One year as a vegan

It feels like only yesterday that I wrote about my experiences six months into going vegan. Everything in that post remains relevant; both another six months has elongated the learning curve. So, what else have I realised?

• Confidence comes with time! For a while, I couldn’t talk about veganism with family members without getting angry, accusatory, and upset. Now, with more knowledge under my belt, I can engage in conversation and am trying to improve my method of pointing out ethical hypocrisies, e.g. my meat-eating brother cooing over newly hatched chicks; the ridiculousness of happy smiling Percy Pig sweets made from pork gelatine; the idea that organic eggs are more acceptable to eat than battery farm eggs. I’m really impressed by the dialogue technique used by some activists in outreach: mostly asking questions, and letting the other person join up the dots, while you empathise with their realisations.
• Remember that you weren’t always vegan (unless you were). When my vegetarian father protests that he doesn’t like soy milk, therefore doesn’t want to ditch the dairy in his tea, I often forget that I went through the exact same thought process. Coming from a place of understanding and empathy is so much more effective than accusing, or expecting a person to go vegan immediately after you’ve explained why they should.
• Veganism prompts a chain reaction. It took me two years to see the light after one of my closest friends went vegan. At the time, I didn’t understand what it meant, and I hadn’t a clue why anybody would go even further than vegetarian. A few months after I went vegan, my twin brother said he wanted to go veggie (although this wasn’t an immediate process), my housemate went vegan after conversations about the egg and dairy industry (and now sends me links and screenshots of other people’s hypocritical behaviour), and a few months ago, my dad went vegetarian. Amazingly, my younger brother – who had previously admitted that meat-eating is unethical, but continued eating it nonetheless – watched What the Health and informed my dad that we’ve all been lied to. The fact that animal industries weigh in heavily on the information put out by professional health organisations made him feel cheated. A week on, the teen who for many months ate three eggs for breakfast hasn’t touched animal products. You are a role model to other people, even if you’re not aware of it. Individual efforts are not futile!

Who knows what the next year will entail!

Here’s to another year! x

Courgette and chickpea sandwich

Sandwiches are the perfect lunchtime food. Forget salads, soup, beans on toast, it’s the sandwich that is the undefeated champ of the midday meal. I think that a well-executed sandwich is unequivocally the only thing which can pull you back from a disappointing morning, and the ideal food to motivate you towards lunchtime.

Lately, I’ve been working on my sandwich game. Sure, hummous and veg between toasted brown bread is a beautiful thing, but there are higher levels of satisfaction to reach. Substitute the hummous for avocado, and you’ve progressed a little. But stick slabs of smoked tofu between slices of sourdough, layered with crisp lettuce, cucumber, and red pepper, topped off with a touch of relish, and you’ve got yourself a belter.

Here’s a new favourite of mine, ideal for when you’ve got a little extra time to prepare your lunch, or if you know you’ve got a difficult morning ahead and want something to look forward to. For those who live and breathe carbs, like myself, the doubling-up of them in this sandwich will satiate the most deep-set of hungers.

To feed one person, you’ll need:

• two slices of thick HIGH QUALITY bread. None of that bleached white abomination or limp branded granary. Visit a bakery (or supermarket bakery), or even better, invest in a bread-maker (which will churn out pure joy for the rest of your life).
• one petite, or half of a medium courgette
• 1/2 can of chickpeas
• handful plum tomatoes, or one or two salad tomatoes
• small clove of garlic
• lettuce leaves
• tahini
• juice of half a lemon
• paprika
• chilli flakes
• handful of coriander / parsley
• salt and pepper
• olive oil
• sweet chutney or relish (I used tamarind chutney).

Begin by halving the courgette, and halving again. Slice into rectangles. Heat a little oil in a frying pan and set the courgettes to cook until well-browned on each side. Just before they’re done, add thinly sliced garlic and cook for a few minutes, before seasoning with salt, pepper, and a pinch of chilli flakes.

Meanwhile, place two thick slices of bread in the toaster. Drain and rinse the chickpeas, before mashing in a bowl with a fork. Add a tbsp of tahini, a few coriander or parsley leaves, a decent squeeze of lemon, and then season with salt, pepper, and half a tsp of paprika. Mix well to create a thick paste.

When the bread has toasted, layer one slice with the chickpea mash and sliced tomato. Tip the courgettes and garlic on top and arrange precariously. Spread a small amount of chutney on the other slice of bread, place on top of the other, and press down. Use your bread knife to slice diagonally into two perfect triangles.

