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Going vegan (general veganism thread)
Hey everyone, I am attempting to go vegan.
I just wanted to do a "vegan weekend", but I’m about a month in, and I'm feeling like I can keep this up. I've tried in the past, but there are far more vegan options than there were several years ago. If you are a vegan, please let me know any tips, tricks, etc. that you wish you knew sooner. If you are on the fence or curious about it, ask questions! Post your favorite vegan recipes in the comments or any online resources you recommend on veganism. General veganism thread.
I've had to go dairy free for health reasons and generally go for vegan options when they're present, my best friend has been vegan for a long time.
This is the crispy tofu recipe I learned from, quick and easy in the air fryer, toss that in some stir fry, and you got yourself an easy dinner.
This Marry Me Tofu recipe is also really good. Like. Holy shit. Take care, you can make it a real fatty dish though depending on your choice of cream.
My bestie swears by this recipe book, The Complete Plant-Based Cookbook.
The HappyCow app can be helpful for finding vegan restaurant options near you. A surprising number of chains are starting to offer online resources for eating vegan/around allergens, like I'll Google like "Applebee's vegan options" if I end up at one to get their page before trying to parse their regular menu.
I swear by oat milk products though, it is a top tier non dairy creamer. Coconut milk is good for things like curry, but I personally can't stand it making other stuff taste like coconut. Almond products are mostly awful and consume way too much water in their production compared to superior products. It's a great time to go vegan, there's tons of substitutes that weren't available 10 years ago.
I also advise focusing more on making dishes that happen to be vegan rather than imitating meat dishes, although the latter is becoming easier to do well enough. Like, for example, you'll be disappointed trying to make a vegan meat loaf, but stir fry and curry go hard and often end up vegan, or are veganized with little effort.
Yes this is a good point. If you try to have a lot of fake cheese and fake meat you will be disappointed.
I generally enjoy Indian food because there are a lot of vegetarian choices (fewer vegan choices) and it isn’t trying to be a version of some meat product.
Similarly, it’s pretty easy to have vegan Chinese food, substituting tofu for meat. But I guess if you are getting it from a restaurant you aren’t sure if they are using oyster sauce or animal based oils.
I also enjoy things like veggie burgers. The ones that are just something to put on a sandwich instead of meat, not the ones that are trying to taste like meat.
I dunno that I agree. I probably use fake meat in half the stuff I home cook and I find lots of those substitutes to be pretty great. Very much depends on the product.
This is one of those things that seems obvious, but too many people sleep on it. There are thousands of amazing dishes that are already vegan. You can have whole meals be vegan, serve them to carnivores, and have them not notice that they're not eating meat. It's not even a trick or anything, it's just phrasing; I can invite my parents for dinner and tell them that we're having spring rolls and stir-fry with rice, and it raises no alarm bells to my dad, but if I say, "oh and it's vegan" then he'll resist because he's of an age where it's not a meal if an animal doesn't die. But unless you mention it, it's not really a thing.
I can't shift my head around how to do fried rice without prawns or eggs, please help. You said stir fry with rice, oops. But in general can you share more Asian vegan meals? I know they should be obvious but I didn't grow up that way and have a huge blind spot. (Eg, a proper meal will have land sea and air animals)
First a disclaimer: I'm a huge gweilo and I'm not making authentic Cantonese food when I cook it. I'm better than the sanitized chinois one might receive at a takeaway place, but I wasn't raised to believe that leaving out the egg in fried rice is a sin, so take what I'm saying with a grain of salt.
To do fried rice without egg, you can just omit the step where you put the egg in fried rice. I know that sounds actively bad, but it can be pretty good! You can also change up the other ingredients to be more veggie favourable; mushrooms, shelled edamame, and onions can be very savoury and make a vegan fried rice a pretty good option. However, that does go against the original point, which was that there are dishes that are vegan by design; fried rice isn't one of them.
For a stir-fry, if I were doing a vegan option, I'd usually do a Thai style and use veggies that lend themselves to that sort of a meal - broccoli, mini corn, peas, carrots - along with an umami option like mushrooms or grilled eggplant. I think there are some other good options though as well:
Generally, if I were picking to make something that is authentically vegetarian, I would often go with a curry or stir-fry and probably not pick Cantonese style, which I often associate with shrimp plus chicken in a dish.
