Milk, Cheese & Eggs

[Fay]

I have a problem.

You can get certain milk, cheese or egg brands that are free range but what about the milk,cheese and eggs used in products such as bread and snacks. There is no way of knowing if these products are free range. What do you guys do about this, just get them anyhow? I can't possibly contact all brands to ask if the products used are free range and I'm not much of the cooking and baking kind of person.

[TheQueen]

It can be hard sometimes. I'm guessing you don't want to become a full vegan but you only want free range dairy and eggs? Eggs are actually pretty easy; most of the ones in the stores that are free range and organic aren't dyed white, they're plain ol' brown. Milk and cheese is easy too, and I find soymilk tastes better than regular milk anyways.

But the snacks can be difficult, because most brands don't use free range products as it's more expensive, and they just want more bang for their buck. Some products' websites may give a bit more information on their ingredients, but it's rare to find any of the name brand snacks using free range products. A lot of the organic and health foods are free range, or they use substitutes, and they're plenty good as well! You just have to search around to find the good vegetarian snacks, or you'll have to settle for the name brand stuff. Plus, you can always buy name brand snacks that simply don't have milk or eggs or cheese in them. And as a last note on bread, some types of wheat breads don't have milk or eggs in them. I'm not sure how they manage that, but there's some at my local grocery store. It's my favorite!

[Susan9608]

You might want to investigate what exactly free-range means. The term "free-range" makes people think that the animals live natural lives outside in the fresh air and sunshine, and that these animals live lives free of cruelty.

The USDA says that animals termed "free-range" must have access to the outdoors, but it makes no provisions on how long they must be outside or how large of an area they have to be outside in. Free-range also refers to animals used for meat, not for animals used for eggs or milk.

Free-range milk/cheese/eggs and such are not the same thing as foods labeled organic or natural or anything like that. Check out this link: PETA Media Center > Factsheets > Free-Range Eggs and Meat: Conning Consumers?.

As far as eating commercially prepared foods or foods from restaurants, while you can't write to every single company, you can utilize the research done by others on the same subject. PETA has a good list of cruelty free companies that might have the information you're looking for.

[Fay]

Thanks for the information, I know that free range doesn't mean the animals are being treated well. It's very disturbing. One of the problems is that I live in the Netherlands and theres not much information about company's over here. But I'll have a look for international brands at PETA website.

I just turned vegetarian 3 days ago. Right now going completely vegan in one go is too tough for me right now but I definitely look out to doing so in the future. It's a lot of information to take in but I am doing my best.