Serve with salad leaves, or wrap up to put in your lunchbox. This one’s a winner.

Volunteering @ the Vegan Society

A while ago, I read a little notice on the Vegan Society’s website calling for remote editorial volunteers to help proof-read articles. What a good way to get a little extra experience on my CV, I thought, and to have some involvement with a charity that works hard to get the vegan message out there. I quickly signed up and within a week, I had arranged to actually do a week’s worth of volunteering in the offices. The Vegan Society provide invaluable resources in nutrition, products, transitioning to veganism, and perspectives on the lifestyle, so volunteering seemed a fantastic way to get an insight into how they work, and learn a lot on the way.

The offices are based in the Jewellery Quarter, Birmingham, and I learned from Dr Sam Calvert (Head of Communications and expert on history) that the city was chosen over other destinations for its good cost of living and location. The Society was founded by a group of non-dairy vegetarians, including Donald Watson, marking themselves apart from the Vegetarian Society. You can find more about the Vegan Society’s history on this webpage, including a really fascinating history of the Society’s beginnings by Dr Calvert.

In my week of volunteering, I met officers of campaigns, PR, the CEO, dietitian, the senior advocacy officer, and more. There’s far more going on than I was aware of, with the trademarking of vegan products a significant operation – that little logo our hearts fill with joy to see. They’re a committed group and do a great job!

I spent time researching an article for the Society’s magazine, The Vegan, and penned a couple of blog posts for the website, including one on the interaction of veganism and minimalism. I wrote a film review (of Okja, nonetheless), helped to edit a section of the website posting news, and subtitled YouTube videos. I researched worldwide vegan animal sanctuaries for a directory, which gave me so much optimism – there are so many people out there absolutely dedicated to caring for vulnerable animals.

The most striking aspect of volunteering is the sense of community: used to the fact that you have a minority belief, coming together with like-minded others bolsters your sense of the impact you’re having. It’s easy to lose sight of the growing population of vegans until you come into contact with so many at once! If you do feel disconnected, I’d really recommend taking steps such as joining vegan Facebook groups (UK Vegan, Vegan UK, Vegan Dogs United, What Skint Vegans Eat, and local groups), going to vegan festivals, or finding vegan cafes. YouTube is obviously an inexhaustible treasure trove of resources: try Nutritionfacts.org for everything you need to know health-wise, Mic the Vegan to debunk vegan myths and anti-vegan studies, Joey Carbstrong and Earthling Ed for fantastic activism, and vloggers such as Naturally Stefanie and Jon Venus if it’s gains you’re after.

To sum up – my volunteering experience made me realise that you don’t have to dedicate yourself to activism to be a ‘proper’ vegan. There are some people who would have you think such a thing – but I think that as long as you’re touching other people’s lives, you’re making them think about issues they might not have previously considered – and that in itself is enough.

Red lentil, spinach, and green bean curry

I’ve mentioned previously my love for a well-flavoured daal, specifically those cooked with coconut milk, for a delicious balance of earthy spice.  A week on from my last batch cook of this godly stuff, I had the dahl cravings again, but decided to satiate them in a novel way: red lentil curry.

In another note, I come from a multicultural town where you can often smell south Asian cuisine as you wander the streets at dinner time; and the strongest of these scents I’ve finally identified, after using it in my own food. Fenugreek is potent stuff, seeming to cling to the very air the morning after you’ve cooked with it. But it adds another taste to curries, one which is hard to describe; suffice to say its powerful smell is easy to tolerate once you’ve tasted the outcome.

Now, I don’t pretend to be an expert at all in any culture of cooking. I just like to play about with different flavours and foods – and while this recipe may fall short of a more ‘authentic’ version, it did the job for me – hearty, healthy, and flavourful.

For two generous portions, you’ll need:

• one onion
• two cloves of garlic
• thumb-sized piece of ginger
• one red chilli
• 1 tsp mustard seeds
• 1/2 each tsp ground cumin and ground coriander
• 1/3 tsp ground fenugreek
• 1/4 tsp ground turmeric
• 120g dried red lentils
• 100g green beans
• 100g baby spinach
• tin of chopped tomatoes

Begin by rinsing the lentils well, and setting to cook for half an hour while you prepare the curry base.

