Hey y’all! Bianca here from Vegan Crunk. Lindsay asked me to write a guest post, so here goes. If you don’t know me, I’m a Dirty South vegan from Memphis, Tennessee. I’m currently working on a cookbook of veganized Southern classics and comfort dishes. I’ve been vegetarian for almost 16 years, and a vegan for five.
Having spent so much of my youth as a vegetarian (beginning at age 14), I can honestly say that I never really missed meat. Maybe for a few weeks after giving it up, but I don’t remember the transition from omnivore to vegetarian being very hard. Much harder was the move from a lacto-ovo veg diet to veganism.
But unlike most people, it wasn’t the cheese that held me back. It was the eggs. In my pregan days, I loved eggs … incredible, edible eggs. Fried, scrambled, boiled, made into an omelet — it didn’t matter. After transitioning, it took me a hot minute to get used to the idea of never having another deviled egg or a cheesy, fluffy omelet. That was, of course, before I realized what a wonderful stand-in tofu makes for eggs.
I started with Tofu Scramble:
Though it lacks of the fluff of scrambled eggs, tofu scramble makes up for it in the presence of fresh veggies. It’s more nutritionally complete, and oh so comforting. Here’s my recipe:
Cheeze Eggs
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3 Tbsp. soymilk
1 Tbsp. soy sauce
2 Tbsp. nutritional yeast
1/2 tsp. onion powder
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. turmeric
1/2 tsp. dried basil
1/4 tsp. celery salt
1 cup chopped vegetables, optional
Non-stick cooking spray or 2 tsp. oil
1 lb. extra-firm tofu
Blend soymilk, soy sauce, and spices in a small bowl. Spray a non-stick skillet with cooking spray or use a couple teaspoons of olive oil to sauté veggies (if using) for 3 to 4 minutes. Crumble in tofu and add spice mixture. Cook several minutes until any water from the tofu is absorbed and tofu is hot.
After discovering the Fat-Free Vegan Kitchen blog and Vegan Brunch, I began making vegan omelets:
Finally, I got all crazy and decided that if tofu could make better-than-eggy scrambles and omelets, how would the bean curd fare in a deviled “egg”? After a little experimentation, Tofu Deviled Eggy Bites were born:
I’ve served these at parties to non-vegans who declared that they actually taste very much like actual deviled eggs. The secret is black salt — available at Indian markets. Here’s the recipe:
Tofu Deviled Eggy Bites
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1 pound extra firm tofu
Half of a 12.3-ounce package of firm silk tofu (about 1 cup)
1 cup canned Great Northern beans, drained and rinsed
2 Tbsp. vegan mayonnaise (like Vegenaise)
1 Tbsp. yellow mustard
1 tsp. turmeric
1/2 tsp. black salt (plus about 1 Tbsp. more for spreading on “egg whites”)
1 Tbsp. dill pickle relish
1/2 Tbsp. red onion, very finely minced
Black pepper, to taste
Paprika, for garnish
Fresh chives (optional, for garnish)
Drain water from the extra firm tofu. Wrap in several layers of paper towels and place on a plate. Put something heavy on top, like a jar or book, and allow to press in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
After extra firm tofu is pressed, cut it in half. Then cut each half into four quadrants or squares. Slide a knife on the side of each quadrant to cut three squares from each. In the end, you should have about 24 little squares. If these instructions are too confusing, just cut into bite-sized squares and aim to get about 20 to 24. Set aside.
Place the silk tofu, beans, mayonnaise, mustard, turmeric, and one teaspoon black salt into a food processor. Process for about a minute or until smooth. Transfer to a mixing bowl and stir in relish, onion, and black pepper. Set aside.
Pour the other tablespoon of black salt into a small bowl. Using your fingertip, rub a touch of black salt on each white firm tofu square. Top each square with a dollop (about one teaspoon) of the yellow silk tofu mixture.