Edit for some other options:
Dal (Indian lentil curry) is a great option, and there are approximately as many varieties of dal as there are people who make dal.
There are a large number of thai or indian curries that are vegetarian - squash, eggplant, tofu, mushroom, cauliflower, potato, paneer are all great options for bases. Butter paneer is one of my personal favourites, with the paneer very nicely grilled or sauteed, added to soft potatoes with the butter sauce... that's hard to beat.
In my area there are a bunch of pho places that have great vegetarian (and maybe vegan) options, though I'm in southern ontario, so I'm not sure how authentic they are to Vietnamese cuisine.
Elsewhere in the thread, Ethiopean / Eritrean food was mentioned, and the lentil curry they make pairs incredibly well with injera, the flatbread that it is eaten with. There are a bunch of Eritrean options that are great, though obviously that's African and not Asian.
IIRC, you raise your own chickens and have eggs ? In this regard I think using eggs is fine lol.
I think another tip for people wanting to explore plant based diets is to realize that merely reducing your animal product intake is meaningful. It doesn’t have to be an all in thing !
It may help to ask yourself why you want to eat more plant based food and then see if your choices align with that.
That being said, I also am curious to see some of these recipes ! The oyster sauce replacement would be…hard for me.
There are vegan osyter sauces and I honestly cannot tell the difference.
REALLY?! Because I made the mistake once of buying a storebrand one, or even one that didn't have oysters, but had some other...sea creature, and it was NOT good.
If there are any specific brands you like, I'd be interested to know.
Lee Kum Kee.
As far as I’m concerned they are the only brand.
IIRC the bottle says “mushroom oyster sauce” or something like that.
Hmmm I'm second guessing my taste buds now. But Lee Kam Kee . It's generally the brand of any sauce at my house.
I'm moderately intrigued by how the pictured mushrooms aren't pleurotus ostreatus, aka oyster mushrooms
Haha yeah the bottle specifically says 香菇 which are shiitake, but yeah I had to double check because it would make more sense as oyster mushrooms
I just need to vent for a moment. Why the fuck has everything gone almond. Almond milk, almond yogurt, almond cheese, the default alt-milk at every coffee shop seems to be almond. I can't believe how just... Fine... Everyone is with this. Oat milk and soy milk can have their problems but almond milk is nothing but problems. Besides, hemp milk is the superior latte choice.
I just don't get how a group of people who, I presume, are at least partially motivated to choose alt-milk by the environmental impacts of dairy have collectively picked maybe the worst option. It drives me insane!
It seems that Almonds have simply become cheap.
Though I have to say that I'm dumbfounded that somehow commercial almondmilk is cheaper than commercial oatmilk. Maybe all the stuff they add to it that are not oats are expensive?
Could it be the porridge mental link? I've never seen oat milk on the shelves that's more expensive than the almond milk next to it.
I would add one additional note that I feel applied to me on my four year vegan journey.
I would often bristle at omnivore people making comments that vegan food should just be vegan food and not try to be omnivore food—even though I do broadly agree with the idea!
When you adopt a plant based diet it’s definitely more helpful to focus on plant based foods to adjust your palette. An Impossible meatloaf isn’t bad, but it’s not going to have all the same characteristics of a cow meatloaf and setting yourself up for comparison is setting yourself up for failure. Plus, eating a lot of meat alternatives means you’re eating less whole foods.
But once you do adjust your palette there can be lots of wonderful vegan foods that do “scratch the itch” that a omnivore recipe targets. For instance, if I want a meatloaf I am probably up for something comforting and familiar that’s easy to make. I like making this vegan lentil loaf because it scratches that itch.
Similarly, this scrambled tofu recipe is amazing, and it hits that “warm savory soft food on toast” itch that I can get for breakfast.
I didn’t mean to start writing a ton of paragraphs with recipes but this lasagna is also amazing and stands up on its own.
I would also recommend thinking through where you want to draw the line in terms of your commitment to “practical and possible” because it’s easy to get caught in purity tests, and it can be helpful to know beforehand so you’re not freaking out at a store looking at ingredients.
You are a hero, there is so much good stuff in this comment that it alone was worth making the post. The recipes look great, though I admit Gardein + air fryer has been a necessary part of the process lol. Do you find the HappyCow app useful enough to warrant being its own app?
