-
April 25, 2016
Being vegan
“This will be so easy,” I thought to myself. “I’m practically vegetarian, anyway. Going vegan for a month will be a doss.”
Well, I was wrong. It was tough, but not in the way I expected.
Like many people in the run-up to the New Year, I thought about my goals for 2016 and what I wanted to achieve. Me and my friends talked about becoming healthier, fitter and leaner. Standard. Then a friend talked about her friend who decided to go vegan for 30 days and the benefits she cultivated from a plant-based diet – weight loss, clearer skin, shinier hair. “Yes!” I said. “I want all of that, too!”
My housemate also told me about Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret, a documentary that follows filmmaker Kip Anderson on his quest to discover how damaging animal agriculture can be. I became convinced, and so the seed had been sown.
By the time I got round to kick-starting my new diet, it was February. I hadn’t realised then, but there was such a thing as Veganuary, a campaign that runs every January aiming to inspire people to become vegan.
I’d missed the boat, but decided to make February my Veganuary. In truth, the only way I really prepared was to buy lots of bags of quinoa, seven cartons of soya milk and vegan butter. My diet on the whole was already meat-free. I did some research by reading various blogs and websites, like vegansociety.com and peta.org, and bought myself a new vegan cookbook.
The first couple of weeks was fine. I made sure to read every single food label when I went grocery shopping, and took note of animal ingredients such as carmine (red pigment from dried female insects), glycerin (fat), keratin (protein from hooves, horns and quills) and lactose. I became adept at spotting the offending ingredients and happily changed my diet accordingly.
Where I tripped up was when it came to eating out in social occasions. It is near impossible to be a good vegan when dining out with non-vegan friends/family. That was the thing I found most difficult, simply because there are not enough restaurants that cater to vegans.
Vegetarian options are prevalent, but it seems the UK has much further to go when it comes to offering vegan choices in mainstream restaurants. Obviously it all depends on where you live and where you go to eat, but it seemed to me that the sector is a little lacking in this area.
I didn’t completely succumb as I had no meat whatsoever, but I do confess to slipping up with mayo, a veggie – and very cheesy – lasagne and an epic home-made cake my friend had made for a gathering. I didn’t even crave any particular food, not even cheese, which was a massive surprise. By the end, the health benefits I expected didn’t really happen. I may have had a flatter stomach due to not feeling bloated all the time, but I think that’s about it.
What became important was that I learned so much more about the dedication it takes to be a full-time vegan. I discovered how shocking it was that the food industry pads out our food with all those extra unnecessary ingredients. And I found out more about agriculture’s role when it comes to climate change.
Even now I’ve stopped buying milk (I never liked the taste anyway so I don’t know why I bothered before) and instead opt for vegan alternatives.
It was a huge learning experience and it has helped me to become a more informed consumer of food. It’s definitely something I’d recommend people to try, whether they go on to become full-time vegans or not.
Mary Ann Pickford
@maryannpickford
