Vegan Again!
by Food and lifestyle orientated article.
Day 427 of my complete vegan-ism movement, although that is only 99.9% to the true vegans. My 1% is leather. As my couch, bed and shoes are made from it, I may have a long way to go, but my diet is now 100% animal product free and there is no going back to the calf feed for me.
Yes it is a complicated matter, and to some of us it may even seem a bit weird. However I won’t judge you if you don’t judge me, so here’s my story……
I have been vegetarian since the age of 6, through choice, not force, simply because I cannot bear animal cruelty. I have always relied heavily on dairy products because of this, as when I became vegetarian, the choices of products were limited and neither my mother nor I (not at 6) were very educated in the matter. She had no idea what to feed me.
So my diet consisted of pretty much, pizza,and macaroni cheese,and pasta with cheese, and cheese on toast, and pitta breads with rice and yes, you guessed it, cheese. I loved it, it tasted good, and was my main source of protein until I was bout 16. At which point, having been vegetarian for so long, I was reaching a higher level of consciousness as to what I was eating.
I became concerned about the level of animal produce that was still entering my system, cheese, milk with cereal, chocolate, eggs in cakes, although I couldn’t eat an egg????? it makes no sense does it! So at 17 when I left home, I got into pulses as my main protein, in a big way, lentils and beans and the like. Cooked everything from scratch, so I knew what I was eating, yeah and now I know that all the processed food was no good anyway, but at that time, it wasn’t even about that, I just wanted to know what I was putting into my body. I was severely deluded however, as I still liked my man to buy me a box of chocolates, and I still loved cheese.
I grew up in a place where, as a vegetarian, you couldn’t, and still can’t, even go out for a meal without the vegetarian option consisting of brie with cranberry on a bed of brown or some other milk infested pasta dish. Therefore, I convinced myself that I was weird. That as everybody else eats a chicken salad, or egg mayo, or cheese and onion sandwich from the supermarket when they are on the move and need a quick snack and so I continued with my dairy vegetarian diet, which is specified as lac-to vegetarianism.
I was never happy and content with that however, never fully enjoying a meal if it had animal products in it. So I decided to be vegan, a year or so before my daughter was born. That was great, albeit difficult in the society I live in, but I was comfortable, I wasn’t sure why at the time, but it was just right for me. My biggest pitfall was chocolate, but in that time I found carob which satisfied my sweet tooth, and all was well. Not long after I fell pregnant however, I had very strong cravings for cheese, not on its own, but in pasta, pizza and toast, I just had to have it. I wasn’t educated enough on the subject to fill my cravings with vegan-ism, I had to have the hot pasta cheesy dish that was so comforting to me when I felt ill, it was all I knew. Yes, pregnancy was an illness for me!
The rest is history
Since then I’ve been lac-to vegetarian IE- no meat, fish or eggs, but dairy products and the odd bit of chocolate fudge cake……eggs? The thing is, is that I have a vegan brain….what is a vegan brain!?! ….I just do not fully enjoy what I am eating unless it is 100% animal product free and therefore I simply cannot do it anymore.
This is a massive lifestyle decision-and a very difficult one. Is not so bad for me because I am actually very vegan orientated. Trying to adjust in a society which isn’t however, is a very different matter. EVERYTHING HAS MILK IN IT. True story.
Watch out for part two where I will include some easy recipes and ideas for traditional snack and meal times including the best vegan chocolate fudge cake EVER!
Liked it