Also I will get that recipe book, thanks!
You're welcome, happy to help :)
Finding convenience foods like your Gardein in the air fryer has been pretty essential in keeping us eating less meat, recipes can be expensive, time consuming, and risky if it's you're first time going for it!
HappyCow is very situationally useful, like dependent on where you're at and who you're with. Like where I live, there's tons of great vegan options everywhere, so it's kinda moot. But visiting somewhere new or with folks that don't typically eat vegan? It can shine there. My bestie ended up getting the premium one and felt it was worthwhile but I didn't get it.
If you're talking about the charge for the iPhone app, I think it was worth it. But you can also use their website for free if you'd prefer it.
I think it's best to think of products like Gardein and Impossible and the like as transition foods. They're great for getting you started on a vegan lifestyle, but if you keep eating it what's going to stop you from transitioning back?
Honestly, keeping eating it, because you prefer not killing animals even though you occasionally eat fake meat replacements.
Been vegan for 10 years and I still eat "fake meat", "fake nuggets", etc every so often when I'm too bored to cook & I ran out of tofu or whatever. No reason not to, if you feel comfortable with that (I originally didn't at all because I found it creepy). Yet now I do, and I still wouldn't touch meat with a 50 metre pole. I get disgusted by it both visually and in terms of smell. I also eat fake dairy such as violife, alpro etc quite often.
I'm not sure I understand what a "transition food" means here or why it'd relate to me going back.
I mean it as in it's something you're eating to transition yourself to eating vegan because you're eating it instead of eating meat. I'm not saying to give it up, either. Heck, I've got some fake chicken nuggets in the freezer right now. I'm just saying that it works better to think of it as a tool that helps you make this kind of transition. It's advice that I got when I started and I found it helpful.
In that context yeah, it makes a lot of sense! I thought you were implying "never at all" in your original comment, which I feel could have the opposite effect for some.
Funnily, I didn't even have a single option for meat replacements back in the day in my home country, so when they became available it actually took me years of effort to get myself to eat the more realistic ones without feeling very icky about it.
I would describe myself as someone who would like to be vegan but fails to live up to that quite frequently.
I've been mostly vegetarian for a while (I tell people I'm "95% vegetarian"), and I've been slowly shifting more of my foods to be vegan (I'm probably about 50% vegan at the moment). I eat meat when I've been served it, or when, occasionally, I'm weak-willed and make the bad choice to feed a craving.
For me, thinking of vegetarianism and veganism as a spectrum rather than binary has been very helpful. It was remarkably easy for me to go mostly (say, 80%) vegetarian when I first started. It is considerably harder to go 100%, however. Same with veganism.
When it's portrayed as a binary, as in I “am" vegan or "am not" vegan, it's easy to see any single lapse as a "failure" and make me want to throw in the towel and just go back to 0%, or "not vegan." When it's a spectrum, however, I'm able to have some grace for myself and live up to my ideals better, even though I'm not perfect at them. It helps me play the long game of making incremental changes over time.
The way I think about it is that I'm not "vegetarian" or "vegan" as an identity, but that, when faced with decisions about food, I try to make a vegetarian/vegan choice as much as I possibly can. On any given day, we make dozens different choices about food: what to eat and not eat, what to buy, what to make, do I take one of the donuts that someone brought into work, etc. Additionally, we will make those choices day in and day out for years, decades, the rest of our lives.
If I was previously at 20% vegan and I move that to even 30%, that's still progress and worth celebrating, rather than maligning, because that still represents a change of THOUSANDS of food decisions in the long term. I was able to ratchet my vegetarianism up quite high (despite not getting to 100%), and I'm currently working on my vegan percentage slowly but surely.
Now, outside of my philosophical bloviating here, I'm also about the world's worst vegetarian/vegan in that I genuinely hate cooking and preparing food. I don't enjoy it; I don't get any fulfillment out of it; I resent having to do it.1
I loathe having to buy different ingredients and time freshness on things. Every time I've tried to be an adult and cook for myself I end up with a bunch of food in my fridge that's gone bad and dozens of expensive spices and oils and whatnot that I only use a little bit of. I find myself getting fed up with the whole process and just getting fast food or convenience foods as a fallback.