Bio JL began her vegetarian-to-vegan journey in 2002. Four years ago she made a conscious decision to change careers and find balance in her life, which meant she could finally explore interests outside of work. Those include volunteering for nonprofit organizations, enjoying all kinds of red wine, taking up knitting and running a few half-marathons and triathlons each year. Then she began eating vegan; she became obsessed with cooking.When she’s not making grocery lists, training for a half-marathon or trying just one more recipe she found on a vegan blog, she goes to work as an administrator at a community college and teaches a course on nonprofit management at a local university. JL lives in metro NYC with her husband and two cats. You can find her on Twitter: http://twitter.com/JLgoesVegan or in the blogosphere http://jerrilynn.tumblr.com/ where she’s taking baby steps to find her blog voice.
EVERYBODY HAS A STORY At the age of 36 I quit eating meat. Almost. I was in Kenya for work. We were in a small village in the Rift Valley. There was a celebration held in for an auspicious occasion and my colleagues and I were guests of honor. Early in the day an elder from the community brought a goat to the site of the celebration—a truth demonstration of generosity. The goat was presented and subsequently killed and boiled. That evening, we were offered the goat for dinner. To refuse it would have been an affront (or so I told myself?) Essentially I met a goat, shook his hand then ate him. I became a vegetarian.
Not exactly. I become one of those—I‘m a vegetarian, but I eat fish—people. That went on for nearly four years. Fish was my crutch. I didn’t eat fish at home but had convinced myself that eating out would be too difficult so I should just order fish. I ate out a lot. On a vacation four years ago, after eating fish to the point of ridiculousness, I decided it was time to be a real vegetarian. I gave up fish.
During this span of eight years I had somehow morphed from a 36 year old couch potato who smoked a pack a day and would eat half a bag of fun size Baby Ruth candy bars in one sitting to a non-smoker, 20 pounds lighter, gearing up for her first marathon in 2005 at the age of 40.
Fast forward to January of 2010, age 44. I run. A lot.
May 2010, just after a 5k Race in 26:30; not a bad pace for a couch-potato-to-runner turning 45 in two months
I compete in triathlons. I eat vegetarian and pretty healthily at that. But somehow every November and December I would find myself nursing a post-race season injury. Less exercise and holiday feeding frenzies = chubby JL each January. This year I received an email from my local yoga studio about a cleanse workshop. I had never done a cleanse in my life, but it intrigued me.I met with Jill of Hera Wellness who led an extremely informative workshop explaining a variety of cleansing methods. And I was off, a 14-day cleanse of clean eating (no processed foods), no coffee, no caffeine, no sugar, no dairy, no wheat, no wine (what?! no red wine?! I survived) and, in the middle, three days of Master Cleanse. At the conclusion of the cleanse I felt fantastic and became a cleanse convert. I continued eating the same healthy way (but resumed red wine and a cup of coffee a day) and I continued to eliminate dairy and wheat from my diet.Suddenly I realized that the only animal based foods in my diet were honey and eggs. I realized I was an egg away from being a vegan.
For six months I have been eating vegan. I have never felt better. I had my annual physical with my general practitioner about 5 months into my new vegan diet. I told her to indicate in my file that I was eating vegan. She scrunched up her nose and asked “Why vegan?” I described a typical day of eating and she concluded that I may be one of the healthiest eaters she knows. Four days later she phoned me with my blood work results. She began the conversation by saying “Keep eating the way you’re eating.” My already decent cholesterol from a year ago (174) was down to 128.
How did I go about making the transition? I am a planner. I love a good spreadsheet. I knew I couldn’t go into this without really thinking it through; I consulted with my nutrition counselor and with her guidance, and the vegan blogosphere, I equipped myself to do it right. As a result of reading many, many (many! blogs) I purchased several books
The first vegan blog I stumbled upon was Cook.Vegan.Lover! After reading Lindsay’s blog I kept clicking links and finding more and more great blogs to read.
Where to start with all of this great information on the web? Most mornings, before going out for a training run, I sit down with a cup of warm water, cayenne pepper and lemon or a cup of half-caf/ half– decaf coffee and I read, read, read. Each time I stumble upon a recipe I must try, I cut and paste it into a Google document (I have 192 recipes, but who’s counting?) Then, when out and about I may find one of the new ingredients because it’s on my iPhone. (Medjool dates,Bragg Liquid Aminos, chia seeds, dulse flakes, nutritional yeast)
I used to eek through preparing a meal. Boca cheese burger on a wheat bun, steamed veggie, a salad. Now I’m obsessed with vegan cooking. I plan my meals. Each Saturday my husband and I hit the farmer’s market and my local health food store for most of my organic produce and “hard to find” items, and Trader Joe’s for the rest. On Sundays I move into the kitchen, turn my stereo on full blast and just start cooking. I try out new recipes with tofu, TVP and tempeh. With lentils and beans. Soups, stew. Veggie burgers, collard and kale salads, quinoa a zillion ways, chutneys.I purchased a L’Equip dehydrator and make “raw” kale chips, flax crackers and sunflower seed bread.
