Talk to me about being a Vegan?
- Thread starter Fatboy123
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- environment vegan
Soldato
I do love travelling to Asia, and the people there. But they are utter scum when it comes to animal welfare!
Soldato
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- 19 Oct 2008
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I minimise meat consumption, usually only having if have a craving for meat which is rare. I'd never want to eat cats and dogs but it would also be wrong to be disgusted with others/societies that do. They are just other animals after all.
I find the meat substitutes weird, like the meat grown in a lab/kind of 3d printed. I'd rather just have plant based foods
THis one is plant based I think but I don't see the point of making it look like steak.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJYWM-5taIE&feature=emb_logo
Caporegime
You clearly care about about animals from what you're saying. I think if you visited the farms where you source your meat, looked at those animals, interacted with them and saw their individual personalities, you'd perhaps feel different about killing them needlessly.
Caporegime
It's really heart warming to see how mainstream it's becoming. Wagamama's for example are aiming to have 50% of their menu vegan by the end of the year. McDonalds are trailing a vegan burger in Sweden. Costa and Starbucks have expanded their vegan range massively. Papa Johns and Dominoes have large dedicated vegan sections on their menus. The demand is there and constantly growing.
People are starting to wake up to how bad meat is for the animals, their health and the planet. It's amazing.
@LiE you probably don;t eat much as you're a swole boi but do you know of any Vegan chocolate that tastes as good as that derived from milk fats? I'd have no issue going veggy / vegan (now that I'm having Huel most of my animal intake is reducing anyways) but the OH is a choclate fiend and without a subsitute I don;t think she'd ever move away from it.
Soldato
If I can’t buy it in a supermarket it’s a crazy chemical. Methyl Cellulose? Vegetable fibres? Wheat protein? They are processed to **** and back. Even the citric acid. They could use lemon juice but they don’t. They use synthetic citric acid. It’s chemical junk. You can wrap it up any way you like. You’re eating heavily chemically processed plant protein so you can have a bit of variety in your diet. Just buy vegetables.
As the animal proteins disappear (and they will just due to cost and public revulsion) then you’ll see more processed soya and mycelial protein tarted up as something healthy. These are 100% synthetic and they used to be proud of it, but now they hide that bit. Just buy vegetables. Or better yet, grow your own. That way you really know what has been applied to it.
And then we have the issue of the vitamin supplements. Also mainly chemicals. It’s difficult but if you accept nature, you can’t have unnatural in your diet.
Soldato
Carob is supposedly the option. There are some vegetable based bars but they’re full of chemical emulsifiers (that’s what the milk does in chocolate). You could just get some cacao nibs and make your own chocolate?
Caporegime
Hotel chocolate do a vegan range - > https://www.hotelchocolat.com/uk/shop/collections/dietary/vegan-chocolate/
Vegan kitkat on it's way bro, Nestlé got you. https://www.nestle.com/media/news/nestle-first-vegan-kitkat-coming-soon
These are also divine - https://www.thevegankindsupermarket.com/p/monty-bojangles-cocoa-nib-nights-vegan-truffles-180g
You can obviously go to town on dark chocolate as most are vegan, I like orange variety ->https://appyshop.co.uk/store-9/food-cupboard/confectionery/co-op-irr-dark-75-orange-5000128831581
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Just want to agree with this.
I think it depends on what you currently eat. If you already eat a lot of processed, ready made foods then of course the like for like vegan replacement is going to be very similar. However, I think a lot of people who are vegan and stay vegan cook the majority of meals themselves. It really doesn't take long to cook a meal and it's a lot cheaper. Again, I implore you to go check out my meal plan thread and you'll see around 25 meals I've had in the last few weeks. Pretty much all of them on the table in under 30 minutes (a few in less than an hour but mainly save them for the weekend) and they are very cheap. I just got back from Lidl where I've bought the majority of what I need for the next 7 dinners (and some lunches and snacks) and it cost £42 for two people. I'll probably spend £20 in Tesco later on some more bits and pieces (tofu, sesame oil, rice noodles & jarred spices I've ran out of).
The idea that vegan food is more expensive is just wrong, if you are cooking the majority of meals yourself.
Meal plan for this week:
Singapore noodles
Tofu tikka masala (Nora Cooks) with naan bread https://www.noracooks.com/vegan-tikka-masala/
Bangers & Mash
Alfredo pasta with garlic bread
Coronation tofu salad (Olive) https://www.olivemagazine.com/recipes/vegan/coronation-tofu-salad/
Roasted cauliflower & giant couscous salad with zhoug (Olive) https://www.olivemagazine.com/recip...ouscous-salad-with-zhoug-and-crispy-shallots/
Barley, grilled peach & pecan salad (Olive) https://www.olivemagazine.com/recipes/vegan/farro-grilled-peach-and-pecan-salad/
Must have been quiet at work at that point
I mainly took exception to your idea that eating local is an easy fix for environmental issues when it's not. I'm not that well versed on biodynamic farming I must admit but I don't expect it's viable for a lot of the population to go down that route. I also imagine it's vastly more expensive?
