Vesanto Melina

Here we've done something like 10 books on plant-based nutrition and foods. Some have really good recipes and most are on nutrition and they're in 14 languages now. And we started off Many years ago, we had a book, Becoming Vegetarian, that was so controversial at the time in the early 90s.

Brenda Davis

1994, it first came out.

Vesanto Melina

It had a chapter called Without Meat. Well, that was being somewhat acceptable at that time. And then a chapter without dairy.

Brenda Davis

It was like we had committed a major crime in the nutrition world. Even the thought of saying dairy is not necessary. necessary for survival. That was not something dietitians said at that time.

Vesanto Melina

But we've been, since then, really well accepted. I've had numerous awards from dietitians in different countries, and I'm lead author of the current position paper on vegetarian nutrition for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

Brenda Davis

Yeah, Vesanto received the highest award offered by Dietitians of Canada, which is called the Riley Jeffs Memorial Lecture Award in 2017. So I can tell you we've come a long way.

Vesanto Melina

And Brenda gives talks to medical doctors in many countries, let alone many parts of the US, and get standing ovations. So from like more than 1,000 doctors at a time.

Brenda Davis

Yeah, it's exciting. People all over the world are getting very interested in lifestyle medicine. So just a couple of years ago, I was in Lithuania with the founding president of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine, Dr. John Kelly, and we did a 10-day lifestyle intervention. And it was a demonstration for the government and the medical school to show what could be accomplished with 10 days of intervention. And I've done some research in the Marshall Islands doing similar work, and that was also with Dr. Kelly. So we're all over the world. I'm heading to Saudi Arabia in December to speak to physicians on lifestyle medicine as well. So it's exciting to see the interest around the world.

Vesanto Melina

So why did you become vegetarian in the first place, and then why vegan?

Brenda Davis

Well, I started out, it was probably 1989 when, and it's kind of interesting thinking back. I was actually a public health nutritionist. And the public health world was really about in Canada, Canada's food guide and the four food groups. And I did radio interviews with Peter Zosky and all of these things. It was an exciting career. But I had a little bit of a revelation in about 1989. I had an interaction with a very close friend who was going off to hunt deer. And I remember him stopping by for coffee on his way. I tried to think of something I could say to him that would stop him from killing another deer. And so I challenged him. I said, I don't understand why you would feel good about going into the bush with a big gun and shooting a perfectly innocent animal who I don't think deserves to die. And it was really what he said back to me that changed the course of my life. He said, just because you don't have the guts to pull the trigger does not mean you're not responsible for the trigger being pulled every time you buy a piece of meat camouflaged in cellophane in the grocery store. And then he said, at least the animals I eat have had a life. I wonder if you can say the same for the ones that are sitting on your plate. And it was the first time anybody had ever really forced me to, or encouraged me to take responsibility for the food I was eating. And my mom grew up on a farm. I always thought about farm animals like, you know, living like they do in storybooks, Old MacDonald's Farm. And I decided to find out what animal agriculture was really all about. And I ordered agriculture magazines. I did all sorts of research. And it took me about two weeks to decide I didn't want to consume the products of animals that have been raised and the conditions 90% of animals are raised today, which is CAFOs, confined animal feeding operations. And I thought to myself, why would I want to contribute to pain, suffering, and death when I do not have to. And the reality is that as a dietitian, I knew I could put together a diet that was not only healthy, but that could protect against chronic disease, eliminating these foods. And I, at that point, decided that is exactly what I was going to do. And I thought I, as a dietitian, I want to do everything in my power to help others that come to that realization to be able to put together diets that work at every stage of the life cycle. And that's when I, you know, I met Vesanto. I mean, we, yeah, I met Vesanto back in 19, probably 90 or 91. And I was just absolutely so excited to meet another real live vegetarian dietitian. And we connected and it was within a year of our connection that we started working on these books because we shared. This was our first one. Yeah, we shared a vision of doing the, yeah, doing the same thing.

