are just like eating waxed paper but a few stand out.\u00a0 Follow Your Heart<\/a> makes excellent Cheddar and Mozzarella, both melt great and the Cheddar can make a mean mac and cheese. \u00a0 Galaxy<\/a> makes a good rice Parmesan and individual slice, but be sure to read the label as some of their products contain casein, a milk protein aids in melting. \u00a0 Follow Your Heart cheese do not contain casein and melt just fine.<\/p>\n

Also, don’t think all of those dairy cows live a great life just being milked daily. \u00a0 They are kept pregnant and live short lives, average being 4 years. \u00a0 Are you contributing to the cruel farming of animals by just eating dairy cheese?\u00a0 Yes.<\/p>\n

All of this leads up to a news story<\/a> I saw today. \u00a0 Sweetwater Valley Farm<\/a>, a local Tennesssee cheese maker, has issued a statement saying one type of it’s cheese should not be eaten as it may contain Listeria. \u00a0 Seems like a worthy risk to eat that nice cheesy sandwich or casserole topped with stringy goodness, doesn’t it?\u00a0 \u00a0 Listeria can cause death in the young or elderly. \u00a0\u00a0 Healthy adults may be inconvenienced by headaches, cramping,\u00a0 vomiting and diarrhea.\u00a0 No big deal.\u00a0 Teh story also mentions that if you have some of this cheese you may return it for a replacement.\u00a0\u00a0 Something doesn’t sound right about that.\u00a0 “Here’s my chunk of Listeria, may I have another that has less bacteria?”<\/p>\n

While were on the subject of cheese, don’t forget about Cazu Marzu<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the hardest things to give up when I became vegan was cheese.\u00a0 I think that goes for most vegans I have talked with and most vegetarians name cheese as the one thing keeping them from being vegan.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Begin a “strict-vegetarian” and eating cheese must be met with reading labels and investigating for cheeses […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,52,78,77],"tags":[489,512,535,534],"class_list":["post-181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-animals","category-cheese","category-local","category-recall","tag-animals","tag-cheese","tag-local","tag-recall"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":524,"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181\/revisions\/524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nashveggie.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}