As the year draws to a close, I’ve been thinking a lot about this space and what I can do in the new year to challenge myself (and hopefully you) in new ways. It probably doesn’t come across this way on the blog, but I often struggle with questions like – What am I doing to make a difference? What can I do to help people and animals? Am I growing on a personal level? Lately, these questions have gone mostly unanswered. Don’t get me wrong, I love sharing my recipes with you (and I know it makes a positive difference based on your feedback – thank you), so I have no plans to stop recipe development. It’s something I enjoy immensely more days than not. But there are other things I could be doing and I’ve felt this pull at my heart strings a lot in recent months. With only weeks to go until my cookbook manuscript is due, I’m feeling worn out and I’m sure this a big reason for the rut I feel like I’m stuck in. The good thing about a rut is that it usually prompts a change for the better (with time). Discomfort prompts motion.
In spirit of change, I’m starting a series on veganism this year – simple posts that can make the transition to a plant-based diet easier. I’m really excited about this. To be honest, it’s something I’ve wanted to do for over a year now, but I tend to suffer from the mindset that if I can’t do it exactly right or if I don’t know all the answers, then I shouldn’t do it at all. Well, this is a rather silly way to go through life, don’t you think? The truth is, I’m the only one holding myself back. I want to share whatever it is that I can offer and trust that it will be helpful for some of you. Even if you have no desire of going vegan or if you are already a vegan yourself, I still hope that this series will be inspiring and peak some curiosity about things you may want to know more about.
Here are some examples of questions I receive every week:
What can I replace yogurt with?
What’s a substitute for sour cream?
I have no idea what to do. Do you have a vegan 101 Series I can read through to get started?
What do you eat each day?
How do I get protein?
What the bleep is a flax egg????
What do I do if I have a craving for an old food?
Why do you soak beans and nuts? Will my husband fart less if I soak his nuts? (Yes someone wrote this once…I almost spit out my drink.)
I want to start TODAY…help me!
It occurred to me that it would be more helpful if I posted my experiences on the blog, rather than simply via email. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the past few years, it’s that a vegan diet isn’t about what you take away; it’s really about what you add in. I didn’t know this for a long time. For every food that I decided to forgo, I eventually added at least a handful of new, vibrant foods in its place. But first, I had to learn what it is I could add into my diet. This wasn’t easy for me in the beginning and I suspect it’s not for many. Three and a half years into it, I’m still very much learning.
To make this series a success, it’s important for me to have your feedback and input. I’d love to know some of the questions you are struggling with right now or perhaps things you struggled with in the past but triumphed over. Everyone loves a good success story, myself included. [Side note: I’m considering the return of reader success stories, perhaps in a Q & A format – would you enjoy this feature again on OSG?]
For those of you who are making some changes to your diet in 2013, I hope you’ll find this series timely and helpful in your journey. More on all of this very soon.
For more in this series, see:
Part 1: How To Make The Transition
Part 2: Replacing Dairy Milk
Part 3: Homemade Oat Milk
Part 4: Homemade Almond Milk
Part 5: Ten Tips for eating out as a vegan
I wish you a happy, fun, and safe New Year’s surrounded by the people you love! Happy New Year to you all. Thank you for reading Oh She Glows and bringing me into your home each week. I bid farewell to 2012 filled with gratitude.
FANTASTIC idea! I can’t wait to read this series.
First, I love your blog! Your recipes always turn out great! I am looking forward to your series, excellent idea. I love to read success stories and I love to hear what others eat on a daily basis. I also love short and easy dinner recipes, 5 ingredients or less and super healthy cookie or bar recipes (with fruit as substitute for sweetener and fat). I have been working toward eliminating wheat from my diet and I feel so much better. Trying to stick with oats, brown rice and brown rice pasta and quinoa.
Thank you so much for doing this Angela! I also love what you said about how ruts and discomfort can produce changes for the better. Here are just a few of the questions I can think of right now:
1. Building muscle/optimum fitness on a vegan diet. I recently started CrossFit and was vegetarian/lifting weights for the year prior and never really saw a lot of progress. CrossFit is really important to me and as I know that your body composition is primarily built in the kitchen, this is really important to me. How do you balance your food choices for fitness (servings of each ‘type’ of food per day, maybe?) and make sure you are really well fueling your body to build muscle, improve your fitness, etc.?
2. How to make good salads. Is there a kind of formula to make delicious salads? (I appreciated your post on “My Go-To Kale Salad” but I’m also trying to avoid sweeteners in 2013 (maple syrup in the dressing) and have trouble making salads I like to eat.
3. Supplementation. How do you know you’re getting enough iron, B12, etc.? Again, I love the ideals of veganism and enjoyed eating vegetarian but I really don’t want to compromise my health and fitness. This would be really helpful!
Also, I love success stories as well and I’m sure I’ll come up with more questions. But in the meantime, thanks Angela and have a happy New Year!
