Thoughts From a Vegan Girl

I was taking a survey the other day for Vegetarian Times magazine and as part of the survey, I was asked to specify my eating habits. Out of habit, I selected "Vegan" and while doing so, read the description specifying that Vegans not only eliminate animal products from their diet but also from their life - leather, wool, silk, down, etc. For various, that does not describe me. I have long known that the majority of people consider Veganism to exclude these products, so I have opted to call myself a "dietary Vegan"... makes sense, right? Well, after reading the description for "Vegan" that this survey provided, I kept reading and the classification right below Vegan was "Total Vegetarian". The description for this was: "I eat only food derived from plants and refrain from eating any animal foods, including fish, eggs, dairy products and honey"... so, with the exception of honey, I guess I am Total Vegetarian... who knew?? And I thought the typical waitstaff found "Vegan" confusing... wait till I unleash this on 'em!

Turns out there's lots of nuances of vegetarianism - check it out! Vegetarianism on Wikipedia.com

I'll start with the second topic mentioned in my title: Seriously, I mix together two cups of whole grain pastry flour (I am sure any would do), 1 tsp of baking soda, 1 tsp of baking powder, 2 cups of soy milk and 2 TBS of oil and voila - perfectly delicious and simple vegan pancakes. Of course, I rarely make a pancake without including blueberries, lots of small native Maine blueberries, so I beg the question: why is there no restaurant in this wonderful city that will make such a thing?

And now, motivations to being a vegan. I am a vegan for health reasons. I've suffered from chronic aches and pains throughout most of my adult life, in one form or another. I have tried PT, regular exercise, supplements - all to no avail. Then I went to a OT who suggested I remove sugars from my diet. I did it for a month and I did feel better, but seriously, no sugars, ever?! No juice, no wine, careful on the fruits and veggies I eat?? Needless to say, not the ideal diet for me. So then I was at the gym one day, sweating my tail off on the elliptical and I caught the end of Ellen where she has these guests I had never heard of - Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin. I could only catch a snippet of it, but what I hear, I like, and it turns out they wrote a book, so I buy it: Skinny Bitch. Then, like a week later, I am sitting at a restaurant and a friend of mines parents tell me about another book The China Study, and then it's on! I try it for a month and I am hooked - both on the food I have been eating and how I feel. This is how I came to be vegan for health reasons. I still wear leather and wool and alpaca and hell, I even bought a yak sweater for my husband this past Christmas. Does this make me a bad vegan? Or maybe I'm not a true vegan? Do I have to stipulate that in conversations with other vegans? Oh, I also eat honey! The whole thing is a little confusing to me. Truly, I am comfortable calling myself a vegan but it does get a little weird for me if I go to a vegan event and I am sporting my leather Danskos.

Don't get me wrong, I have seen some footage and read some detailed accounts about the treatment of animals that absolutely disgusts me, but I am just not sure I can take that step to remove all animal products from my life. I also do NOT want to become of those people that protests and throws paint. The one exception to this is that I would protest a circus... they are disgusting and they make me sick.

So, what do you think: are there other people who share my practices? Maybe I should call myself a "dietary vegan"?

It's Day 16 and I'm not wavering. I feel good, my back doesn't hurt as consistently as it used to when I got out of bed and... I'm wearing clothes I have not worn in some time. Sweet!

The past few days have been very challenging though. Saturday I went to the veg food fest at USM and I really enjoyed it... tried some great food, joined a vegan meetup in an effort to expand my like-minded friends. The food was catered by The Pepper Club and it was all scrumptious. Then Sunday came... Ever since I started this new lifestyle, we have been in search for a brunch place that could accommodate. Now I understand having anything close to breakfast without cheese or eggs is going to be a challenge, but I am not completely discouraged. So, we went to The Good Egg, which is The Pepper Club's morning-time alter-ego. I was so disappointed. The only thing I could eat was granola with fruit - they were even out of rice milk! The granola was pretty good, but the fruit was melon... who eats cantaloupe with their granola?? I wanted berries. I got cantaloupe. Oh, and it was $7. grumble. grumble. grumble. Needless to say, I left disappointed and hungry. Then my biggest challenge yet: Last night, I went to a going away party and I loved all the food there, but aside from a plate of grapes and strawberries, it was all off limits. (My disclaimer: this was a private party of meat loving folks, so I fully expected to not be able to partake in the food. It's one of those things us vegans have to learn to live with - no biggie! But knowing who cooked it and how freakin' delicious it was was challenging all the same.) But, the good news is that I stuck to it and ate some delicious rice and lentils when I got home. Phew!

The reward? This morning, I got up with no back pain and while getting ready for work, I put on a pair of capris that I have not comfortably worn all spring. Nice!

Ciao!

... but unless you live in a cave, you can't help but hear someone, somewhere make reference to her. I was reading a recent blog and I read something about Oprah going vegan for 21 days (wimp... apparently she can't commit to the 30 days like yours truly). Then, I was at the gym on Thursday, I heard some verbiage from a preview for one of those TV magazine shows that led me to believe she was done her 21 days of veganism. So I was curious...