Vesanto Melina

Yeah.

Brenda Davis

How about you?

Vesanto Melina

Well, I started, I'm 77 now. And I started about 40 years ago, actually 41 years ago, it was really a big trend to go plant-based. So I went plant-based too, because everybody was doing it. was really just a common thing we were doing. And my friends and I, and this is a really good way to enter it, we started cooking for each other. We'd each cook one night a week, and we'd make really good food. And one person was good at Indonesian food, one was good at Indian food, one liked North American fast food. So we'd get this mix of things and it was really fun and we tried to outdo each other. And so you got good food all the time. And it was, I find it a really nice way to share that way. So my interest was actually with good food, but I was still including cheese at that time. I didn't really understand the link between veal calves and milk production. and the slaughter of veal calves, just because they're boys that are born to these cows that have to be impregnated. So anyway, later on I dropped dairy, and I also have a dairy allergy, so that wasn't very hard to do too. Then I started learning more about the animal issues, and I learned about boar bashing, and that one was about how they hit pigs with a crowbar on their snout to get them to get into the truck. And sometimes they use an electric cattle prod now. They don't always do that. But I had fallen down when I was a little kid and hurt my nose. So it was really sensitive to me thinking about these pigs. That's their sensitive place. And I just felt, too, I didn't want to be contributing in any way to that suffering. And so then became the journey of, okay, how do we do this in really good health? And we start discovering things, like how do we get omega-3s in our diet if we don't use fish? You know, we had to start learning about hemp seeds and walnuts and how do we get these nutrients from plant foods. So that's been really fun. And then we could show people how to do it and make it taste good and People liked it.

Brenda Davis

And it's so interesting because when we first wrote Becoming Vegetarian, to be really quite honest, it was a vegan book in disguise because we were helping people who didn't want to consume meat, but also who didn't want to consume dairy. Because it was really the first book that I'm aware of that provided solid guidelines for every stage of the life cycle, we had to be very, very cautious about our recommendations. And so, for example, Vesanto did the protein chapter, and she made contact with several of the world's leading experts on protein to make sure that our recommendations were bang on, because it's a little bit different if you're not consuming animal products, you want to make sure that the amount of protein you're getting is appropriate. And also with the omega-3 fatty acids, I probably talked to five of the leading experts in the world, one from Chile, one from England, one from India, two from Canada, one from the States, because we didn't have at that time in the United States. any national guidelines on essential fatty acids. We did in Canada. And that's why we were so compelled to create guidelines that would work for vegetarians. And so because vegetarians are consuming direct sources of DHA and EPA, how much ALA do we need? And even in those days, you couldn't purchase supplements that were completely vegetarian for EPA and DHA. So we had a lot of figuring to do and we were very, very cautious when we created those guidelines as well as for vitamin B12 and so on to make sure that the diets would meet the RDA for all of the nutrients. So it's a project. Yeah.

Vesanto Melina

Now we've got books that are really the leaders in plant-based nutrition and known to be that around the world. And we've got the Becoming Vegan Express edition, which is simpler, and then this more complex Becoming Vegan Comprehensive edition that's bigger and entirely referenced. It goes through all these details, how much iodine, this is not just for people on plant-based diets, but those who are moving in that direction or want to find out for a family member, this kind of thing. And it's also used as a college text. This one, it's all referenced. And then we had the book, Cooking Vegan, which I did with the chef from the Four Seasons. And that has recipes that are healthy, delicious, and easy. and they really taste good, and they help people use these plant foods and make it taste good, and it's simple, they're well tested, people like them, and so that makes the practical side come up, and all the recipes have nutritional analysis.

Brenda Davis

Yeah, and it really is good when you bring a very highly qualified chef into the mix, you can get some wonderful results, so I love this book.

Vesanto Melina

Oh, thank you, Brenda. So we've had a warm reception. Thank you.