In Conscious Eating, Gabriel Cousins writes: “According to the American Dietetic Association, pure vegetarian diets in America usually contain twice the required protein for one’s daily need. Harvard researchers have found that it is difficult to have a vegetarian diet that will produce a protein deficiency unless there is an excess of vegetarian junk foods and sweets. In fact, if vegetarian protein is consumed in its live state, even less protein is needed because research shows that one half of the assimilable protein is destroyed by cooking.”