Eat Every Plant:Introduction
Eat Every Plant is a free encyclopedia of edible plants, and also a way for users to document and track progress toward eating every edible plant.
Overview
"Encyclopedia of every edible plant" means the content should be encyclopedic in nature, similar to Wikipedia articles, but focused entirely on the use of plants as food. So, while the Wikipedia article on a certain plant might have sections on evolutionary history, ecology, uses including construction material, fuel, ornamental plants, etc., none of those sections would be present in the Eat Every Plant article. Instead there could be sections on its history as a foodstuff, recipes, nutritional information, and where to find it in a form suitable for eating.
The secondary, non-encyclopedic purpose of this site is to track users' individual progress toward the goal of eating every edible plant - or at least as many as possible. Currently this is done through categories - see Category:Keenan's status categories for examples.
How to participate
This is a wiki, meaning anyone with an account can edit it and the changes show up immediately. Automatic account creation is currently turned off, but to request an account simply email Keenan (his name is Keenan Pepper and his email address is just his name at gmail).
Benefits of a plant-based diet
While it is not the primary focus of this project to persuade people to eat more plant foods and less animal ones, the primary authors feel it is their ethical duty to at least mention the many benefits of a plant-based diet. See Plant-based diet on Wikipedia, and One Green Planet, for basic introductions to this subject. Some important things to note are:
- Even if you have no intention at all of becoming a strict vegan, you can still make relatively small/easy changes to your diet that have a huge positive impact.
- Even if you have no ethical qualms about raising animals for food, you should think twice about the huge consumption of resources (water and energy) that meat entails. For example, in response to a drought one might think of decreasing water usage by taking shorter showers, or turning off the water while brushing one's teeth, but these are insignificant when compared to the amount of water used in animal agriculture - for example, a pound of beef is equivalent to a 370-minute shower.