You should read the book Finding Ultra by Rich Roll. He’s a super athlete and is totally vegan and gluten free! He answers a lot of questions that I had about food in that book. Also Eat and Run is another great book by a vegan athlete. I am huge fitness fanatic and one thing I have been looking more into is cutting out wheat/gluten. The more I read the more I am convinced that it is just weighing me down…might give that a try. Also, I use Garden of Life Raw Meal Protein powder after my workouts with some ground flax seed, maca root and chia seeds in it and it really helps me recover and it has tons of extra vitamins that vegans (or anyone for that matter) need. Just my two cents take it or leave it :)
Oh thank you so much! I will definitely look into those. I also want to cut out at least wheat/gluten but also limit myself to ‘true’ whole grains, those that haven’t been ground into flours as I’ve read that they can have the same effect on blood sugar, so these look really helpful! I guess I’m also wondering about increasing strength/building muscle vs. endurance training but these look like a good start. Thank you again!
Yeah, I have been reading the book Wheat Belly and it talks about the blood sugar spikes even with “whole grains” being a huge issue. This is primarily because the growers of the grains have distorted the original whole grains so much that they are not the same at all. Pretty interesting read…by the way I’m a librarian so I have an excuse for all the excess reading I do :)
I’m current a vegetarian working towards being vegan in 2013. I would love to see more recipes where those of us without a wholefoods/wegmans near by could make vegan recipes. I LOVED how your cookie ball recipe included ingredient swaps for items I can’t find at my local grocery store. I would also love to see what beauty products you recommend- I know this is a cooking blog but my first vegan goal this year is to cut out all animal tested products!
I think this is a great idea. I am a part-time vegan, but planning to make it more of a full-time gig this coming year. One thing that I have really been looking into lately is taking out a lot of the excess gluten that I eat (have been reading Wheat Belly and it’s kind of freaked me out). What do you think about vegan baking that’s gluten free? Will you have any recipes like that in your soon to come cookbook? So looking forward to your cookbook! Blessings for the new year.
Great idea! I think it’s important to always have a reminder of how vegan diets can be healthy – and how to make them that way. I became a vegan for health reasons. My doctor told me then that if I noticed, I would never see a cow eating meat to get their protein, and that I wouldn’t need to, either. I was vegan for 1-1/2 years until last month when I *had* to add egg and chicken to the new anti-candida diet (ACD) I’ve had to start. I’ve missed a lot of the whole grains, but developed sensitivities to them; hoping that this ACD will heal me so that I can again enjoy some of those foods that were so satisfying. I have to tell you, though, that becoming a vegan opened a whole new world of veggies to me. I can remember the first time I tried chard – and didn’t know that I should remove the tough stems for the way I cooked it. Now I’ve learned that chard stems can be sauteed with onions and put into soups and such. I think hints like those would be very helpful to newbies. Looking forward to what I can learn from others with your new plan!
The the one I hear the most as far as vegan meal intimidation is meal prep times. There are a lot of very delicious vegan recipes out there that just take a looong time to make or require ingredients that new-to-vegan people simply won’t have in their pantry. I think we have the bad tendency to assume the basics of an easy vegan meal are obvious (because they are to *us*) and only post the more advanced ones we’re prouder of creating.
I think the majority of recipes people find are intimidatingly complex, use scary new ingredients like Nutritional Yeast, or take too much time compared to what they’re used to preparing. On a weeknight I try to aim for dinners that leave awesome leftovers for lunch the next day, as well as taking less than 30 minutes from the start of cooking to starting to eat. Recipes that fit those criteria are shockingly hard to find.
This is such a great point, am something I’m probably guilty of myself.
This is such a great idea Angela. I’ve always been intrigued by veganism but because I do not know any vegans I have no one to model habits after, or simply observe. By revealing how you approach a vegan diet, with meal planning and such, I think it will offer people realistic ways to approach a completely new diet.
My fear with veganism is losing muscle mass. Maybe it is irrational but I do fear that strength training will become extremely trying. What are your thoughts on this?
Your blog is great Angela, and probably is so because of the effort you put in reinventing yourself and constantly improving this space. It’s a wonderful and unique :)
First, I love that you’re doing this! I have been vegetarian for going on ten years now, and in 2012 I took so many more steps toward becoming vegan. I have it down at home, but what I have yet to figure out how to do well – and without feeling deprived – is how to handle social situations, especially at work and with family.
So often at work there are celebrations that incorporate sweets (which of course I love!) and I know that the sweets contain eggs or milk or something of that nature. I don’t always have time to make myself a dish and I often feel like I’m either insulting the person who made the treat, or trying to be “righteous” by saying “No, I don’t eat that.”
Also, my family understands that this is a diet I’m trying to adapt, and often tries very hard to purchase things for me to eat. But what often happens is I realize later that the soy cheese they bought actually has dairy in it, etc. I often eat it because I know they have made such an attempt to accommodate my eating habits, but then I feel like I will never be able to be 100 percent vegan.
I would love to hear how you and others handle these situations.
I’m so glad you are doing this! I’ve been vegan for almost two years now. The most common question I get is: How do you live without CHEESE?! I say that Daiya is a delicious substitute for melted cheese (pizza, etc) and Tofutti Cream Cheese is my favourite for cool and creamy substitutes like cheesecakes and sandwich spreads. Soaked and pureed cashews also make a great substitute. I thought I’d miss cheese terribly, but after a couple of weeks, I had no desire to eat it anymore.