My husband LOVES baking, so I know what it looks like to see true joy and passion in the kitchen. It is fulfilling to him. He looks forward to it. I have exactly 0% of that feeling when it comes to making food. It has never not felt like a chore to me, and it's a chore I'd put at the bottom of the list. I'd genuinely rather clean my toilet.
This, obviously, doesn't line up with my desired values, because vegan and vegetarian convenience foods aren't exactly commonplace. They require effort, and it's clear I simply don't have the throughput. So, what do I do?
I let someone else do it for me! I pay for a meal service.
Well, two, technically.
Mosaic is a frozen meal service that has an entirely vegetarian menu, with many of their options also being vegan. Not only that, but their meals are good. I find them tasty and satisfying.
CookUnity has meals of all types, but you can filter by vegan and vegetarian. I am genuinely impressed by how tasty many of their meals are.
Both of them are US-only (I think), and subscription-only, which means I do have to juggle pausing weeks and whatnot, but I find that way less tedious than cooking for myself each day. I generally order CookUnity weekly and have it for several of my meals, whereas Mosaic I will order when my freezer is running low and I need to restock it.
Even though both are pricey from a per-meal standpoint, I consider them worth it because they save me a lot of time and frustration AND because I get vegetarian and vegan meals2 that I genuinely like and even crave. A lot of people have the perception that vegetarian and vegan meals are generally boring or bland, but CookUnity especially gets a lot of good flavor into theirs. Mosaic is also good, but it tends to have the issue that most frozen meals have: a one-note texture and mouthfeel.
So, to you or to anyone reading this: if eating more vegetarian or vegan meals feels like a lot of work to you, know that you don't have to do the work. You can pay someone else to do it for you (and, if you're kitchen-averse like me, they'll almost certainly do a better job and make something tastier than you would even if you tried your hardest).
1. An aside, but I also have odd, touch-based sensory issues which inhibit me preparing food well even when I want to. Back when I was eating meat and trying to cook like an adult, I would rarely ever buy it because the idea of touching raw meat is like nails on a chalkboard to me. Outside of that, I just hate the sensation of having stuff on my hands. As a kid I learned to use chopsticks because I liked Cheetos but hated the dust getting on my fingers, for example.
2. Depending on what your standards are, you might have trouble supporting a company that uses animal products, even if some of what they sell is nominally vegan. The only fully vegan meal service I've tried is Purple Carrot but I did not find their meals to be tasty or satisfying.
I really like looking at meat intake as a scale, and moving the scale towards less meat intake being a good thing. I'm not a vegan (I think I've probably posted about eating eggs in the "what are you cooking" thread about a hundred times), but there's a lot of vegetarian and vegan options that I love, and we try to do a few vegetable based meals every week. I think any time people move the needle towards less meat - especially beef - they are making micro-improvements to the world.
Agreements aside, full stop, we have found a wild wrench in the clone theory. I cook every day, often multiple times, and I love it.
For anyone who isn't K who reads this and doesn't know about the clone theory - we have found many, many similarities over the years. This is maybe the only key difference.
Interesting that, after uncovering so many similarities, we’re finally getting info on the parameters that The Simulation did choose to change between our specific models.
Looks like we were given nearly opposite initializations for the
cooking_affinityvariable, while, for example,nationalitywas only slightly tweaked.Most of the differences have been in the
timeandspaceclasses, though, and we've uncovered one directly incore, and I think it's the first key difference.I think it's great to try and reduce the intake as much as possible, that's also how I started. I have been vegan for almost 2 years now, with some lapses as well. However, as for the binary classification with veganism. I get it, in the way that veganism is not the same as vegan food choices (or rather plant-based food). Veganism applies to other aspects as well, leather, glues, brushes, shampoo, there's so many aspects for which it basically comes down to the binary: Do you avoid animal exploitation as much as possible, or not?
This might be just semantics, and as I said, I have slowly transitioned in it as well, and I think people becoming gatekeepy are doing the opposite of what they intend - I still remember an insanely annoying vegan talking to me over 10 years ago- probably kept me from even considering veganism, or anything around it for years.
Well this is a new experience for me; I’ve never had someone read my mind before 😅 we apparently have near identical philosophies on vegetarianism/veganism!