Finely chop the onion, garlic, ginger and chilli. Fry the onion gently in oil for five – ten minutes, or until softened. Put the mustard seeds in a dry frying pan on a medium heat, and cook until you hear them begin to pop. Add garlic, ginger, and chilli to the onions and fry for another minute, adding more oil if needed. Then, tip in all the spices and cook for a minute, stirring well.

Pour in the chopped tomatoes with 50ml of water, stir, and leave to simmer fairly vigorously for around twenty-five minutes. Meanwhile, get a pan of brown rice boiling. Trim and halve the green beans before adding to the rice and cooking for eight minutes, before setting aside. Drain the lentils.

Shortly before the rice is cooked, begin adding the spinach to the curry in handfuls. Afterwards, stir through the beans and the lentils, seasoning well with salt and pepper. Serve the curry with the rice and enjoy.

Review: V Rev, Manchester

For those who still hold the assumption that vegan food is all salads and spirulina, a visit to V Rev in Manchester’s stylish Northern Quarter is a must. Not only is there no single head of broccoli in sight, there’s no limp side-salad available for the sensible vegan, either. Entering the doors, you go all in for unhealthy eating, the stuff of parents’ nightmares and American fast-food dreams.

V Rev is a completely vegan diner, specialising in beefburgers, chk’n burgers, and fully-loaded fries. There’s a range of organic and fair-trade soft drinks to complement the meal if one doesn’t opt for a huge milkshake or beer. Most strikingly, the creative powerhouse behind the menu has utilised all of their pop culture knowledge in naming each item: from the ‘Hell-vis Presley’ beef patty to the ‘Wake Me Up Before Mojito’ cocktail, the levels of pun are atmospheric. It’s canny marketing, capturing the diner’s modern aesthetic and giving the traditional vegan stereotype – long-haired, anaemic, tree-worshipping – a right kick up the backside.

Guac to the Future

Walking in on a Friday night, the diner is busy and bustling, but it’s not long before I’m guided to my reserved table in a quieter zone. We order beer, cider, the special donut burger, and a ‘Guac to the Future’. The first consists of fried chik’n, cheez, baecon, fried onions and maple sriracha sauce sandwiched between two sweet donuts, and it’s an interesting combination. Hard to get your mouth round – but the different layers of sweetness bring it home. The Guac is made from breaded, deep-fried seitan, and I try it in that hope that I get over my first average experience of it – but I don’t. The texture isn’t chicken, but it’s chewy and reminiscent of it in a way which doesn’t twist your brain wondering if it actually could be the dead stuff itself. Also included is cheez, guacamole, chipotle mayo, salsa, and lettuce – all good toppings. Both burgers come with sides of fries, which I drown in slightly luminous and watered-down ketchup. The drinks are great, though, and the service friendly – “Where did you get your blouse?” – so we tip gratefully.

A factor close to my heart is cleanliness, with no complaints. The decor fits in with the old-school American diner feel – food’s served in red plastic boxes, with squeezy condiment bottles. The wall prints had me Googling “You’re the nutritional yeast to my macaroni” to self-mail next Valentine’s.

So, V Rev have an awesome thing going with their unique menu and whole aura of what my dad calls ‘trendiness’. While the food’s no Temple of Seitan, it’s still tasty, and I’ve heard excellent reports on the milkshakes. Most importantly, it’s idolised by vegans and omivores alike, if their social media feeds are anything to go by. You can find their Instagram here and website here.

V Rev, 20-26 Edge St, Manchester, M4 1HN

Sweet courgette pasta sauce

Sometimes, things we put little thought into end up turning out well. Think spontaneous trips, impetuous decisions, and the undeliberate decision to go out for dinner. Although I am generally not at all a person to act on impulse, I can occasionally throw together a tasty meal with little planning or thought, as this recipe shows. The tomato puree, sugar and balsamic vinegar bring together a lovely sweet sauce, mimicking the variety of expensive organic tomato we can never justify buying in the supermarket.

(Those unappetising chunks lining the bowl’s perimeter are Cauldron’s vegan sausages – in my opinion, the most superior veggie sausage on the market. They aren’t meaty, but soft and beany – so perfect for anyone who prefers a beanburger over their soy protein mockmeat.)