I take pictures of my food.
Grilled yams with homemade rhubarb chutney, grilled sesame-miso tofu and grilled asparagus
They say the journey is the destination. I have been on a vegetarian journey and have finally arrived to eating vegan. Note I say eat vegan. I now find myself confronted with what it means to be vegan. The journey continues.
So over the next few weeks the Hubz and I are going to be crazy busy with moving and various events. I am taking this busy time as an opportunity to feature a number of different guest bloggers who will be covering a number of different topics. I will be blogging whenever possible and will keep you up to date on the pantry challenge but for now enjoy the upcoming guest blog posts.
Hello Cook. Vegan. Lover. readers! My name is Lauren, I’m a blogger and I chronicle my journey towards healing Crohn’s disease through a high raw vegan diet, on my blog, Ginger is The New Pink. I’ve had crohn’s for 5 years and became a vegan shortly after diagnosed and noticed a huge difference in my symptoms. I am now pregnant with my first child, due in November and staying vegan, or healthy hasn’t been much of a challenge at all.
When I first found out I was pregnant, I felt great for 2-3 weeks, I was eating well, exercising, meditating, doing all my usual “rituals.” Then came the morning sickness. Or as many call it, “all day sickness”. I found myself not hungry or wanting to eat at all. Exercise.. ha, and anything else that involved moving from the couch, out of the question. I’ve seen a lot of people leave veganism at this time. They tend to crave more bland protein foods like eggs, fish, or chicken, but not me. I had no cravings, and leaving veganism was never an option for me. I got through this time with lots of brown rice and other grains. My doctor assured me that the baby would be healthy because of how I ate before I became pregnant. Phew! What a relief! I knew my mostly veggie, high raw, vegan diet would help the baby thrive, while I couldn’t.
My dear pug Ginger got a lot of use out of my rebounder!
Luckily this phase did pass. At around 10 weeks my appetite started coming back and I was craving kale again! Happy day! Since then I’ve started working out again, doing prenatal yoga, cooking, un-cooking, and just all around enjoying feeling good again! I was so happy to be able to provide my baby with the right nutrients and vitamins I know he/she will thrive on. My doctor questioned my diet at first, but when she realized how much I knew about veganism, and what I should be eating for the baby, she stated that I knew more then she did about nutrition! Score for vegans! I do take a B12 shot once a month, vegan DHA oil, a vegan prenatal and a few other supplements as “insurance.” But I am pretty confident that as long as I eat a wide variety of fruits and veggies and make sure my protein is a little higher then normal, that I will be fine. For iron, I use spinach daily in my green smoothies and Sunwarrior protein powder has made it very easy to make sure I am getting enough protein. Normally, I am not a protein gal, I feel that I get enough protein from different vegan sources, but with pregnancy, I have been extra cautious.
Green Smoothie with spinach, mango, DHA oil, Sunwarrior protein, Maca Powder and Almond Milk
Now I am 16 weeks and loving ALL vegan food! I’ve even been eating more raw then ever. The baby seems to have a fondness for watermelon and kale! I’ve been having some minor aches and pains and exercise definitely helps improve that. I can’t imagine myself eating junk at this time. My baby is thriving on my diet! When he/she comes into this world I will teach him or her to be kind to all living beings, and why would choose not to eat animals. Most children don’t even understand that the chicken they are eating is the same chicken that they learn about in school. I feel it’s very important to educate my child on this, hopefully when he or she is old enough to make his or her own choices he or she will remember kindness and appreciate all that I have taught them about empathy towards animals and the environment.
HEAVEN!
Kale Salad with cherry tomatoes, raw pickles, raw sauerkraut, sunflower seeds, hemp seeds, avocado, olive oil and lemon.
