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Hi Everyone! I'm so excited and confused!!
Started
by claire
on November 10, 2009
I just decided to return to being a vegetarian. I put that decision off for so long and it feels so right to practice my values in my whole life, including eating. As soon as I decided to be a vegetarian again I started looking all over the Internet and spent 2 hours at the bookstore looking through cookbooks the next day. I belong to a fantastic food Co-op in Ann arbor Michigan and we also have wonderful local produce at the farmer's market most of the year. I live with my boyfriend and he eats meat, but he is so supportive and I think he might eventually be open to this. He has type one diabetes and I know that I can't pressure him when it comes to food, even though I think it could be great for him. I was a strict vegetarian for several years and after a 4 year hiatus, I have been vegetarian for almost two weeks and feel FANTASTIC.
I have been fully taking this on as a fun project and everything I learn makes me beleive that it is juts as important to go vegan as it was to go vegetarian. But here's the thing. Its seems like such a strange world right now. There is milk and eggs in so much stuff that I never realized. I don't like most cheese and never liked milk and don't care about eggs so I thought I'm way ahead of the game. But I'm a major CheezIt and ice cream addict. Also I butter things completely subconsciously... and it dawned on me that yogurt and mozzerella were dairy (Haha). I'm flirting for now because I know that this journey might take some time, but I know that I would like to be in a comitted relationship with vegan very soon.
Hi Claire!
I'm similar and have flirted with veganism before. I really want to try out macrobiotics too for better health and well-being. Anyways, the problem with my flirting before was that I got this "all or nothing" approach that really frustrated me and to give up before I had the backing of my own solid reasons for why I would chose to eat one thing or another. This time I'm taking the gradual approach and only giving up things as I come to recognize them as actions that don't reflect my values or ideals. It's been working great!
Sooo my advice to you is that there are some great canola-oil or vegetable-based butters (Smart Balance is REALLY good), and there are a lot of alternative milks for cereal or recipes like soy, almond milk, hazelnut milk, etc. I also really enjoy the "Divine" (I think or "Purely Decadence" - I recognize it by label, lol!) soy ice cream. Their carrot cake flavor is great. Also there is soy yogurt as well that is absent of casein and totally vegan :) It took a bit of "flirting" for me to initially get used to them, but now I prefer non-dairy milk, Smart Balance, etc. Oh and food coops are the best - that's great you have one in Ann Arbor!
-Jules
daiya foods makes vegan cheese that actually tastes and melts like real cheese. so delicious makes coconut milk yogurt that is DIVINE and they also make amazing icecream that is vegan. Give those a try!
Thanks everyone for the tips, I have commited to being vegan and have been trying something new and vegan almost every day. I know it's not a long term plan to have rice dream sandwiches and vegan cookies and rice nog, but it has been so encouraging to prove to myself that I just don't need animal products. I will definately try daiya cheese and I have really loved the earth balance and coconut deserts.
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