The only significant place we differ, I think, is that I’ve landed on simple meals w/frozen veggies and pantry staples instead of meal prep services (probably to my detriment). My palate isn’t all that complex: I’m perfectly happy to have some roasted root vegetables and hummus for dinner, or a simple bean, pea, and kale pasta w/spicy sauce for lunch. Realistically I probably have some (mild) nutrient deficiencies from that, so I should probably get some bloodwork done XD
Make sure you supplement your b12 somehow. Been vegan for 10 years now and never had a problem - I used to get it from energy drinks but nowadays I drink far fewer of them and I get a proper supplement.
For cooking, you can get extra inspiration from cuisines with lots of vegan-friendly dishes. For example, Greek cuisine has a lot of less-known plant-based foods because lent was/is a thing for roughly 1/3 of the year.
That said, I found it hard to find cosmetics that were vegan-friendly back in the day, although food was always mostly a non-issue. Vegan-friendly shampoos, perfumes, etc etc were basically almost not a thing back in the day in my home country.
I get my B12 from Nutritional Yeast, which incidentally is super healthy for other reasons too. And tastes great.
Just in case: nutritional yeast doesn't contain B12 naturally, so it's important to check if it's fortified with it, and how much one has to consume in order to cover the daily recommended intake.
Good call! The bulk kind from WinCo is, and Anthony's from Amazon is, for those looking!
I like it on popcorn. How else do you use it?
I find it's really good to "fill in" savory flavors. For instance, imagine you're making something heavy garlic; it's going to take the flavors more towards the umami and distract from the floral undertone of allium. By volume, I probably mostly use it in soups and salad dressings.
I sprinkle it on steamed or roasted veggies (broccoli, asparagus, and potatoes especially)
Sprinkle it on pasta in place of parmesan cheese
I also make a "cheese" sauce out of it for vegan mac and cheese by making a roux, then oat milk, spices, and yeast. I also add tomato paste sometimes and use this "cheese" sauce as a base sauce for vegan pizza.
The vegan food I love most is ethiopian or eritrean. They do amazing things to lentils and split peas. If you have a restaurant near you or if you travel to a city with good ethiopian restaurants, you might want to try it.
I've never had Ethiopian food, and now I have a reason to try it! Thanks for the recommendation!
A long time ago, I lived in a small apartment complex, and someone in the building organized a sort of "block party" potluck for residents. It was a fun little get-together and a great way to meet my neighbors.
One of them was a chef at a local Ethiopian restaurant. The food they brought was unbelievably good. Like, earth-shatteringly amazing. I became an instant convert.
Unfortunately, there are no local Ethiopian restaurants near where I currently live.
I still miss it.
I have the opposite problem. There is one not too far from me but my husband has somehow decided that he doesn’t like it.
I know the struggle! My husband and I align on most food preferences, but we occasionally diverge quite drastically. We’ve gotten good at picking up takeout from two different places and eat them together at home when we have strong differing meal preferences.
If you ever get out to DC, we have the largest ex-pat community in the country. There are several excellent Ethiopian restaurants here.
If you do, ping me. Would be glad to get together and take you to one of my two favorites—both in Silver Spring, MD.
I will keep this in mind, thank you for the kind offer
Oakland California also has excellent Ethiopian food and isn't far from San Francisco by transit
Oh, how I miss the Ethiopian food in Oakland. I only went once before I moved back to Ohio, and I’m severely regretting that I didn’t eat there more.
There will be plenty of meat on the menu but the veggie dishes are amazing
Misir wot is a crowd pleaser and a great first dish to try! Make sure it’s vegan at the place you’re getting it from though: some restaurants use nitter kibbeh as the cooking fat which is not vegan.
You're in for a treat
Eating with injera is a lot of fun. :D
I really want to acknowledge how cool it is that there are so many vegans here. My wife and I have been vegan for 8 years — I saw this post and thought “alright, better hop in there, it’s probably a ghost town.” Never have I been so happy to be so wrong!
@RNG welcome to the club! So excited to have you! I’m literally warming up some Daring frozen meals right now because we ran out of cooked food and time to cook tonight.
