Veg Thanksgiving: Really, Why Not?

For years, products like Tofurky and Unturkey have been on the market with varying levels of appeal. This year, there's a brand-new product: Garden Protein (which makes the mock meat used in Morningstar Farms' Meal Starters Chik'n and Steak strips) has come up with an out-of-this-world Veggie Turkey Breast With Wild Rice and Cranberry Stuffing. It's hands-down the best vegetarian turkey product on the market, and it's one of the best mock meats I've ever had in terms of both taste and texture. Make sure you check it out, for Thanksgiving and beyond.

Not only is it easier than ever to celebrate a vegetarian Thanksgiving, it's also more important than ever before. Earlier this year, PETA conducted its first-ever investigation of a turkey slaughterhouse. The appalling abuses documented at a Butterball slaughterhouse that slaughters 50,000 birds each day beg us to leave turkeys off our tables this holiday. Slaughterhouse workers were seen stomping on and punching live birds and slamming them against walls. One worker stepped on a turkey's head until her skull exploded, one caused a turkey's spine to pop out by slamming her against a metal handrail, and another inserted his finger into a bird's vagina. These sickening abuses were not isolated incidents: They're par for the course in poultry slaughterhouses, as previous PETA undercover investigations have shown. For more information, please visit ButterballCruelty.com.

When we're giving thanks this holiday, it seems a lot more appropriate to do so without the guilt of supporting the horrible abuses of the turkey industry--especially when easy and tasty alternatives to turkey flesh are readily available.