I committed to doing #veganuary this year for a few reasons.

1. I simply wanted to challenge myself. I want to think before I snack, before I shove a pizza in the oven, before I order something on a menu. I want to remind myself that I’m in control of all my actions, because I feel like I’m falling into that place in adulthood where you mind-numbingly go about all your actions. Every month this year, I want to have a new challenge and so in January, I chose to eat vegan.
2. I wanted to try new foods. I do tend to eat a lot of vegan meals and I’ve almost entirely cut milk from my diet. The only time I’d eat dairy would be if it were part of a recipe (ie, a sauce). I often replace chicken with chickpeas and I would never really buy red meat. I enjoy a lot of the vegan meals I eat so I thought it would be fun to branch out and try even more.
3. I often defend vegans, who have got themselves into quite a controversial place in the last few years. Although the militant vegans are extremely annoying, there are people who are simply having their lunch, staying quiet and moving on. Whenever people discuss veganism and there’s someone who just doesn’t understand it, I try and explain. However, I’ve never done it so I wanted to be able to have more credible arguments when it comes to veganism.

I personally don’t see anything ethically wrong with eating animal products. I understand that everything should be done in moderation (not just with food, but everything) so I try and be sustainable when it comes to purchasing food & eating. I’m not doing this for ethical reasons and I highly doubt that will change over this month, or my life, for that matter.

I respect people who do eat vegan for ethical reasons, though. With the state our planet is in, every little helps.

However…

I’ve now been eating vegan for seven days and it’s not everything I dreamed it would be!

Day One

Day one was great! I enjoyed everything I ate and I remember even saying to my husband, “I’m so glad I’m vegan!”

For breakfast, I have been having soy vanilla yogurt with granola & blueberries. I’ve been eating this for about a month now so it wasn’t a change to my diet at all. And honestly, it’s so delicious!! Soy yogurt is the dreamiest.

For lunch, I made quinoa with chopped fruit, veg & walnuts. (Apples & pomegranates go great with savoury meals!) For the dressing, I mixed olive oil, lime, maple syrup, coriander & garlic. It’s sweet and fresh. I’m having it again this week.

For dinner, I made a chickpea korma curry. It’s a Tasty recipe, made in one pot and really delicious.

Day one, off to a great start.

Day Two

Perhaps my biggest mistake in the first three days was eating the same three meals, haha. But I always have done that if I have leftovers so I’m not sure if that was the problem.

Today was difficult because I went for a 3.5-hour hike and didn’t bring anything to eat as soon as it was over (had to wait around 1.5-2 hours before I was home to eat) and I felt so lightheaded, sick and dizzy!

All I wanted was sugar.

This is where my veganism failed this week. We stopped at Tesco on the way home and I went to the sweets section, quickly read the ingredients on the back and bought some chewy strawberry pencils.

I ate half the pack before looking at the ingredients again only to see, this time, that it had beef gelatine in them! Oops!

Fail count: One

Day Three

Had the same three meals and my main feeling throughout this day was boredom. I had bought some guacamole which I was buzzing to eat when I went to open it up only to see it had cream in it!! Why!!

Around 8pm, I was so hungry so I had my first vegan snack session which was… again… boring.

I had an apple (which I’d rarely eat as a snack), dairy and gluten-free chocolate chip cookies, and soy milk.

The vegan cookies are fine but they are no Oreos.

Day Four

Ali & I went out for lunch today. I was excited to have something made for me.

However, on a menu with at least 100 options, I could eat…

One thing.

They had one vegan option.

At this point, I’m not really seeing how this is a lifestyle choice for some people. Why would you want to be limited like that?!

So for lunch, I had a very oily tomato-y spaghetti dinner that didn’t have any fresh veg chopped through it. Basically, it was like someone cooked some spaghetti, mixed tinned tomatoes with olive oil and dropped it in a bowl.

To make myself feel better, I ordered some skinny fries.

At least there’s some joy in this life.

Lol.

For dinner, I had Linda McCartney “pulled pork” burgers. To be honest, they weren’t bad. The taste and flavours were fine, but the texture??? It was a mix between tough chicken and cardboard! When it tasted pretty much like pulled pork but felt like that, all I wanted to do was have a big bite of real pulled pork 😦

Day Five

We went to Starbucks on the road home from our holiday. I got a chai latte with oat milk (a long time fave of mine) and the five-grain oatmeal.

To be honest, I’ve been eating honey. A friend told me it’s better for the bees to make honey so I haven’t given that up (sorry, vegans). So I mixed that into my breakfast.

For lunch, from Starbucks, I had some weird sandwich thing which again, didn’t delight me.

For me, food has always been a source of enjoyment, a treat. Eating is something I’ve always looked forward to.

This week, I haven’t. I kind of dread mealtimes because I don’t know if I’m actually going to like what I eat. That is a really offputting feeling for me.

I’m sure if I went long term with this, I’d stop feeling this way because I’d learn what I like and don’t like.

For dinner, my mum made baked potatoes and for me and my sister (vegetarian), she made some kind of bean, tomato, vegan chili. It was really nice (I’ll probs get the recipe) but I’m not a massive fan of baked potatoes. But maybe it would be better with rice for me!

Day Six

I actually didn’t eat today until like 12:30pm. Because I wasn’t excited to eat.

When I did it, I just had toast with jam & peanut butter.

Yay.

For dinner, I made a lemon coconut spaghetti.

To be fair, it wasn’t terrible but it just felt really slimy to me.

It’s like, no matter what I eat, there’s something wrong with it.

I probably sound really ungrateful. Sorry.

 

Anyway. today I’m back home, in my normal routine, and I have some really exciting sounding meals planned out for the week! So hopefully, next week’s #veganuary diaries will be… happier.

Fail count: One

Noticable changes: Besides feeling sad about the taste of my food, I have been feeling a lot more awake. I haven’t been absolutely shattered by 8pm (maybe it was because I was on holiday…) and I haven’t found it difficult to wake up in the morning. Also, my skin is very clear right now. 🙂