Oh boy, gonna try to organize my thoughts haha. Here’s some recipes we like:
Bali BBQ Tofu Sandwiches
Cacio e Pepe
Cold Sesame Noodles with Crunchy Vegetables
Ramen with Charred Scallions
I have a bunch more, including Thanksgiving and Chanukah recipes, if anyone is ever interested! Feel free to DM!
Also, Pastabilities makes, like, shockingly good vegan box mac n cheese. After going years without the occasional mac n cheese, it was really awesome to find something that fit the niche.
Advice? Mmmm. Two things, I guess:
Oh! And if you have a local animal sanctuary, go volunteer! There’s no better feeling than taking care of animals, I think. Farm animals, it turns out, are awesome.
This is my favorite comment on the thread. I love the practical life advice and it feels nice to be welcomed. I haven't told anyone I'm vegan and I intend to keep it that way as long as possible. I'm not sure I'm prepared to deal with all of the flak I know is going to be coming my way. My only motivation to be vegan is ethical; I really don't care about any alleged health benefits/detriments or whatever. I don't know any vegans so it feels quite isolating, especially considering how social an activity food is. It's an important way of relating to others, and my ethical views make this really irritating and inconvenient if I'm being honest.
❤️
Yeah, the social dynamics of veganism can be more challenging than the actual logistics of avoiding animal products sometimes. We still have a minor conflict every single time we eat with my mother-in-law. On the other hand (and this certainly varies by location and culture), I’ve had plenty of opportunities to be surprised by people’s openness and thoughtfulness about my veganism. My own mother, my sisters-in-law, my brother’s partner, and almost all of my close friends from college have consistently been wonderful about making sure we have food available when we spend time together, and even eating plant-based themselves when we’re around. My best friend actually went vegan after we spent years casually discussing it (also after he got a dog — I think being responsible for an animal’s wellbeing can really change how a person thinks about animal rights).
Anyway, I hope you can eventually find some peace within your own social groups. But if not, feel free to reach out any time to chat, or even just vent! Seems like we have a pretty solid crew of vegan/vegan-adjacent folks here too.
That might be really nice actually? Vegan topics are currently rather contentious, but it could be nice to have an explicitly vegan space for us to form community without challenge
Yeah, I share the same concerns. Even some of the vegans in the vegan subreddits can be pretty unpleasant to engage with (I imagine, in part, because of how often they find themselves forced to defend their choices).
Maybe a middle ground is for some of us (mostly thinking of myself) to start making some more posts about veganism in the ~life group and see how it goes. If they get engagement, and don’t just turn into endless thought terminating cliches, maybe that will be a good indication that a ~life.vegan would make sense as a group.
I've been a vegan for over 30 years.
You don't need to know much about nutrition, but you do need to know a little. If not you will not feel your best, and you will quit. Start taking a b-12 supplement right now. Any cheapo drugstore brand will do.
For a few weeks use cronometer.com to make sure you are getting all of your nutrition. Notice patterns of where you frequently fall short. Do a web a search on "Top 10 sources of _____" for ideas of foods to consume to make up deficits. If you want to read about vegan nutrition I recommend veganhealth.org. It is written by a Registered Dietitian, Author, and a vegan. You can find out more about vegan diets here.
Recipes, finding things to eat that make your life nice is a subjective thing. I am currently into the vegan recipes at Budget Bytes. You can find more recipe sites here. Simply Vegan is a short intro book that covers both nutrition and some down to Earth recipes.
I'm not far enough into vegan diet to have even thought about nutrition. Good tip I'll bookmark, thanks.
Mostly I'm stuck in the "food will taste different" phase. Eg, I know this is delicious vegan mac and cheese but because every bite is different from what my brain is expecting, it tastes off, and off is bad. Same with textures. Recipes that are simply vegetables are totally fine and delicious -- but going to a very acclaimed vegan restaurant actually super demotivated me.
Any tips on the mental shift?
The good news is that this will just happen over time. My wife was a huge cheese lover, and truly disliked all vegan cheese. We now both agree that cow’s milk cheese tastes funky, and there are plenty of vegan cheeses that we’re happy to eat (though there are still only a small number of nut cheeses that we _really _ enjoy). If you can tolerate it, I think the shortest path is actually to take a break from both the animal-based version and plant-based version of the thing you’re stuck on (e.g. Mac n cheese) for a while, give your brain some time to reset/forget, and then try the plant based one again.
