Flexitarianism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Flexitarianism is the practice of eating mainly vegetarian food. Flexitarians prefer to eat vegetarian food, but make occasional exceptions for social, pragmatic, or nutritional reasons. They will eat meat and other animal products sometimes. For example, a flexitarian might make only vegetarian dishes at home, but eat dishes including meat at the home of family or friends.
In 2003, the American Dialect Society voted flexitarian as the year's most useful word and defined it as "a vegetarian who occasionally eats meat".
None of the vegetarian organizations recognize this as a category of vegetarianism, and it is viewed by many vegetarians as being as paradoxical as the word "pesco-vegetarian".
[edit] Origin of term
The earliest known use of the term "flexitarian" occurred in the October 17, 1992 issue of the Austin American-Statesman. In this issue, reporter Linda Anthony wrote an article titled, "Acorn serves up 'flexitarian fare'". The article discussed the recent opening of the new Acorn Café and stated that owner Helga Morath calls her fare "flexitarian".
