Citi Field 2018 Report, Part 2: Not Vegan 😭

Back at Citi Field because I cannot resist a Star Wars/Mets bobblehead.  Though I always start with the usual: the stadium’s Yves veggie dog with all the fixin’s, Nathan’s fries and a Bud Light, I recently received a note from a man named John about the buns paired with the Yves veggie dogs not being vegan. (Thank you, John.) I hadn’t had the time to verify this before this visit… but after making contact with the folks at Citi Field, it is verified. The buns paired with the veggie dog are NOT vegan.  They contain milk and butter, as well as other weird processed ingredients that can be from animal or plant origin. It’s a very frustrating discovery, as I’ve eaten a bunch of these through the years.  I can’t stand how difficult it is to trust bread products even when the innards are purely vegetarian.  I guess a general safe guideline is to bring your own, like John does, but c’mon!  Why does there have to be such weird crap in bread!  It’s things like this that scare would-be vegans away: I got to carry my own buns?!  It brings me to the argument of Effective Advocacy vs. Personal Purity.  The gist of the debate is this: the prioritizing of strict personal purity above all harms one’s ability to be an influential advocate for animals.  Because it annoys people and makes veganism seem very difficult. This quote from the summary linked above sums up one perspective:

Animals don’t need your purity, or else it would make sense to go live in a cabin in the woods, causing as little harm as possible. What the animals need is your advocacy—and they need for it to be as effective and influential as possible. Ultimately veganism can’t just be about us, or it will become just one more narcissistic cultural fad. Veganism must be about helping animals.

So the issue of personal purity becomes one of basic math: Adopting a vegan diet means you’re not supporting the torment and slaughter of dozens of animals every single year. Helping just one more person to go vegan will save twice as many animals. But the reverse is also true: If you do something that prevents another person from adopting a vegan diet, if your example puts up a barrier where you might have built a bridge, that hurts animals—so then it becomes anti-vegan, if vegan means helping animals.

I hate how complicated food has to be.  Processed food, its ingredients and its processes, are inherently complicated and “Big Food” likes to keep secrets.  Besides discerning whether a food is vegan or not vegan, there are endless complications that are paired with an industrialized food system… a profit system… argribusiness and all its grossness.  Like take Hain-Celestial, who owns Yves Veggie Cuisine. Hain-Celestial is pretty icky, as described by Farm Wars here. Writer/Activist Barbara H. Peterson has posted screen shots of the company’s stock holdings summary and an excerpt from Organic Consumer’s Association’s 2003 report on Hain.  Things are getting even more gross across the board as Big Scary Food tries to stay on top of plant based consumer trends.  If the evil affiliation worth it?  Let’s talk about it!

Oh wait, yes… back to The Mets and vegan (or not vegan) food…

These Italian Ices from Papa Rosso are likely vegan, but not confirmed.  Well, maybe the chocolate and orange creamsicle ain’t vegan.  

In the World’s Fare Market there are some vegan options. Garden of Eatin’ blue tortillas with pic de gallo and guacamole, expensive BluePrint juices…  there is also the sushi place in there, Daruma of Tokoyo.

Also… THE TOFU BAO is definitely gone. That one that was clearly labelled “vegan.”  The Jim Bean Highball Club, which replaced the Promenade Club, has booted Baohaus. In its place, non-vegan mozzarella sticks (Big Mozz), chicken sandwiches (Lil Sweet Chick), donuts (Chomp Donut Co.), and 2nd stands for Arancini Brothers and Dō (They are now outside by the Shea Bridge too.)  I reported on the bao last season and I’m sad it’s gone, but I’ll post it here so we can weep together with all this other disappointing news. Siiiigh