How About Giving Up Slaughter, and Not Just for Lent?

It’s hard to come down on Louisiana, particularly the New Orleans area after what they’ve been through, but nothing makes you say "WTF?" more than the ritual slaughter of a pig, purely for entertainment purposes. I’m assuming the photo attached to "Cajuns Fete Carnival With Pig Slaughter" by Stacey Plaisance is from the event. I found it frightening (and far more terrifying from the eyes of the pig), and though people eat meat every day, buying it from someone who already did most of the dirty work (consuming it is the rest of the dirty work), I disagree with those who claim watching with glee while the pig is slaughtered is not that different.

What it takes to eat a pig’s flesh is different from what it takes to watch the pig be killed or do the killing yourself.

Let’s deconstruct:

• In St. Martinville, which is140 miles west of New Orleans, they still hold "La Grande Boucherie des Cajuns" the weekend before Ash Wednesday. Let me get this straight: the origin of the need for this ritual is that Lent is around the corner, so we have to get in some extra slaughter because maybe we’ll be giving something up for Lent. Like slaughter, maybe? They say fasting will begin, but even if some do fast, they’re doing so as a gesture of giving something up that’s important to them, with full intention of resuming the practice after Easter. This public event is merely slaughter in commemoration of past slaughter. That’s the entire point.
• In the category "You can’t make this stuff up," we have:

"I don’t think I’ll be able to watch them kill the pig, but I sure like the food," Jody Gibbens, of Bandera, Texas, said Saturday as she sipped a beer and weighed her lunch options as a band played in the background.

• And just in case you’re wondering about the effect of public slaughter on children:

Twelve-year-old Sage DeLaunay’s arms were dripping with fat after he beat out more than 20 kids to win a greased pig contest – and the lard-covered piglet he nabbed. "This was my first time, and I’m so excited," he said. "I’m gonna raise it and kill it one day."

Ah, such worthwhile activities and aspirations handed down in St. Martinville. The respect for life, the compassion, the, oh wait. A 12-year old boy who has just had a glorious time abusing some frantic piglets, and presumably has watched a pig ("it") get slaughtered, feels excitement and eagerly awaits the day his hand may end a pig’s life. This is what this one Catholic community has created.

Clearly, vegan education hasn’t quite made it to St. Martinville.

But it has made it to South Florida, and last night’s Cooking with Guests resulted in a delectable dinner of Vegetable Lasagna with Herbed Tofu Ricotta.

Dinner was followed by the best chocolate cake I’ve ever tasted, Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Ganache Frosting, and both recipes were courtesy of  The Candle Cafe Cookbook.

The cream the cake is sitting in is from my raw avocado coconut cream pie recipe. I was feeling like the richness and the denseness of the cake needed to be offset by something a bit lighter.

Though things certainly aren’t looking good in at least one part of Louisiana for pigs, here in South Florida, in my house, one more guest has stopped eating meat (not just in my house, but when she leaves here, as well). She has also ditched eggs, and as usually, pizza (and nachos and grilled cheese, in her case) is all that’s left. But the weekend’s not over . . .

Wish me luck.