How many vegans on board?

kacie

I'm not a vegan but I would like to be, I've given up dairy except the occasional egg, but am finding it hard to come up with vegan main meals. I'm very fussy and don't like mushrooms and alot of veg. My breakfast are vegan I found that easy to change over, does anyone have any suggestions for main meals. I could easily give up egg as I only have it either in sandwiches or on toast.

savvy

kacie wrote: »

I'm not a vegan but I would like to be, I've given up dairy except the occasional egg, but am finding it hard to come up with vegan main meals. I'm very fussy and don't like mushrooms and alot of veg. My breakfast are vegan I found that easy to change over, does anyone have any suggestions for main meals. I could easily give up egg as I only have it either in sandwiches or on toast.

If you like Indian foods there are a lot of curries and dahls you can make, along with Thai curries which are my fave Risottos, pastas and couscous dishes can work well, and stir fry or some Chinese influences.

Seitan has become a massive hit in our house too, soooooooooo versatile :T There are tons of recipes for seitan over the net, some can be teamed with vegan yorkshire puds, savoury pancakes and Mexican dishes

Surf the net there are masses of recipes out there, some of my faves are VegWeb and PPK

ThriftyFelicity

savvy wrote: »

Has anyone made seitan at all??? There's a link here where some have but was wondering if any of you guys had and how easy/hard it was.........and of course where you get your gluten flour from??

I make faux meaty things with seitan. Once I ordered gluten flour in bulk from Low Carb Megastore, but the stuff they sent me had a best before date of just a few weeks after I purchased it, so I haven't ordered it from them since.

Now I order Bobs Red Mill gluten flour (and a whole bunch of other stuff) from iHerb.com, an American company with great prices and really cheap shipping to the UK ($4... less than £3), as long as you keep the order under 3 pounds in weight. And if the order is less than £17 in value, there is no VAT or duty payable and it comes straight to the door in usually about a week.

If anyone is interested, I can give you an online code that will give you $5 off your first order... PM me for it

sleepymy

That's great to know ThriftyFelicity, I really shouldn't eat too much gluten but seitan looks so appealing.

Sainsbury's have some good offers on atm:
2 X Alpro light/organic/vanilla/unsweetened 1ltr (non chilled) cartons @ £1.50.
2 X Alpro desserts @ £2.50.
Save 33% on selected Dove's Farm flours.
Save 50% on Hobnobs, now 42p per packet.
BOGOF on jammie dodgers.

MountainView_2

I haven't read this whole thread – as it is huge, but I'm another fellow vegan raising my hand

I was a vegetarian for about 5+ years or so, but turned vegan about 10 years ago. I'm a huge food hedonist and I have honestly never eaten so well, healthily or eaten such tasty food as I have since turning vegan. It's change my culinary mindset; I think a lot of people in this country at least still have the 'meat and two veg mindset', which I suspect is what trips up a lot of new vegans. That and a focus on 'replacing' and 'substituting' the meat content of their diet as opposed looking at vegan cookery as a different way of cooking. I mean, it doesn't have to be a different way of cooking, but I like building up and focusing on layers, textures, flavours, sensations to the point of it being an artform sometimes.

One of my pet niggles, is these so called celebrity chefs who make sarcastic remarks about vegans/veggies 'missing out' – which tells me they have absolutely no clue how to cook with originality.

Anyway, it's good to see other vegans on the board!

savvy

A very astute post MountainView :T:T You are soooo right about the culinary creativity with vegan cooking, I also indulge in vegan raw foods which is even more creative and amazing! :j I will admit to being one of those with the meat and 2 veg mindset :o OMG I just couldn't see how you could have a 'meal' without meat.............but then that was how I was brought up so wasn't exposed to anything else!

I get very jaded by the celeb chefs comments too and their lack of ability to be able to offer a vegan dish..........and possibly only one or two uninspiring vegetarian options laden with cheese. I used to get this annoyed by it when I was a meat eater as I preferred to eat vegetarian when we went out on the account of not knowing where the meat has come from and what they've been doing with it etc. I can't believe they're still not that open to it after all this time, but then guess they wouldn't make so much money from veg*n options!!

MountainView_2

savvy wrote: »

A very astute post MountainView :T:T You are soooo right about the culinary creativity with vegan cooking, I also indulge in vegan raw foods which is even more creative and amazing! :j I will admit to being one of those with the meat and 2 veg mindset :o OMG I just couldn't see how you could have a 'meal' without meat.............but then that was how I was brought up so wasn't exposed to anything else!

I get very jaded by the celeb chefs comments too and their lack of ability to be able to offer a vegan dish..........and possibly only one or two uninspiring vegetarian options laden with cheese. I used to get this annoyed by it when I was a meat eater as I preferred to eat vegetarian when we went out on the account of not knowing where the meat has come from and what they've been doing with it etc. I can't believe they're still not that open to it after all this time, but then guess they wouldn't make so much money from veg*n options!!

