Thursday, December 2, 2010

State of the GVE address

At almost the end of the GVE and since I bet you’re wondering how it went (whether because you are interested in veganism yourself, wanting to garner a little schadenfreude by seeing me fail, or you’re killing time reading piffy prose on the internet) and I aim to please.
Well, to be honest, I didn’t succeed completely with my goal of total veganism- two days in, and a lack of prepared-ness (plus drunk hunger) had me stopping by the gas station for a bag of really, really animal-o-licious chips. After that little boo-boo I figured out I needed to plan better. Being vegan means you have to eat more frequently than an omnivore, probably about every two hours or so. Protein is in scarce supply so nuts, beans, tofu, TVP, tempeh- all crucial to a happy, full vegan who has no gas-station centric cravings. Using my trusty Moosewood Cookbook, the Fat-Free Vegan blog, and the vast stores energy I should be pouring into my job, I planned out a week’s worth of food (21 meals plus snacks and desserts, to be exact). A sample day looks something like this:
Breakfast: Oatmeal with bananas and strawberries sliced up in it.
Lunch: Brussels sprouts and shiitake mushroom soup
Snack: Baba Ganoush (with cherry tomatoes and tortilla chips as dippers)
Dinner: Asparagus and chickpea casserole
Dessert: Dark chocolate vegan cake*
I devoted one night to making a big batch of soup, casserole, baba, and cake so I didn’t have to think much once the munchies took hold. With that plan I was actually able to stick to my veganism AND have a lot more time during the week what with all the premade meals, so I got some grad school application stuff done too. Yay!
Three lessons learned: Vegans have to eat more often, go to the grocery store more often (what with all the produce) and research a lot. Never ever ask why something isn’t vegan, since it’s always some horribly gross reason you probably don’t want to know… and finally, veganism is a commitment- a commitment to compassion, environmental friendliness, and good health. If you do it right, it makes you feel better to know that you’re being good to your body and the earth. Will I keep it up? TBA. I have enough produce and lesson plans to last me another week or so- so we’ll see! But not to worry, I’ll be writing about plenty of other stuff too.

*sorry, trade secret ;)

1 comment:

  1. glad youve started back up. g'luck with the experiment. i might be hitting you up for recipes soon!

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