Just like Adam and Eve: Israelis grow hungry for vegan diet

Just like Adam and Eve: Israelis grow hungry for vegan diet

TEL AVIV — The music pounded, the liquor flowed, dancers filled the floor and khinkali meat dumplings and kababi skewers — staples of traditional Georgian cuisines — sat on almost every table.

That was back in February, before Nana Shrier, the owner of the hip Tel Aviv bar and restaurant Nanuchka, saw a television news report about factory farming. Then everything changed.

Abhorred by how animals are treated in industrial meat and dairy production, Shrier stripped all the animal products from the menu — from cheese to eggs to chicken and steak — and made the restaurant entirely vegan.

It wasn’t an easy shift. Retaining the restaurant’s Georgian character has forced Shrier to get creative, finding meat substitutes and trying new dishes. She has also noticed that customers order less hard alcohol when they don’t eat meat. But none of that matters to her.

“We understood that there’s no price worth paying to create animal products, to see, to sell, to produce or to buy them,” she said. “The atmosphere is pleasant, but I would have paid any price. I would have lost half my business for this.”

According to the activist group Vegan-Friendly, Shrier is one of approximately 300,000 vegans in Israel. At nearly 4 percent of the country, activists say Israel has the highest per capita vegan population of anywhere in the world. And the trend appears to be accelerating.

A survey conducted in January found that 8 percent of Israelis are vegetarian and nearly 5 percent are vegan. Four years ago, Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics reported that just 2.6 percent of Israelis were vegetarian or vegan.

Some 7,000 Israelis have accepted the Challenge 22 to go vegan for 22 days since the initiative was launched in May by the animal rights group Anonymous. About 250 Israeli restaurants are now certified “vegan friendly” by the group of the same name, meaning that at least one-quarter of their dishes contain no animal products.

Israel is also frequently included on lists of the world’s most vegan-friendly nations, thanks in part to the fact that national staples such as falafel and hummus contain no animal products. And on Oct. 13, Tel Aviv’s second annual Vegan-Fest drew more than 10,000 attendees to a festival of food, crafts and music that organizers claim is the world’s largest.

“The makeup of the community is the biggest change,” said Omri Paz, founder of Vegan-Friendly, which organized the festival. “In the past, maybe they were more spiritual, or people society viewed as a little different, a little strange. A lot of the new vegans are mainstream — vegan lawyers, vegan teachers. Everyone can be vegan.”

The alternative and the mainstream mingled freely at the festival, where people wearing baggy tie-dyed pants and shirts reading “Proud To Be Vegan” mixed with families enjoying picnics. The food stands lining the park offered everything from vegan cakes and ice cream to vegan shwarma, Israel’s trademark spiced lamb dish.

Even Domino’s Pizza had a booth showcasing its vegan pies — first sold in Israel. Ido Fridman, the vice president of marketing for Domino’s Israel, said the company has sold about 300,000 vegan pizzas since launching the pie last year.

Israel’s vegan boom comes at a time of heightened awareness of animal welfare on factory farms.

A Hebrew-subtitled lecture on veganism has garnered nearly a million views on YouTube in a country of just 8 million people. One-fifth of the country tuned in to see a vegan activist win the latest season of the Israeli version of the “Big Brother” reality television show. And a popular investigative news show has broadcast six segments exposing the mistreatment of animals in Israel’s meat and dairy industries.

The heightened consciousness around animal welfare has bolstered vegan activists. Founded just two years ago, Vegan-Friendly has seen attendance at its festival jump 25 percent this year. Another animal rights group founded two years ago, Free 269, recently opened Israel’s first sanctuary for animals from factory farms and has spawned dozens of offshoots in other countries.

“There’s the virality of Facebook and YouTube, so the messages and the pictures and videos are exposed to tons of people,” Paz said. “It helps that people are used to eating falafel and Israeli salad.”

Israeli veganism took root in secular liberal circles, but religious Israelis are joining the movement, too. Many note that the biblical Adam and Eve were vegetarians in the Garden of Eden.

Yehuda Shein, the chairman of Behemla, a religious organization that advocates against animal cruelty, says he is undeterred by the time-honored custom of eating meat on Shabbat and holidays.

“There’s no commandment to eat meat,” Shein said. “People make their own adjustments. They stop eating meat, they do something else. But our goal is to bring the information to the public.”

Veganism is not entirely a new development in Israel. The African Hebrew Israelites have abstained from animal products for decades. But while activists have cheered the recent growth in vegan awareness, veteran vegans fear it may be a passing fad.

Arie Rave, who started the vegan Buddha Burgers restaurant in Tel Aviv eight years ago and is about to open his sixth franchise, said he hopes new adherents take it seriously.

“People don’t become vegan in one day,” said Rave, whose restaurants are filled with posters touting veganism’s moral, health and ecological benefits. “It’s not one day or one conversation. It’s not just a menu. It’s an ideology.”

While Jews in North America are not embracing veganism at the same rate as Israelis, the movement is slowly gaining momentum here as well, according to Jeffrey Cohan, the executive director of Jewish Vegetarians of North America, and a regular blogger for The Jewish Chronicle.

JVNA is striving to accelerate the growth of the vegan movement in North America, Cohan said, and “to help people with the transition.” That help can be found on the group’s website, jewishveg.com, where one can view a host of vegan suggestions for Jewish cuisine, including plant-based recipes for chopped “liver” and “brisket.”

Cohan pointed to “the democratization of information” as one of the reasons for the current growth of veganism both in Israel and in the United States.

“The meat, dairy and egg industries have always done a great job hiding what they’re doing,” he said. But with the rise in the use of social media, through which anyone can read about and see the conditions imposed upon animals in the food factories, “word is getting out. They’re having a hard time hiding the cruelty.”

The increase in veganism can also be attributed to the fact that plant-based food options are now widely available, not only at mainstream supermarkets, but also at an increasing number of restaurants. A list of Pittsburgh eateries that feature a selection of vegan options can be found at veganpittsburgh.org.

JVNA has been looking to Israel’s embrace of veganism as an example for American Jews, Cohan said. The organization plans to bring one of  Israel’s top food critics, Ori Shivit — who has adopted a vegan diet — to the U.S. to speak about the growth of the movement there. And Richard Schwartz, president emeritus of JVNA, was in Ramat Gan, Israel, just last week to speak at Vegan Fest, billed as the world’s largest vegan festival.

“We have regular contacts with the vegan community in Israel,” Cohan said. “We look to them for ideas and inspiration.”

Toby Tabachnick contributed to this report.

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