Hi there Savvy


I totally agree with you about the cheesy vegetarian options presented by 'celebrity chefs'! Lol. I rarely see anything unique and they always laden it with more cheese than is possible to eat! Lol, it's as if the veggies are a mere garnish!


They just generally don't know know to cook without animal products. These chefs are supposed to be on TV because they are the best at what they do *ironic coughing fit*. Then when they go and serve up some 'veggie lasagne' as the height of original and creative cookery I wonder how on earth they manage to turn on an oven let alone cook in a michelin star restaurant, lol. Oh, and to qualify that – I'm not knocking veggie lasagne I love the stuff! Anyway, enough my if my mini rant hee hee.


I haven't delved into raw cookery in any great length, but have dabbled a tiny bit, and loved it. It's something I would certainly love to experiment with more, as I enjoyed the pure, fresh flavours. I suppose inadvertently I do raw 'cooking' a little bit as I love my veggies, even out on the garden I'm nibbling bits of my herbs or veggies, especially at the moment with it being harvest time.


What's your favourite raw vegan dish at the moment Savvy? Actually, being the foodie I am, I'd love to hear everyone's current favourite vegan dish

savvy

Hey Mountainview :hello:

MountainView wrote: »

Hi there Savvy

I totally agree with you about the cheesy vegetarian options presented by 'celebrity chefs'! Lol. I rarely see anything unique and they always laden it with more cheese than is possible to eat! Lol, it's as if the veggies are a mere garnish!

They just generally don't know know to cook without animal products. These chefs are supposed to be on TV because they are the best at what they do *ironic coughing fit*. Then when they go and serve up some 'veggie lasagne' as the height of original and creative cookery I wonder how on earth they manage to turn on an oven let alone cook in a michelin star restaurant, lol. Oh, and to qualify that – I'm not knocking veggie lasagne I love the stuff! Anyway, enough my if my mini rant hee hee.

Sooooooo true, do you know what, the first time I experienced this phenomenom was when I was a meat eater but had food intolerances and had to go through the elimination period, oh dear god what a nightmare and you ended up just being grateful if they could knock up a boring salad for you :eek: Not all were that bad, there were a couple - Jamie Oliver's Fifteen was amazing (that was when I was veggie by that stage) as they made up a rice batter for me to make the battered courgette flowers.....which were divine! Incidentally it transpired that I was intolerant to about 50% of meats and dairy and eggs anyway..........so am very glad to have discovered vegan eating :T

MountainView wrote: »

I haven't delved into raw cookery in any great length, but have dabbled a tiny bit, and loved it. It's something I would certainly love to experiment with more, as I enjoyed the pure, fresh flavours. I suppose inadvertently I do raw 'cooking' a little bit as I love my veggies, even out on the garden I'm nibbling bits of my herbs or veggies, especially at the moment with it being harvest time.


What's your favourite raw vegan dish at the moment Savvy? Actually, being the foodie I am, I'd love to hear everyone's current favourite vegan dish

I think one thing that is amazing with raw foods, is the variety!! :cool: I've learnt so much about wildfoods that I'd never have been open to before - we are SO blinkered by what supermarkets offer us We now have an international food shop that offers much more variety thank god :T But nothing beats finding foods that our forefathers ate that we turn our noses up at now. I've been out on wildfood walks, the best one was at the seaside, where we had seakale and samphire that was amazing

BUT the BEST thing about raw..................is the desserts!!! :j OMG they are awesome, far superior to the fat and sugar laden offerings you usually get, and a lot more healthier too. And out of them all my favourite is Ani Phyo's cheezecake...................omg sooooooooooooooo divine, yet simple to make!!!

As for cooked vegan, at the moment our house is loving seitan :T:T:T probably the hot wingz so far, but there's tons of recipes for it I haven't tried yet. My personal overall favourite would be green thai curries though.........can't get enough of them

_Andy_

Yep Thai curries are awesome!

talking of raw vegan food, heading back to San Francisco later in the year, Cafe Gratitude there is just amazing, their raw-food tiramisu rocks

http://www.cafegratitude.com/cafemenufeb08

_Andy_

Pet hate questions I always seem to get asked about being vegan - (I should carry an FAQ to handout with me)

1) So what DO you eat? (duh)
2) But what about protein?
3) So do you eat fish?
4) You eat eggs though don't you?
5) Why are you vegan? (none of your business )
6) But you must want to eat meat, you eat vegan 'sausages'/whatever replacement
7) What about leather - your shoes are leather aren't they? (no)
8) "Can you eat that then?" (yes or I wouldn't be eating it - duh)

etc etc ad nauseum