#veganlyfe

On Going Vegan &Being Vegan

My name is Sarah Collins and I created this blog as a way to share my experience as a vegan, as well as recipes. 

When I first went vegan I worked in a health food store, a place that I would have figured would’ve had a larger crowd of people that were more receptive to the idea of Veganism, but I ended up encountering the same sort of attitudes that I got most everywhere else; Vegans were assumed to be these very opinionated people that thought you were a very bad person if you ate meat. I was also amazed with the amount of people who were assured that they knew what Vegan was, but often were confusing it with being Vegetarian, or Pescatarian, or some other diet. This was one of the most frustrating things that I encountered as a Vegan; at parties, when dining out with friends, or meeting my boyfriend’s parents, I ended up in situations where I had to weigh how rude or awkward it might be to correct their mistakes while trying to accommodate me vs how I was going to explain not eating the food they had made “just for me”. This also led to a certain level of spite being made permissible every time I’d hear non-vegans make the joke about how Vegans always brought up their Veganism. In lieu of this I just want to say that Wikipedia defines Veganism as “the practice of abstaining from the use of animal products, particularly in diet, and an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals”. What this means, in layman’s terms, is that Vegans don’t eat meat, dairy, or any other food that may contain ingredients that have come from or are made from an animal.

I had friends who Vegans that ranged anywhere from “I sneak cheese” to “I buy exclusively Vegan products and Vegan sugar”.  A lot of the people that I knew that were Vegan were Vegan for moral reasons, but the ethical discussion on the topic was one I always strayed away from as most people seemed to take it far more personally than I enjoyed to be around. I understood both sides; I understood the feeling of feeling like you were being told that you were a bad person whose beliefs or standards couldn’t possibly be comprehended based solely on the idea that you side was disagreed with, but also understood the moral, ethical, and even social-economic implications that came with mass production and the maltreatment of animals, regardless of their purpose to/in society.

I thought that giving up cheese was going to be the most difficult task that I encountered; I later found out that being vegan came with a slew of other pros and cons that I had never even anticipated. I had to become more creative with my cooking so that I wouldn’t end up losing dishes that I was used to or had already grown to love pre-vegan. I had to relearn how to do everything that I had previous known how to do; it was like learning how to ride a bike, only to find out years later that you had forgotten how to do it. Buying pre-packaged foods became the easiest route for being Vegan, but most of the foods that I was buying where heavily processed and still ended up having the feel and taste of food that seemed less like something my mother would make, and more like something that someone with no time or creative fuel would create. When I would cook fresher foods, I found myself running short on time to have to be cooking every day and buying fresh produce constantly. I thought that there had to be some sort of happy medium between the two.

 I had stopped being Vegan for awhile because I had run into the issue of not getting enough of what my body needed; this I later realized had less to do with me being Vegan and more to do with poor lifestyle choices and being ill informed. I created this blog to document my time being Vegan, as well as to help others who are considering doing so. I have chosen to be Vegan time and time again for health reasons, so most of the recipes that I post will be ones that will try and lean more towards the healthier side and be higher in protein content. Most of my generalized information for this blog is drawn from sites like Bodybuilding.com and sometimes I will modify non-vegan recipes to be Vegan.

I have listed some sites that were my favorite Vegan recipe blogs for those wanting to expand their food collection beyond this site, as well as know my taste.

Oh She Glows

Simple Vegan Blog