Be patient with your tongue/brain — it’ll catch up eventually!
Where do I find vegan cheese?
Other folks have given the right answers for everyday cheese alternatives (Miyokos is another good brand if you happen to have it at a nearby store).
But some of the BEST nut cheese you can get is from Riverdel in NYC. It’s definitely not an every day kind of thing, as it’s somewhat expensive (but, like, fancy soft animal milk cheese isn’t exactly cheap either), but it’s so good. It’s one of the only things we can consistently give to the fully plant-skeptical people in our lives that they will loudly express enjoyment of. And they ship nationwide! Rebel Cheese is another awesome nut cheese maker (and their cafe is worth going to in person if you’re ever in Austin, TX!).
One notable thing about plant based cheese alternatives is that they’re usually more single-purpose than animal milk cheese. Some products are better as a melt on a sandwich, others work best as a pizza topping, still others are better for eating on crackers, etc. If you have specific places you’re looking to use a cheese alternative, feel free to ask about which kind to try first!
I live not too far from Austin, so I might make the trek to Rebel Cheese (and I'll tell you all about it if I go!)
If you do, there are a lot of really great vegan restaurants in Austin! Nori has spectacular vegan sushi (we once ordered everything on the menu there). Casa de Luz is a whole vegan community center, actually one of the coolest places I’ve ever been. Beer Plant and Bouldin Creek Cafe are also great!
At the vegan section of your local supermarkets' fridges, if any. Brands will vary depending on your country of residence but Violife is pretty ubiquitous in Europe and North America
Sadly their products are primarily coconut fat-based, which I find far less tasty compared to other alternatives
At stores similar to Whole Foods in your area, food co-ops, and health food stores.
Many you can order online.
Don't try for it.
They will never taste 100% the same, but they will taste good in their own category.
I've always like the "naturally vegan" ethnic recipes the best. Centuries of development.
There are so many types of vegan recipes keep going until you find some you like.
As you try recipes, write down/save the ones you would make again.
Gardein, Beyond, Impossible, etc. are entirely indistinguishable imo. There is greater diversity in flavor between two meat patties, chicken strips, etc. then there is between alternatives and what they replace.
They're definitely distinguishable in texture, looks, and smell (thankfully, tbh) but I have no clue about taste. Fuck if I remember what
f l e s htastes like after 10 years.That's the downside with eating what you get whilst travelling if due to a bad translation or guess you get meat. You can remember and compare. On the upside though these days there's enough variety I can get veggie burgers and sausages that I enjoy without them having to be "perfect" replicas.
About 10 years vegan here.
Respectfully, I strongly disagree about avoiding mock meats. While not exact simulations, they're good enough these days that they'll pass. Beyond Burger and Impossible are both excellent. You can get Beyond most affordably at Costco (in the US, anyway).
I tend to improvise most of my recipes if only because I don't like referring to recipes when I'm cooking (ADHD) and I'm handy enough in the kitchen that the results tend to be pretty good regardless: years of watching hours of Food Network each evening leads to a lot of learning by osmosis (and that's a long story).
I'm a big fan of cooking with dried beans, using a pressure cooker to achieve the right effect. Another benefit: it's damn cheap!
I didn't see anyone else mention: cook with nutritional yeast (aka "nooch"). It's:
I put it in damn near every dish I prepare except desserts.
Try using textured vegetable protein (TVP). Per weight, it's also quite affordable. It gives you a meat-like texture while giving you a ton of room to add your own flavor.
I tend to love using it for vegan sausage crumbles. I put them in a microwaveable bowl with a good amount of water and:
I also like to make a soup using a similar list as the above, dried white beans, maybe some diced potato and carrots, and maybe some rice. It comes out like a healthier and equally tasty Tuscan soup like at Olive Garden—but vegan!
I tend to make a lot of Chipotle-style bowls. Most of the ingredients, including the beans, are fairly easy to prep and keep in the fridge for quick meals. I make a lot of beans in the pressure cooker, freeze the bulk of them for defrosting for meals later, while using a much smaller amount for meals.
Oh! If you want to make anything with a heavy cream sort of profile, I can't recommend enough making your own cashew cream! Just keep a large stash of cashews in your pantry, have a super powerful blender (Vitamix here), and add salt, a little lemon juice and a little nooch. Modify to taste.
