Meet the Compassionate Cuisine Contest Winner!

Congrats to Darcie, the winner of the Compassionate Cuisine contest! Darcie is a longtime friend of CAS and credits a little pig named Ozzie for starting her cruelty-free journey. Chef Linda made her requested vegan crab cakes at the New York Veg Food Festival! Read Darcie’s story below! Ozzie the potbellied pig changed my feelings about eating meat.  I first met Ozzie when I visited Catskill Animal Sanctuary in 2006. He was strolling through the barn while I was on tour and I just had to take his picture. That photo inspired me to make the drawing you see here. In 2008, I visited CAS for another tour with some friends and there was Ozzie, rooting around near the barn.  I left our group, walked up to him and crouched down to give him a belly rub. I was not ready for what happened next! Ozzie gently placed his head in my lap as I rubbed his side. Ozzie’s gentle disposition forever changed how I viewed pigs. I wasn’t expecting this sweet pig to show affection to a human who ate pork and didn’t question the suffering behind it. My heart absolutely melted and from then on, I started to feel very uncomfortable eating meat. In the summer of 2013, I visited CAS again and looked all over for my pig friend, finally asking Kathy Stevens where Ozzie was. When she told me that he had passed on, I had to fight the urge to cry in front of the tour group.  I decided that day that meat would no longer be on the menu for me.  I emailed Kathy on her birthday in July to tell her that I was going veg as a birthday gift to her for all the work that she does and in memory of Ozzie.  I occasionally eat dairy and eggs but I hope to eliminate those from my diet in time. There aren’t too many vegan restaurants in my local area, but I did find one with vegan cupcakes which I thoroughly enjoyed!