To serve two, you’ll need:

• one red onion
• two cloves of garlic
• one small carrot
• one large courgette
• half a bag of kale
• tin of chopped tomatoes
• tomato puree
• dried rosemary and oregano
• dried chilli flakes
• balsamic vinegar
• sugar

Begin by roughly chopping the onion and leaving to cook gently for ten minutes. Finely chop the carrot and add to the pan. After these ten minutes, add sliced garlic. (To remove the skins easily, shake each clove in a jam jar before peeling.) Cook for a few minutes.

Add a tbsp of tomato puree and stir well to incorporate. Finely slice the courgette and put in the pan. Tip in the chopped tomatoes, with a glug of balsamic vinegar, two pinches each of the dried rosemary and oregano, two pinches of sugar, and a tsp of chilli flakes. Stir again, and leave to simmer for twenty-five minutes, or until the courgette is tender and the sauce well-reduced.

Meanwhile, set a pan of fusilli to cook. I also steamed a few handfuls of kale, seasoned with lemon juice, salt and pepper. Serve the pasta with the sauce, and sprinkle with nutritional yeast.

Banana ‘nice’ cream

Three years late, I have finally jumped on the vegan nice cream bandwagon. A little tired of sorbet, and craving a cheap alternative to the luxury of Booja-Booja, I dug out the frozen bananas I’d squirrelled away in the freezer. Blending them in my food processor with two tablespoons of cocoa powder yielded a gloriously luxuriant dessert, anchored down by the sweetness of the banana (frozen when brown) and transformed by the cocoa.

Most delightfully, this ice cream is healthy: there are no added sugars, chemicals, stabilisers or other nasties. I’d quite happily whip this up as a  satisfying dessert, snack, or breakfast.

To jazz this simple recipe up, try adding:

• frozen berries, such as raspberries, strawberries, cherries
• mango chunks
• dark chocolate chunks
• crumbled Oreos
• peanut butter
• flavourings or extracts, such as vanilla, peppermint, caramel…

Roasted red pepper & tomato sauce

Stir-in pasta sauces are both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, they cut down cooking time by at least 70% and put a dinner on the table, stat. On the other hand, they discourage folk from making their own more delicious, fresher, and nutritious sauces. Aside from the standard chopped tomatoes, onion, garlic, and herb affair, a beautiful pasta sauce can be made from blitzing roasted vegetables together. This recipe is one I have been playing around with: it’s more time-consuming than the other options, but the final product is well worth it.

To serve two, you’ll need:

• two red peppers
• twenty plum tomatoes
• one red onion
• two cloves of garlic
• chill flakes
• balsamic vinegar
• tomato puree
• olive oil
• salt and pepper
• wholewheat spaghetti.

Begin by preheating the oven to gas mark 6, and slicing the red peppers. Drizzle in oil, arrange with plenty of space on baking trays, and intersperse with the tomatoes. Roast for 30-40 minutes, or until tender – you may need to switch your trays round to ensure even cooking.

Meanwhile, chop the onion and and cook gently for ten minutes, sprinkling with salt and a pinch of sugar. Add sliced garlic and cook for another three minutes, before adding a tablespoon of tomato puree, mixing well, and leaving for another minute. Pour in a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar and simmer very gently for one minute.

Set up your food processor, and tip in the roasted vegetables, onions, and garlic, with a sprinkling of chilli flakes and seasoning. Blitz until smooth. Check seasoning, adding more sugar or balsamic if you want it sweeter.

Set the spaghetti on to cook, with spinach in a steamer for some complementary greens. Mix the pasta and sauce and warm in the pan. Serve with the spinach, and enjoy!

Chickpea and spinach curry

Although it’s June, British weather keeps us forever in thrall of its impetuous decision-making and rash promises. On days like today, when it’s rained consistently for hours on end, a hot bowl of curry provides a dose of relief from the glum skies and damp pavements. Here, chickpeas pack a double-dose of heartiness to a big pile of happy-inducing rice, and the warm flavours almost make the rain disappear. This recipe is relatively simple to make, and is fantastic for batch cooking for busy weeknight dinners.

To serve two, you’ll need:

• One red onion
• Three cloves of garlic
• One red chilli
• Thumb-sized piece of ginger
• 3/4 tsp each ground cumin, ground coriander, turmeric
• 1/2 tsp fenugreek
• One tin / carton of chickpeas (soaked and cooked from scratch, or use an organic variety if you’re able to, for plumper and softer pulses)
• One tin of chopped tomatoes
• 200ml coconut milk
• 150g fresh spinach, or around eight frozen lumps
• A handful of coriander

 

Begin by finely chopping the onion and leaving to cook gently for ten minutes on a low heat. Finely chop garlic, ginger, and chilli before adding to the pan and frying for one minute. Add the spices and fry briefly before tipping in the tomatoes. Stir everything well and simmer for fifteen minutes.