Thank you Lindsay for letting me share! I hope you all stop by my blog and watch as my pregnancy progresses, I promise vegan food only! 😉 Lots of love to all your readers! 🙂
Hi Bloggies! Hope you are having a wonderful weekend and are enjoying the photos from the Hubz and I’s honeymoon. We are currently in Portland, Maine for our 2nd wedding anniversary and since I am not sure how much time I will have for blogging I’ve invited my good Twitter friend and new blogger Megan to be a guest on my blog. Hope you enjoy her wonderful post!
Ich bin Veganerin: An American Vegan in Germany
By Megan Eaton
In my 24 years, I have traveled throughout the US and Canada, and visited the Bahamas, Finland, Austria, Sweden, Denmark, Japan, France, and Portugal. Other languages and cultures define my life, one in particular: 11 years ago I began taking German. Since then I have traveled throughout and studied in German, completed a BA and most of an MA in German Studies, and taught German to university students. Speaking and working with the German language is, it seems, what I was meant to do. I currently teach at a middle/high school in Germany. I am also a vegan.
What is remarkable about my veganism in Germany is that I first became a vegan after I moved here. Nothing particular about Germany prompted my change in lifestyle; my reasons were ethical and health-inspired, reasons that transcend national borders. In fact, my decision to become vegan was all the more shocking to my friends and family simply because it’s Germany. You know, wurst (1500 kinds, according to Wikipedia), schnitzel, cheese, hollandaise sauce, and the omnipresent bakeries offering more custardy, honey-glazed, egg-washed goodness than you can shake a carrot stick at. I heard a lot of ‘It is going to be impossible!’ and, at the beginning, I also operated in that mindset.
It’s true, the concept of veganism hasn’t made its way as far into mainstream German culture as it has in the United States, but being vegan here is far from impossible. It’s actually impossibly easy and has given me a unique point of entry into every day life.
Vegan staples are easily available in Germany, groceries are cheap, and organics are everywhere. The two main drugstore chains, Rossmann and DM, have extremely low-priced in-house organic brands. When I go pick up dish soap or paper towels, I can also buy a huge bag of organic oats, almond butter, maple syrup, pizza crust mix, vegan tortellini, chocolate bars, spelt flour, apple-mango sauce, and soy milk. It’s a dream come true! DM has this organic grocery section as well as a mind-blowing in-house natural bodycare brand. So while I’m getting all that other random organic food, I can also pick from several cheap, quality, and clearly-labeled (!) vegan body washes, shampoos, face masks, and hand soaps.
Rossmann and DM are literally EVERYWHERE and the vegan snacks and pure fruit juices are lifesavers when faced with a 45-minute commute on an empty stomach.
Cooking for and taking care of yourself is only one part of a vegan lifestyle, though. Staying home alone is nice, but you need friends too. Making new friends is difficult anyways, especially the older we get, but in a foreign country in a foreign language it’s even more of a challenge. When I became vegan, I was new here. I wanted to meet new people and I wanted to meet other vegans. I did a search for ‘vegan’ on MeinVZ, which is a German version of Facebook, and found a potluck in my city. I signed up, baked some cookies, showed up and instantly had a new, like-minded group of young people to hang out with. I have even hosted my own vegan food and game night for German vegans from the area!
The Spread at My Vegan Dinner
MeinVZ has an extremely active and welcoming vegan community with lively forums, frequent meet-ups all over the country, vegan couchsurfing, and information about demonstrations and other events. It may be partly because Germany is so much smaller than the US, but I could never imagine this type of a forum being so far-reaching and well connected at home. Everyone knows everyone and people travel far and wide to hang out and be awesome vegans together. It’s pretty great, and all it takes is the (admittedly scary) first step of saying, Hi! Is anyone signed up to bring cookies yet?
Possibly my favorite part of my vegan Euro-trip has been discovering parts of cities that I might never have gone to if I weren’t vegan. A few months ago, I went with a friend to try a new restaurant with a partially-vegan menu (Pizza! Gyros! Cheeseburgers!).
