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Welcome to the show that introduces you to the best of the best in the world of fine epicure!
Today on Vegetarian Elite we present the amazing Tracye McQuirter, co-founder of BlackVegetarians.org, the first comprehensive website for about a million and a half African American vegetarians.
Tracye is also a public health nutritionist, a dynamic speaker, an author, and a glowingly vivacious vegan for over 20 years.

Tracye McQuirter(f): I honestly never thought that I would be a vegetarian, a vegan, a healthy eater, none of that. I never thought that I would be a public health nutritionist. Our black student union at Amherst College brought Dick Gregory to campus to talk about the state of black America.

And instead, he flipped the script-x on us and he decided to talk about the plate of black America. So he talked about how unhealthfully most black folks eat.

He spent the next two and a half hours graphically tracing the path of a hamburger from a cow on a factory farm, to a slaughterhouse, to a fast food place, to a clogged artery, to a heart attack. And that was the first time I had ever heard anything like that in my life, linking diet to disease. That was the catalyst that started me researching to become a vegetarian.

I’ll be 43 this year, and it took me about 2 years to become vegan after I became vegetarian. So I became vegetarian in 1986.

HOST: Multifaceted Tracye went on to achieve her Master’s degree in public health nutrition from New York University. With her vegan-inspired physical energy and mental clarity, Tracye was the perfect person to be a public policy advocate. In 1999, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine filed, and won, a lawsuit against the US Department of Agriculture about the fact that 6 out of 10 of the members of their Dietary Guidelines Committee represented the meat and dairy industries.

Tracye worked for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine as a nutrition policy advisor, and helped create the strategy for this breakthrough in nutritional honesty.

America’s largest health support organization for African American women, the Black Women’s Health Imperative, has also consulted Tracye about nutrition.

More information on Tracye McQuirter, her book “By Any Greens Necessary,” and how to improve your health can be found at:www.ByAnyGreensNecessary.com