Photo by MedicalNewsToday.
Your ears hear the noises and your stomach feels a sharp pain inside. Right now you’re starving for food but let’s say you don’t know how to cook. So you head to a fast-food restaurant like Taco Bell, McDonalds, Burger King, etc. It is your only option on how you can get a hot meal in your belly. However, with processed meat and frozen food with a whole lot of grease, the food can make you feel awful. Imagine a menu where you can get a healthier source of meat with a great taste.
Fast-food chains like Burger King, Del Co Taco and many others’ consumer demands are changing with vegetarian and vegan options to select from.
DeMarco Hussey, a sophomore business major, is into fitness and often checks his diet. Hussey has a heavier-set frame and is trying to watch his diet, but he runs into daily challenges on campus.
“It’s the same cafe but just a different day with the same stuff,” Hussey said.
Cabrini’s campus has fried food every day, including burgers, hot dogs and fries. However, with vegetarian and vegan options, people like Hussey could still try to be fit and not worry about what they eat. According to USA TODAY , plant-based protein continues to go more mainstream, making it easier to maintain a vegan or meat-free lifestyle.
Hussey appreciates fast-food chains creating meatless options, and now he doesn’t feel as bad about himself or worry about his physical health.
“A lot of times I don’t like what Cavs Corner is serving here on campus, so I like to go off-campus and get food at places like Wendy’s and Wawa which I can afford, but McDonald’s is the cheapest and they are my favorite. So I need them to get on board and start making these vegetarian and vegan foods.”
According to USA Today, the global fast-food giant already has vegan burgers in other countries, including the McVegan, which it added to menus in Sweden and Finland in 2017. India has also been a part of this trend recently.
Kesiah Vaughn, an education major, says she often does not eat at fast-food places. When she eats at places like McDonald’s and she does not feel unwell unless she’s thinking about what she ate. It is a psychological game when it comes to eating foods that she knows are bad for her mind, body and soul.
“I love it now how places like them are caring for more people and are becoming inclusive when it comes to eating their product,” Vaughn said. Everybody doesn’t eat from those types of places anymore due to the processed meats and other stuff like that.”
According to a June 2018 Nielsen report, while only 6 percent of Americans said they follow a strictly vegetarian lifestyle and 3 percent a strictly vegan lifestyle, 39 percent of Americans said they were trying to eat more plant-based products.
Fast food chains offering vegan and meatless foods can be a solution to lessen high cholesterol, blood sugar, diabetes and other heart diseases that caused by unhealthy greasy foods. Cabrini students could now look for more vegan, vegetarian and plant-based foods on their favorite fast-food restaurants.