Also, the above can be turned into a decent mozzarella-issue texture and close-ish flavor with a bit additional lemon juice, a lot more nooch, and tapioca starch. Put that in a pan, sauce or otherwise, over low to medium heat, and stir frequently until it gets nice and thick. It becomes fairly stretchy and, as a huge bonus, the starch lets it brown really well which is great for appearance and adds more flavor via Maillard reaction. This kicks absolute ass in a vegan lasagna. And that is one of my favorite places to use the sausage I described above.
I could go on and on. There are so many dishes to try!
Okay, so a few dumb questions:
It's a leftover from the brewing process. Loads of protein. Amazon has it. Store in an airtight container; I use mason jars. Use it on popcorn, dump it into stews or soups, add it to damn near anything that you cook using water to get some more savory flavor in. Try some. It's weird and awesome.
See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutritional_yeast
I recommend the fortified variety.
It's an inactive yeast with a lot of nutritional value, which you can use as a cheesy alternative in some cooked foods, especially pasta-based or grain-based dishes but honestly anything goes. I
Well any local large hypermarket theoretically has it in its "dry food" vegan section, but if not, I confidently find it in "bio food" or "nuts" shops.
I just toss the bag in the fridge like I do with anything else (I'm paranoid of my house bugs getting in my stuff) but it's pretty shelf-stable and lasts years.
Like a spice, albeit in larger quantities. I mainly do it right before eating but I've also added it in e.g. mushroom mince that I'd then used as a filling for a completely different food.
What country do you live in? Most of the supermarkets I go to do not have nooch. When I need it I either have to go to Sprouts or take the road trip to WinCo (which is usually what I do because they have a really good one in their bulk bins).
I’ll add that you get them very easily from online health stores. They’re perfect for those stores because it’s dry and lightweight.
I am not vegan myself, but I genuinely enjoy plant-based dishes for the variety of flavor, and eat a reasonable number of vegan and vegetarian dishes, so I check out a lot of vegan/veggie content.
I really like Turnip Vegan's channel, if you want some recipe ideas. He has a chill vibe that I dig, too.
https://www.instagram.com/turnipvegan/?hl=en
Everything @Carrow mentioned is great, but I think they left something to subtext that I think should be promoted to text: cook! Cook food as much as you have time for because then you are always cooking food that appeals to you.
I'd try to avoid pre-packaged foods if you're going strict vegan because dairy and egg products are often snuck into them with unusual names you might not think to look for (whey and albumen, for instance). I'm not saying to avoid them entirely unless you're trying to go whole foods plant based for your health, but you'll want to go through them with a fine-toothed comb.
Also you might want to get familliar with some vegan pantry staples. Nutritional yeast and miso are great for adding vaguely cheese-like funk, and you can use things like flax or aquafaba as replacements for eggs in baking. If you do enjoy baking, then it would be wise to get a cookbook rather than just try to wing them, at least until you've got the swing of things.
Ooh! Share the recipe please?
Not sure if this is the right place for this message, but may I request a cook book review, in case someone has given it a try already?
I’ve heard great things about The Vegan Chinese Kitchen, but it’s a bit on the pricey side (and I haven’t had a chance to make it to the library lately). Any thoughts (or even impressions)?
Honestly the one that @Carrow mentioned is pretty much the gold standard in my view. I’m not really much of a cookbook person but I have a copy of that one and it’s pretty damn encyclopedic.
A few people I’ve been watching on YouTube have cookbooks which I haven’t seen personally but imagine based on what they show that they are really great. Miyoko Schinner has a few of them with one focused on making dairy alternative products coming out soon (which is kind of a big deal since she’s the Miyoko of the Miyoko’s brand you may have seen in the vegan cheese aisle). Big Vegan Flavor is written by the person who does the channel Rainbow Plant Life on YouTube. Maybe before you buy you can check out their channels and see if you like the kinds of food they make.
Link for the carrow comment now it's a slightly bigger thread.
I recently made this recipe as raspberry cupcakes and they were honestly some of the best cupcakes I've had in my life. Packed with flavor.
Generally when I go for a plant-based meal I look at food cultures with a long history of it. Indian food has loads of vegetarian options, it's easy to make a couple substitutions to avoid ghee (for example).