I think the most important lesson to impart to the wanna-be vegan (at least it was for me), is that you don’t have to be perfect. I think too many people think it’s impossible to be a perfect vegan, so they don’t try for fear of being a hypocrite. It’s better to do something, than nothing! And go easy on yourself.
Hope that helps! :)
This is a great idea! It sounds like others are having similar questions to mine. Looking forward to the series.
A series like that would be wonderful!! I have just started my journey into moving over to a completely plant based diets. The soups are the easiest (BTW your spicy lentil and kale soup is outstanding) because with my schedule I can make it on the weekends and it lasts through the week. Breakfast for me is a particular challenge; besides oatmeal there aren’t a lot of good options!!!
YESSSS! I am looking forward to this series.
I’d love to go vegan – it’s actually becoming a personal goal, together with going gluten-free – but I live in a rural area of Quebec where everyone who is a bit different really sticks out of the crowd, so as a vegeterian I am often looked at as a ‘weird person’. The only vegeterian options I have in local restaurants are pizza and pasta – so forget about going gluten-free. So, social eating is a big worry for me.
It’s also GREAT to have daily inspiration for new vegan meals and snacks – keeps us motivated!!
I love the idea of you teaching this class.. My question is my daughter (age 15) and I mostly vegetarian and go toward vegan to. HOw do I stay only vegan? Do you like using the meat and cheese substitutes? Or an you not use them!!! Also How do I convince my son(age 17) and husband who are meat eaters and picky eaters to try this??
Hey Angela! First off I love your blog and have been following it for the entirety of 2012. I have always agreed strongly with the health benefits of eating a plant-based diet and have wanted to take the plunge. After seeing a Ted Talk by Matt Cutts encouraging people to try something they’ve always wanted to do for one month, I’ve decided to “go vegan” for the month of January.
My biggest challenge with going vegan is my busy schedule and finding time to plan meals make myself food. I am a student, work 20 hours/week, have multiple leadership positions, and volunteer regularly, which has resulted to eating out/on the run/whatever’s easily available, not conducive strategies for a vegan lifestyle. If you could provide some tips on how to make veganism work witha busy lifestyle and how to navigate those times when you are forced to find something convenient, that would be super helpful for me to complete my first New Year’s Resolution. Thanks so much, and keep up the inspiring work!
My husband and I are vegetarian and already use “substitutes” like tofu and seitan. But he has recently cut out dairy as well and I am having a harder time preparing meals that he will eat. Any ideas would be welcomed, looking forward to this series!
Yes! I’m so excited for this series!
I’ve been experimenting with the vegetarian/vegan lifestyle for a few years now. I grew up on a farm in Iowa and have many relatives, family, and friends that are deeply connected to corn manufacturing businesses and raising livestock. When I’m back home, I have a difficult time with eating meals with family and friends since absolutely everything involves meat and dairy. Perhaps you could incorporate suggestions on how to talk with family/friends into the series. For me, I know ultimately it’s my decision and they will support whatever I do but I anticipate heavy push-back initially. Thanks again!!
Hi Angela! I think this would be a great series and am super excited about reading what you have to say! I would love to read about your meal plans- what you eat on a daily basis!! Can’t wait for the cookbook! Happy New Year!
I love this idea!! I have been a vegan for less than a year and at times it is very hard for me so tips would be awesome! The biggest thing I struggle with is eating out. I don’t eat out very often but there are those few times when friends want to hang out and the social thing is usually eating. I find it hard to be comfortable in these situations and awkward when it has revolve around what I can eat. Another thing is eating at family get-togethers. It’s awkward having to bring my own meal because I don’t want to make a big deal out of it and then having everyone question what I am eating. At times I feel that I am being classified right away into this category as a vegan and that’s not all that I am. I just want to eat something/somewhere and not have everything I can and can’t do questioned. How do you deal with these situations and get past the part being solely defined as a vegan?
love this topic! I second everything you said!!!
Hi Angela! I am new to the site but am really enjoying the posts. I have been attempting veganism on and off for a while now but I made a commitment a couple days ago to stick with it. I have many of the ingredients your recipes call for in my pantry and look forward to lots of experimentation. I have a couple of questions for you (not sure if you can help or not…) – I am a new mom (baby boy is almost 4 months old) and have decided to train for a half marathon, 4 days a week starting the end of January. I want to make sure I am getting adequate nutrition for both muscle repair and for my son’s continued health (I am exclusively breast feeding as of right now). What are some of the foods you would recommend that provide a good source of protein and will help maintain a good level of energy? In a world obsessed with ‘getting enough protein,’ particularly from animal sources, I want to make sure that I am not damaging my muscles in my quest to eat consciously. I am not completely sold on the emphasis of mass consumption of protein but I am adamant that I do this in the healthy way, without jeopardizing my body or the growth of my son. If you could recommend a number of sources that provide the most protein, I will know where to start when planning out pre and post run meals/snacks. I am also really looking forward to this series, and to continued exploration of your blog…beautiful! Thanks so much!!