Article: Half of baseball buys into veggie dogs

[Guest guest]

SOURCE:

http://www.latimes.com/news/columnists/la-sp-crowe222008jul22,0,5211938.column

 

 

 

Half of baseball buys into veggie dogs

 

 

SAN FRANCISCO -- Prince Fielder of the Milwaukee Brewers is being introduced

before last Friday night's game against the San Francisco Giants, and Johanna

McCloy, otherwise preoccupied at AT & T Park, lets out a yelp.

 

" Yes, " she cries. " Vegetarian. "

 

The Berkeley-based McCloy, a self-appointed advocate for meat-eschewing baseball

fans, has crossed the San Francisco Bay to promote her dreamer's quest: to add

veggie dogs to the menu at every major league ballpark.

 

Eight years into her mission, the 43-year-old actress and Duke graduate is

halfway there, with Dodger Stadium among the first to sign on and Angel Stadium

still a holdout. Fielder's decision to give up meat has been a welcome shot in

the arm to the cause, which has encountered pockets of hostile resistance.

 

Last month, after an article about McCloy appeared in the San Francisco

Chronicle magazine, reader Marc Kimberly of Concord wrote: " For goodness' sakes,

is there no limit to which annoying vegetarians won't go in their efforts to try

to convert people from enjoying meat in favor of the bland mishmash of

unappetizing and virtually tasteless 'food' these elitist snobs choke down their

gullets? "

 

McCloy says she was equally dumbfounded when, during an appearance on a Denver

radio station, her efforts were labeled un-American. Her only objective, she

says, is to give fans a choice.

 

" I said, 'How more American can you get?' " McCloy says of her Denver radio

experience. " This is a nation of immigrants, this is a nation of diversity, this

is a nation of opportunity, this is a nation of saying 'yes' to everybody. How

are you threatened by a couple of people to your left at a baseball game

choosing to eat something other than what you're eating? "

 

McCloy, who lived previously in Mount Washington, was introduced to baseball by

a former boyfriend and says it was while attending a game at Dodger Stadium in

2000 that she hatched her idea of promoting meatless alternatives to standard

ballpark fare.

 

" I was blown away by the size and scope of a baseball stadium, " she says, " so I

thought when it came time to eat, 'There's going to be plenty of options,' and

there weren't. I was a vegetarian, and I was naïve. "

 

She says she walked throughout the stadium and discovered that even a Subway

sandwich stand offered no meatless choice.

 

The next day, she called the concessions manager.

 

" He said, 'You're right about the subs. We'll start doing that,' " McCloy

recalls. " I thought, 'Wow.' That was really reinforcing for me because I

realized all I had to do was call and now all these people can have a veggie

sub.

 

" That kind of got me going. "

 

Through research, she found that no big league stadium offered veggie dogs.

Encouraged by vegetarians and animal-rights supporters, she launched a website,

soyhappy.org, and started lobbying concession managers.

 

" I just thought it needed to happen because there was a certain percentage of

the fan base at any given stadium that probably would not be eating at all,

would bring their own food or would resort to eating only peanuts, " McCloy says.

" It seemed like it made good business sense. It never dawned on me that it would

take off like it did. I got this following -- it was bizarre -- and I went with

it. "

 

As an actress who says her main claim to fame was a guest spot on " Star Trek:

The Next Generation " -- " I was one of only two women who made out with Worf in

seven seasons, " she says -- McCloy was used to unconventional followings.

 

But this was different.

 

The Chicago White Sox were the first big league team to offer veggie dogs,

McCloy says, and 14 more followed, among them the Giants.

 

" She's such a good advocate that she sort of makes it competitive between

ballparks, which is cool, " says Sandie Filipiak, director of concessions at AT & T

Park. " It's like, 'Who's got the most vegetarian choices?' "

 

Through her efforts, McCloy has developed an unexpected affinity for baseball

and, since her move to Berkeley in 2002, the Oakland A's.

 

" I've never become like a huge, avid, have-to-read-about-it-everyday kind of

fan, " she says, " but I really enjoy it. And I love everything about the A's. I

love what they represent. I like rooting for the underdog. "

 

She says she's drawn to the A's pluck and resourcefulness, two attributes that

could be ascribed to McCloy in her nonprofit, uphill endeavor.

 

" I'm pretty proud of it, " notes McCloy, who says she cried in 2001 when she bit

into the first veggie dog served at Dodger Stadium. " I didn't realize what a big

deal it was going to be, and then when I realized that it was, at first I was

kind of embarrassed. But then I realized it truly was important to a lot of

people and then I thought about the big picture and how this was kind of a

revolution. "

 

Will it end with veggie dogs in every stadium?

 

" Absolutely, " McCloy says. " I think it's inevitable. "

[Guest guest]

Now this is something. 

I've been a baseball fan for many years, and it's only been in the last few that

I could find a salad at a ballpark.  The closest thing to veg fare has been the

nachos.  I don't think there's any real cheese in the the nacho cheese.

My closest ballpark is Angel Stadium, and it is slim pickin's for a veg, lemme

tell you.

I had my best veg fare at Oakland where I had to find an tiny stand run by the

local black Muslims to get one of the best veg burgers EVER.  The next season,

though, they were gone.

Go Johanna!  One day, I may put on a couple pounds at the game like everybody

else!

 

 

 

" nikita4animals " <nikita4animals

Saturday, July 26, 2008 5:09:38 PM

Article: Half of baseball buys into veggie dogs

 

 

SOURCE:

http://www.latimes. com/news/ columnists/ la-sp-crowe22200 8jul22,0,

5211938.column

 

Half of baseball buys into veggie dogs

 

SAN FRANCISCO -- Prince Fielder of the Milwaukee Brewers is being introduced

before last Friday night's game against the San Francisco Giants, and Johanna

McCloy, otherwise preoccupied at AT & T Park, lets out a yelp.

 

" Yes, " she cries. " Vegetarian. "

 

The Berkeley-based McCloy, a self-appointed advocate for meat-eschewing baseball

fans, has crossed the San Francisco Bay to promote her dreamer's quest: to add

veggie dogs to the menu at every major league ballpark.

 

Eight years into her mission, the 43-year-old actress and Duke graduate is

halfway there, with Dodger Stadium among the first to sign on and Angel Stadium

still a holdout. Fielder's decision to give up meat has been a welcome shot in

the arm to the cause, which has encountered pockets of hostile resistance.

 

Last month, after an article about McCloy appeared in the San Francisco

Chronicle magazine, reader Marc Kimberly of Concord wrote: " For goodness' sakes,

is there no limit to which annoying vegetarians won't go in their efforts to try

to convert people from enjoying meat in favor of the bland mishmash of

unappetizing and virtually tasteless 'food' these elitist snobs choke down their

gullets? "

 

McCloy says she was equally dumbfounded when, during an appearance on a Denver

radio station, her efforts were labeled un-American. Her only objective, she

says, is to give fans a choice.

 

" I said, 'How more American can you get?' " McCloy says of her Denver radio

experience. " This is a nation of immigrants, this is a nation of diversity, this

is a nation of opportunity, this is a nation of saying 'yes' to everybody. How

are you threatened by a couple of people to your left at a baseball game

choosing to eat something other than what you're eating? "

 

McCloy, who lived previously in Mount Washington, was introduced to baseball by

a former boyfriend and says it was while attending a game at Dodger Stadium in

2000 that she hatched her idea of promoting meatless alternatives to standard

ballpark fare.

 

" I was blown away by the size and scope of a baseball stadium, " she says, " so I

thought when it came time to eat, 'There's going to be plenty of options,' and

there weren't. I was a vegetarian, and I was naïve. "

 

She says she walked throughout the stadium and discovered that even a Subway

sandwich stand offered no meatless choice.

 

The next day, she called the concessions manager.

 

" He said, 'You're right about the subs. We'll start doing that,' " McCloy

recalls. " I thought, 'Wow.' That was really reinforcing for me because I

realized all I had to do was call and now all these people can have a veggie

sub.

 

" That kind of got me going. "

 

Through research, she found that no big league stadium offered veggie dogs.

Encouraged by vegetarians and animal-rights supporters, she launched a website,

soyhappy.org, and started lobbying concession managers.

 

" I just thought it needed to happen because there was a certain percentage of

the fan base at any given stadium that probably would not be eating at all,

would bring their own food or would resort to eating only peanuts, " McCloy says.

" It seemed like it made good business sense. It never dawned on me that it would

take off like it did. I got this following -- it was bizarre -- and I went with

it. "

 

As an actress who says her main claim to fame was a guest spot on " Star Trek:

The Next Generation " -- " I was one of only two women who made out with Worf in

seven seasons, " she says -- McCloy was used to unconventional followings.

 

But this was different.

 

The Chicago White Sox were the first big league team to offer veggie dogs,

McCloy says, and 14 more followed, among them the Giants.

 

" She's such a good advocate that she sort of makes it competitive between

ballparks, which is cool, " says Sandie Filipiak, director of concessions at AT & T

Park. " It's like, 'Who's got the most vegetarian choices?' "

 

Through her efforts, McCloy has developed an unexpected affinity for baseball

and, since her move to Berkeley in 2002, the Oakland A's.

 

" I've never become like a huge, avid, have-to-read- about-it- everyday kind of

fan, " she says, " but I really enjoy it. And I love everything about the A's. I

love what they represent. I like rooting for the underdog. "

 

She says she's drawn to the A's pluck and resourcefulness, two attributes that

could be ascribed to McCloy in her nonprofit, uphill endeavor.

 

" I'm pretty proud of it, " notes McCloy, who says she cried in 2001 when she bit

into the first veggie dog served at Dodger Stadium. " I didn't realize what a big

deal it was going to be, and then when I realized that it was, at first I was

kind of embarrassed. But then I realized it truly was important to a lot of

people and then I thought about the big picture and how this was kind of a

revolution. "

 

Will it end with veggie dogs in every stadium?

 

" Absolutely, " McCloy says. " I think it's inevitable. "