Caporegime
Variety is key, if I have the odd processed mock meat I'm OK with that, because my diet is now filled with an abundance of fruit and veg.
Dark chocolate is vegan. I buy the 70% from Lidl and have a couple squares for a snack. Bournville is also vegan. You can make fantastic chocolate mousse with avocado and dark chocolate.
Soldato
I've not eaten a ready meal in years, the closest thing to it I sometimes eat is a 'ready made' pizza. That's it.
I cook every meal I eat, and eat very healthily (I do a lot of exercise and am a big advocate of if you eat crap, you train crap etc)
But some vegan things are much more expensive than meat. I would like to buy the 'This isn't' brand chicken pieces, but they are very expensive compared to a pack of chicken breasts for example.
Some things aren't, I really enjoyed the Wicked Kitchen burgers I had the other day, and they were £2.50 for 2 which I though was very reasonable.
The counter point that some may have over the eat crap, train crap argument is that you should be eating grass fed / corn fed , organic and pasture raised meat - which is just as expensive if not more than vegan choices IMO.
That's good to hear. I'm not much of an exceriser (to say the least!) so needs obviously vary however I do think you're coming it veganism from the wrong angle. Instead of trying to replace your chicken with 'chicken' style pieces why not look at replacing that with legumes, nuts and tofu which should be substantially cheaper. I don't see the point in trying to replace meat with meat replacement as you're right it is going to be more expensive and there is the concern of what's actually in it.
However, I do think there is a place for these replacements either for people new to veganism and for the odd treat. In the same way steak was a treat for me when I ate meat, I consider the meat replacements treats now.
In one of my meals this week I'm having sausages and mash. I'm going to buy the Beyond Meat sausages which are £4 for 2 which is very expensive but it's a treat meal for me so it's justified.
Caporegime
It's a good gateway into becoming fully plant based. You'll find most vegans were veggie before going vegan. Continue to do research into how food is made and you'll naturally start to eat less animal products.
I'd recommend following Earthling Ed on YouTube/Instagram, he produces the best content on veganism.
https://www.youtube.com/c/EarthlingEdChannel
https://www.instagram.com/earthlinged/
This is a good one he put out which I think you'll find useful.
To be fair, I don't need much persuasion - I suffer from depression and there's times I just don't cook because I'm in a low mood, which recently has resulted in wasting a lot of meat. This is turn is making me more unhappy as something has died for naught. As I still have some meat and fish in my freezer, I want to eat that first, for the same reason above. I've already made my impact by buying it, so I should do the right thing and not waste it.
As I try to follow a IIFYM style of eating, it's just going to be a case of finding the veg that helps me with that protein macro. For now, the little dairy I do take in will (hopefully) soon become the animal products I eat.
Soldato
- Joined
- 13 May 2003
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- 8,944
I'm looking forward to moving house so we can grow more of our own food, including raising weaners for pork. I think you're making an interesting choice and good luck with it. My moral direction on meat has been to move towards better standards of husbandry and the long term goal is to take more personal responsibility for rearing and processing it.
Soldato
At one point I thought the same way you did, but we had an issue with the chickens basically eating each other because they're not flock animals, they're derived from solitary animals (jungle fowl) and when they're in groups they peck each other to establish dominance and then they peck a bit more and before you know it they're all pecked to bits. Even the super-duper free-range ones. Likewise, pigs are more intelligent than dogs. They're right up there in the awareness league. You give them space, maybe even toys, and feed them organic stuff but ultimately they get bored and start to bite. And they were almost certainly castrated to avoid boar taint. There is almost no sensible way you can justify eating meat. It's wasteful. It's inarguably cruel and really it's just plain wrong. It's harder to make that distinction about eggs and dairy but you're still exploiting animals and if you don't think you should keep animals (as I do) then you shouldn't eat or use the products from farmed animals.
There is a further argument to be had about hunted meat and fish because those animals lived free/wild and only suffered at the point of death. But you still killed them so you could eat them. That's a pretty crushing blow to anything's five freedoms.
Even being pretty strict ourselves we still rely on manure from organic farm animals because otherwise we'd have to dump tonnes of chemicals into our land every year. And without the humous that binds soil together it would just turn to dust and blow away. It's going to be a difficult future. Microbial biomass might be a solution, but it's really just a sticking plaster over a gaping wound.