肉食

1. Origins, structure, and basic meaning

• Structure: 肉食 is read as にくしょく and is a noun for eating meat as a diet or for carnivory as an animal feeding pattern.
• Basic usage: Use 肉食を少し控える for reducing meat consumption and the compound 肉食動物 for a carnivorous animal.

2. Common pitfalls and similar expressions

• Diet and biological classification
  • The health context concerns meat consumption, while the lion context classifies an animal by what it eats.
• Reducing is not abstaining
  • 少し控えている means cutting back somewhat and does not say that meat has been eliminated entirely.