The restaurant, now a favorite of mine, is just three blocks past my grocery store, down a street I’d never seen that is lined with cute shops, a natural foods store, and ends in a market square. Similarly, our local upscale vegetarian café is located across town in a lovely neighborhood I probably never would have visited. Now I ride my bike up there when I’m looking for a gift, meeting up with a friend for coffee, or craving a tempeh sandwich with sundried tomato pesto.
In Paris last December I shared a meal with the amazing family who runs The Gentle Gourmet B&B on a side street behind the Arc du Triomphe. Before dinner my girlfriends and I met up for a glass of red wine at a neighborhood bar and sat under heaters on the patio. The place was nothing special and yet completely magical, less than a mile away from the Christmas madness on the Champs-Elysees. In Lisbon I became a regular at Celeira Dieta, the natural foods store, and had daily picnics centered around to-die-for seitan empanadas.
In Porto, a city I really didn’t like, my veganism led me to a funky student neighborhood and a dreamy natural foods store and café that saved the trip for me.
When I visit Berlin, an unfathomable treasure trove of vegan riches, trying new restaurants and visiting old favorites helps me keep each trip fresh and introduce my friends to awesome veg food.
Are you a vegan planning a trip or move to Europe? Here are my tips, which I live daily.
1) First and foremost, use the internet to your advantage! Your first stop should be HappyCow.net for a listings and reviews of veg*n restaurants and natural foods stores. Make sure to write down the names and addresses of places you want to visit, and find and mark them on your map before you go!
Facebook is also a great resource, as there are many groups for vegans in particular areas. You may also be able to find meet-ups this way! If you speak the language of the place you are going, see if they have their own social networking sites.
2) Get a guidebook. I usually use Lonely Planet; they mark vegetarian and vegan restaurants with a very clear V and seem to be making a good effort to include as many as they can. Note, however, that the restaurants may always change their opening hours or even close after publication. Usually, these restaurants are also listed on Happy Cow, but it’s nice to have a description and address at hand, bundled with all your other travel information.
3) Be prepared! Before you leave, look up the words for the foods/ingredients you do not eat and write them down. Even better, learn how to say them! But definitely write them down and study them briefly so you can recognize them on menus and ingredients lists.
4) Persevere. Sometimes when I’m traveling alone, I get so tired or have such a bad day that the thought of going back out with my map to look for a restaurant or store just seems impossible. But I usually push through and am glad that I did. This past March I spent 8 day backpacking in Portugal by myself. My final stop was Porto, and by the time I got there, I was exhausted and cranky, the weather was terrible, and I didn’t like the city. All I wanted to do was sit in my room and figure out how quickly I could get out of there, but my stomach and my mind needed good food, so I put on my raincoat, grabbed my book, and struck back out in to the wet gray streets of Porto. The restaurant, Nakité, was there where it said, it was open, and I had the best vegan meal I have ever had in a restaurant, hands down. Olive-marinated tofu on a bed of caramelized onions with a thick crunchy topping.
This, sometimes, is the curse of the vegan. You can’t – you won’t – just go and scarf down the first available food you find. But we should be used to this by now, and the rewards are vast.
5) Finally, most importantly, put yourself out there and be adventurous. All the information you collect isn’t worth anything unless you use it! Talk to people, find other vegans, and visit new places off the beaten path. There aren’t very many vegans on the Earth and we need to work together to share our tips, our food, our experiences, and our cities.
In a way, being vegan abroad is really no different from being vegan anywhere else. Vegans are a minority who learn to live a certain way within the prevailing food and lifestyle culture. When I move back to the United States in six weeks, it will be my first time being a vegan in America. It will be both a comforting homecoming and a culture shock as I enter foreign food environment. But I am a vegan, and I am ready.
Though it lacks of the fluff of scrambled eggs, tofu scramble makes up for it in the presence of fresh veggies. It’s more nutritionally complete, and oh so comforting. Here’s my recipe:
Dare I say that I think tofu omelets taste better than their eggy cousins? And this is coming from a self-professed egg lover. Click here (http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2007/09/vegan-omelette-for-one.html) for Susan V’s yummy omelet recipe.
I’ve served these at parties to non-vegans who declared that they actually taste very much like actual deviled eggs. The secret is black salt — available at Indian markets. Here’s the recipe:
