The Real Benefits Of Regenerative Meat (From A Former Vegan)

Five years ago, we were in some of the best shape of our lives—or so we thought. As dedicated triathletes, we were always grinding and conditioning our bodies for races that were sure to push us to the brink of exhaustion. We were also vegans, which fell in line with the popular belief at the time that athletes thrived on plant-based diets. But as time went on, we constantly found ourselves getting injured, struggling to sustain our energy levels, and worst of all stricken by excruciating gastrointestinal pain. We tried everything we could think of to cure our ailments—countless visits to the doctor, switching to a raw-foods vegan diet, training only in the morning—but nothing worked. Our bodies and minds were at a breaking point.

So we decided to do something crazy: make a 180-degree turn and introduce high-quality meat into our diets. We weren’t sure what would happen (neither of us had eaten meat in years) but we had to do something. And right away, we could feel the impact. Fueled by the healthy fats and proteins meat possesses, our bodies almost immediately bounced back. We felt better than we had in years and seemingly overnight, we felt stronger, healthier, and more capable of competing at the elite levels we were accustomed to.

We dove headfirst into our new diet and felt better by the day. But as we integrated it more and more into our daily lives, we noticed a glaring issue: there weren’t any high-quality meats that fit our active, on-the-go lifestyles. That’s when we decided to make our own. What was a hobby soon became a passion and we realized that homemade snacks weren’t going to cut it. We had to bring our creation to the mainstream—and that’s when EPIC Provisions was born.

The deeper we got into our EPIC pursuits—to develop a product that provides nourishing food for consumers and promotes healthy animal welfare standards—the more invigorated and excited we felt. And that was only the beginning. We found the true calling and purpose behind EPIC when we learned about regenerative agriculture.

The impact of ruminants goes beyond manure; by improving soil quality and aeration, these animals regenerate and heal landscapes. This in turn promotes thriving ecosystems and restores soil biology. Most incredibly, though, these thriving landscapes—especially grasslands, which cover one-third of the world’s land area—sequester carbon from the earth’s atmosphere as they flourish. This not only creates a net-positive return to the environment, it has great potential to reverse climate change.

By supporting regenerative agriculture, voting with our dollars, and showing harmful food corporations that mission-driven companies are the future, we can ensure that we will leave the world better than we found it. To this day, these values continue to fuel our every move and are reflected in efforts like our waste-minimizing Whole Animal Project and our Honesty Pledge.