Add the coconut milk (please choose full-fat – it tastes so much better) and the rinsed chickpeas. Season, and leave to simmer for another ten to fifteen minutes.

Put on your choice of rice to cook (I will always choose the texture and nutritious benefit of brown), and if using frozen spinach, pop this into a steamer. After ten minutes or so, press down on the cooked spinach to squeeze out excess liquid. Tip the spinach into the sauce, and use your spatula or spoon and a fork to separate the clumps of spinach out.

Serve the curry over rice, garnishing with a handful of coriander. Enjoy!

Vegan fried chicken: the mock-meat question

Not everyone is in agreement over mock meats. Are they helpful in weaning omnivores off meat? Do they provide a healthy source of plant-based protein? Is it really vegan to advertise a product which “tastes just like meat”?

For me, I think that whatever helps a person give up meat is a very valuable tool to the vegan cause. So, an uncannily beefy burger made from soy is infinitely better than the actual beef itself. That being said, I’ve found that I don’t enjoy eating products which recall the taste and texture of meat. Although that sounds quite puritanical, if a friend kindly provided me with a veggie sausage at a barbecue, I would happily accept; and, I’m quite partial to a Quorn fishless finger. On the other hand, the new variety of burgers which supposedly bleed take the mock-meat to the next level, one which I don’t necessarily agree with. Why does a vegetable burger need to square up to its animal counterpart? Why can’t we hold it as something entirely separate to meat, rather than comparing it constantly with something it’ll never quite be? A burger which bleeds models itself on a product of extreme injustice and cruelty. Perhaps this burger seeks to perpetuate the so-called human craving for meat, in tricking both our eyes and our tastebuds. This carnivorous ‘instinct’ is not innate – from the moment we’re born, humans are conditioned to think, act, and be a certain way,  and foods we are taught that we need to eat is a part of this. Arguably, a mock-meat which looks to satisfy this conditioned craving for meat, to the extent that it bleeds, damages the vegan attempt to argue that eating flesh is not natural. 

I like to believe that in consuming the average soya protein sausage, we are parodying the meat-power association: meat has always been a symbol of inequality, from the days in which the wealthy flaunted their meat consumption over the vegetable diets of the poor, to the diners today in expensive restaurants who buy vastly overpriced steaks or consume a live octopus to show off their wealth and refinement. I read a study recently which corroborated Carol J. Adams feminist-vegetarian critique in The Sexual Politics of Meat (an absolutely eye-opening and fascinating read): men today eat more red meat than women, and see reducing meat intake as a perversion of Western masculine hegemony.  So, through eating burgers which look and even taste like meat, but essentially are not meat, we can challenge the performative aspect of meat-eating as associated with power and masculinity.

I recently tried vegan fried chicken for the first time, out of curiosity. That might make me a hypocrite, but it’s better than unfairly condemning the mock-meat family. This variety was made from seitan and deep-fat fried; they smelled quite like chicken nuggets, recalling the McDonald’s of my childhood. Resembling popcorn chicken, they were crispy on the outside, and ‘tender’ on the inside; my omnivorous friend said that there was a definite similarity to chicken, although not a striking one. In all honesty, I wasn’t too keen. They didn’t taste fantastic, even when smothered in barbecue sauce, and I felt laden down and heavy after eating five or six of them. What’s more, they cost more than most other options on the menu, at £13.50 – which for me highlighted the way in which the vegan diet is often made out to be ‘exclusive’.

Veganism is not a binary. There are shades of opinion and varying beliefs within the conscious choices vegans make. I know those who don’t like salads, and marvel at others who shun cooked food. Where we stand on mock-meat is another issue. When we can get enough protein from beans, pulses, grains, and nuts, soy burgers aren’t essential; but not everyone has the time or motivation to plan what they eat quite as carefully, in which case soy mince in a spag bol is the best option. Moderation, as always, is key, so eating a lot of mock-meat isn’t the best way forward. Experimentation with wholefoods can lead you in new directions, including to the beautiful discovery of homemade lentil and beetroot burgers. But there’s nothing at all wrong with vegan popcorn chick’n once in a while.