I went to oprah.com and checked her blog on her 21 day "fast" and verified she is indeed done. I was curious what she did, why she did it and what the end results were. Bottom line, she did this fast as a result of reading a book, she was happy to be done and she was looking forward to adding meat and Bordeaux back to her diet. I can't relate.


Day 12

First of all, I have not eliminated alcohol from my diet. Not that I am a big drinker, but knowing I can have a beer or a glass of wine when I want to is good. And second, I do not miss meat; instead, I am really having fun exploring the new foods I can eat. I have made some pretty cool recipes and tried out some pretty good food. I do have to say, I made a curry the other night, which ended being more like a chili and it was screaming for sour cream or cheese or something... but it was fine without it. I just feel good. I am losing weight, I never feel icky after I eat and my back may be getting a little better.

I bought a book the other day called Veganomicon. It is packed full of some really cool recipes and I am looking forward to experimenting with some of them. I am also going to check out the Veggie Food Fest this weekend at USM. Food is a good thing!

That's all for now.

Have a great day / weekend.

For reasons that are plentiful, I have decided to make some changes to what I put in my body and try out a vegan diet with extras for thirty days.

I like to think that I ate fairly healthy to begin with... I always loved fruits & veggies (I could sit and eat a quart of blueberries without blinking), aways opted for whole grain anything and shied away from the bad whites (flour, sugar, rice). All that said, I had some vices: I drank a minimum of 5 Diet Pepsi's a day (it was my coffee), I enjoyed real good micro brew beer and there was no such thing as too much cheese.


So, my vegan diet with extras... extras, you say? Yes, well in addition to removing all the animal products from my diet, I am also eliminating Diet Pepsi and all the bad whites. I am going to do my best to eat organic where I can, but in the interest of not doubling my grocery bill and therefore putting my husband completely over the edge, I will not be as strict on that point.

Today is Day 8. Hindsight being what it is, I wish I would have started this last Monday, June 9th when this endeavor began, but better late than never, right?

My goal here is to document my journey: what works, what doesn't and how I feel along the way. In addition, I am sure how my husband feels will sneak in as he has already shared much of his feelings about this and shed light on things I had not considered. So, here we go...


Day 8:

I have not had a Diet Pepsi since Sunday June 8th and the cravings are all but gone. I suffered from some pretty good headaches the first couple of days, but they have subsided. I do not miss meat at all. I miss cheese and I miss brunch at my favorite restaurant, The Frog & Turtle in Westbrook. (James, the owner, has already given me his thoughts on my experiment, reminding me his scrumptious donuts contain eggs - thanks James).


My initial feelings about this experiment were those of intimidation. I do not have any vegan friends to call upon for advice. Luckily, a very good friend of mine Amy pointed me in the direction of a phenomenal blog entitled Commune Tested, City Approved. The dialog is great and so far, the recipes are fantastic. Bo, my husband is working tonight, so after the gym I came home and experimented with Pad Thai, a recipe I found on the fore mentioned blog. Check it out:



It was really good and the recipe can be found here. (Admittedly, hers has a much prettier presentation.) The taste is a bit more peanuttier than I am used to but the all the flavors are very full, fresh with a little heat. Next time, I think I will experiment with additional vegetables and more heat. Also, I am not happy with the noodles I got this time, rice noodles from Hannaford. Next time, I will make the effort to go to Vientiane Market and hopefully find something a bit more authentic.

As far as how I feel, I feel really good. As a whole when I eat, I feel full and satisfied and not at all deprived. Yes, there are places I will miss going to eat, but the way I see it, this forces me to get out and check out restaurants I may not have checked out before.

Another recipe I have tried that has worked out well are these yummy Rockin Roasted Vegetable Burritos. I made them with some chili tortillas I found at Whole Foods. There are things I have tried that do not work for me... like fake cheese. I tried some, hoping, but it just wasn't good. So, I have decided that I just don't eat cheese - real or fake.

How has my body reacted to all of this? Well, I do not feel tired, my energy is starting to get pretty darn good and I have lost weight. I am not a weigher, I have to go by how my clothes fit. And jeans that I used to have to suck in to zip up now zip up easily... and this is only after one week!!! My back pain is about the same, which is what I am hoping to alleviate with this experiment, but I am not at all deterred... these things take time, right?

And the last thing I will talk about in this post is how my dear ol' hubby is dealing with all of this. It really never occurred to me that this would cause more than a hiccup in our relationship, but apparently, I was wrong. Bo and I love to eat and we have some places that we love to frequent - a few of them where the staff know us by first name. Because of my modifications, this is going to have to change. This didn't sit well with my husband. If I could do it all over again, I would sit down with him and have a more in depth conversation about this before doing it. regardless of how the conversation went, I cannot imagine it would have changed my mind, but it would have given him the opportunity to be part of my decision and to voice his concerns.

All in all, I am very happy I have decided to do this and am anxious to see where the journey will take me.

Ciao.