With the opening ceremonies of the 29th Olympiad just days away, our friends at PETA Asia-Pacific decided to get into the spirit of the games by awarding gold, silver, and bronze honors to Beijing's top vegetarian restaurants.

I know what you're thinking: vegetarian restaurants in China?!? Yes, my friends, it's true, but we really shouldn't be so surprised. After all, the Chinese gave the world tofu, that wonderful high-protein, versatile ingredient that can be used in everything from chocolate mousse pie to faux-ricotta lasagne (if you're still wrestling with tofu, check out our guide to vegetarian cooking).

And now with a drum roll, here are the top vegetarian restaurants in Beijing, as determined by PETA Asia-Pacific:

Gold: Taking the gold is Godly Vegetarian Restaurant. Beijing's oldest Buddhist vegetarian restaurant specializes in Chinese traditional classics, including KingKong HuoFang (stewed mock pork), sweet and sour mock ribs and fish, mock meatballs, mock duck, and much more.

Silver: Pure Lotus Vegetarian Restaurant—run by Tibetan monks—netted the silver. Voted "Best Vegetarian Fare" in the 2007 Beijing Reader Restaurant Awards, this restaurant serves up creatively named dishes such as "hot tears fill the eyes glazed noodles" and "countenance of mercy, words of love stir-fry." Yummy food with a side of zen.

Bronze: Coming in with the bronze is Still Thoughts, a relaxing and intimate oasis of vegetarian calm amidst a bustling alley in the heart of the city. Favorites include the spicy mock-pork intestines dry pot (testament to the fact that for any cruel and weird thing that humans would consider eating, human ingenuity can create a cruelty-free option!), shredded veggie-duck pancakes, and the faux-chicken hot pot.

And on a kinda-sorta related note, here are gold, silver, and bronze naked ladies! They are drawing attention to cruel practices on Chinese fur farms just in time for the Olympic Games:

olimpiadasbeijing2008 / CC
Carl Lewis, the Olympiad of the Century, is vegetarian (and therefore never consumed deer penis) and he did quite well, so we think this new generation will be OK too. However …

Olympic athletes in Beijing are being advised not to use traditional methods to heal injuries because they may contain some herbal substances that are banned. Darn. If you were an Olympic athlete, wouldn't the first thing you'd go for be deer penis? Because deer penis is apparently magical and can heal injuries. But you must—according to Wang Cheng, an expert in traditional medicine—first mix it with some alcohol and take it every day or two. If only I had known back in third grade when I tripped on the balance beam and broke my arm, I would have said, "Mom, go get me some deer penis and alcohol."

If you are not an Olympic athlete, you can still head on over to Beijing to take in the full glory of human athleticism. And while there, you can stop by Guolizhuang and get yourself some ox, donkey, and sheep penises (as well as deer penises, of course—I didn't mean to leave those out).

And if you feel like dropping a cool $500, you can also get some Canadian seal penises. You mean we can bash their heads in, skin them for their fur, AND pay $500 to eat their penises?!?! Penis: It's what's for dinner.

newsx / CC

The Beijing City Government Food Safety Office has reportedly stated that dog meat is off the menu during the Olympics. The world's best athletes are now free from worrying that the meat on their plate may be from someone's stray or confiscated Fido. All 112 official Olympic restaurants are forbidden from serving any dishes containing any part of a dog during the summer games, which start on August 8. So, swimmers and sprinters, don't worry if you see a finger-like object floating in your stew—it's probably just a finger ....

Let's face it, China may be on top of its game in terms of technological innovations, but when it comes to animal protection, the country is dead last at the bottom of the dog pile.

China severely lacks any form of animal welfare. Our investigations into Chinese fur farms and live markets have shown some of the most horrendous acts of cruelty and conditions for animals raised for human use.

We're pleased that Beijing has opted out of the dog-slaughtering business—at least for a few weeks and if only for Olympic restaurants. But I have a suspicion it's not because someone up top realized that dogs feel pain.

A better idea would be to ban all meat from the restaurants. Cows, chickens, pigs, and fish value their lives and don't want to suffer, and they certainly die as wretchedly as dogs do, even if most people never get to know one in the way that they get to know a dog. Kind of a double standard, don't you think?

Besides, the Olympic athletes certainly don't need all the fat and cholesterol loaded in each bite of meat. It would suck to be one lap away from winning gold and suffer a heart attack. Take a bit of advice from Carl Lewis, a legendary Olympian, a vegetarian, and the man who's broken more records than humanly possible.

The only real breakfast of champions is one that's meat-free. And you can take that to the winner's podium.

Posted by Jennifer Cierlitsky

From the "turnabout is fair play" department—and from an Israeli Web site called PetKaput.com—comes a video that dares to imagine what would happen if some role reversal were to happen in the notorious Chinese fur trade. The result is somehow creepier than all the Saw and Hostel films put together—and yet weirdly funny too. Not David Cross or Amy Sedaris funny, but—well, I can't really explain it; you just have to watch:

Ouch! Admittedly, it's a little disturbing, but keep in mind that it's only animation, so no one was actually hurt in the making of it (unfortunately, the same can't be said for the video that inspired it).

Posted by Jeff Mackey