by Michaela Kennedy | Jan 1, 2015 | Lifestyle
2016 as last year is the year I hope more and more to become – and stay – vegan. In the last few years, I started my vegan research journey simply to find more healthy vegetable and legume recipes. The more I eat vegan, the better I feel, not to mention how much my awareness for animal welfare has heightened. I want to make veganism a true commitment to myself and to the other beings on our Earth.
I started out one day at a time, and here is how you can do it, too if you are struggling to go 100 percent vegan. For example, Meatless Monday is an easy commitment. So is occasionally eating vegan. The challenge is to stay a vegan day in and day out – every single meal – and do it the healthy vegan way – with an occasionally unhealthy vegan snack or meal.
A solution that works for me is to do menu planning, But, yes, there’s a but! I suck at creating a proper menu plan – you (and I) don’t want to cook three different meals and two snacks from scratch every day, not to mention the time it takes. We want a plan that is simple to follow, with leftovers for the next day and with a good combination of vitamins and minerals that make meals nutrition rich. And I want – and I bet you want, too – a plan that includes a shopping list.
Free vegan starter kit menu planners
In order to help me with this goal, I have found three free vegan planners that I have reviewed below. Let me know which one you like the best!
The good news is that there are several free menu planners on the Internet for us to use. I’ve done a search to kickstart this year for at good start at Vegan Menu Planning the healthy way. This is what I found, and more is being added.
1. 21-day Vegan Kit Menu from PCRM (Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine)
My all time favorite is the 21 Day Starter Menu. Not only do they have the menu kit with shopping lists, you can also sign up for a free account and make your own menus with your favorite foods.
When that’s done, not only a shopping list will be generated for you, but also the nutritional values in your meals are calculated. Doesn’t get much better than that. Get it here.
PCRM also has a kickstart program you can sign up for PMRC Kickstart (in English, Chinese and Spanish, there’s also Kickstart for India but in English)- they will send you daily emails with tips and recipes. And it starts the 1st of every month, so sign up Today!
2. “Eat This Much” is your personal meal planner and you will need to sign up for an account, which is free. When you set up your profile page you choose if you want to gain weight, maintain or lose weight, your gender, personal measure etc. you can even choose which price level your food budget is. Very cool – you also choose if you want metric or imperial measures! get it at EatThisMuch
3. PETA has a two week Vegan Meal Plan – it is a two-week sample menu. You can get it at PETA Meal Plan. Also, you can order a Vegan Starter Kit as well PETA Vegan Starter Kit
There you go, three free vegan meal planners for you to use.
Before I close I want to draw your attention to the good people at Veganuary, there’s no meal planning there but it’s so full of other fine vegan stuff that’s it well worth your time to check it out.
by Michaela Kennedy | Dec 19, 2014 | Snacks
Vegan tapas have called to me, and I have responded. I now have a load of new vegan appetizer ideas, or vegan tapas, to share with you. Last week was “Tapa″ week here in San Juan de la Ramba, where I've been staying this winter. It’s a lovely small village situated in the northern part of Tenerife, Spain.
Vegan tapas are not traditional
Ten Restaurants competed on serving the most creative tapa. All the restaurants served “their” tapa and a drink for a nice price of €2.50 ($3.10). The problem for me was, of course, that none of the tapas were vegan.
So, I decided to find good tapas recipes and recreate vegan versions for myself.
Vegan tapas to try
The start of this project was to find the recipes. Here are those that I started out with:
1. Vegan Jalapeno Poppers
2. Cherry Tomatoes and Watermelon
3. Tofu Triangles
4. Radicchio Cups
5. Dessert tapas – blueberries 😀
Let's take the dessert first – I've never heard of tapas for dessert, despite having spent some time in Spain. I don't know if it's even a thing, but vegan desserts as tapas, well, I'm all for it!
The jalapeno poppers are too hot for me, but my “tasters” love them! So, if you are into hot stuff this is for you. making sure to remove all the seeds and the inner vein helps, as well as choosing your variety of pepper.
The cherry tomatoes with watermelon are just lovely with a nice mild taste. They can be served as palate cleansers and are great for a hot summer's day.
For the tofu triangles, I used coconut oil, plus I added nutritional yeast and served them warm – a great “snack” taste, salty!
Radicchio cups are so packed with goodness that I can eat them as a meal. These are festive party pleasers
All the vegan tapas I tried were so delicious and well worth the effort – not that they are hard to make, but tapas often need a bit of prep time. I like to make up a batch or two and they will keep for a few days in the refrigerator if they last that long.
by Michaela Kennedy | Oct 27, 2014 | Food Guide
The way Jamie Oliver cooks has always been one of my favourites; he makes it look easy and his energy is cool. What I didn't know was that he also has a nice selection of vegan recipes.
You can find his recipes at http://www.jamieoliver.com/. Not only can you sort recipes alphabetically by date or popularity, but you can also filter your search by ingredients, kitchen, difficulty (I love that :D), course, and occasion for dish type.
I did a search for “not too tricky” and found “Briam”, which is a Greek dish traditionally eaten with feta – I made the dish with vegan feta – it was delicious and easy to make.
The recipes can be found at http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/vegetables-recipes/briam/
Below each recipe you will find the corresponding Nutritional Information 🙂
by Michaela Kennedy | Sep 21, 2014 | Food Guide
Teenagers are hungry all the time – being vegan or not.
The trick is of course always to have something healthy in the fridge or freezer. We don't want it to be too expensive either.
Not only for teenagers but I also like to have something just “to grab”; it is nice not to have to cook a full meal from scratch, but just something healthy and filling.
Here are some great suggestions:
Snacks
Having snacks around has been the best way to keep us all full between meals, or instead of meals when we run out of on time. The old wisdom that snacking ruins your appetite mysteriously doesn’t seem to apply to teenagers and young adults. Try these Simple and Satisfying Vegan Snacks.
Cook in Quantity
I keep vegan taco meat in my freezer and an extra bowl of pasta salad in the fridge when possible. Label the leftover containers to make them easy to find, especially if your wayward teenagers are as bad at feeding themselves as my brother is. Pre-cooked quinoa and wild rice are also excellent in salads and wraps.
Veggie Burgers and Veggie Dogs
Veggie dogs, or not-dogs as we call them in my family, are another easy and filling food. Paired with sprouted buns and homemade ketchup, burgers and dogs are an excellent treat, especially for those less inclined to cooking. Making the veggie burgers yourself can be pretty easy though, if you have a little more time than money, and store-bought has never tasted as good to me as what I make myself.
Get more tips at http://www.onegreenplanet.org/
by Michaela Kennedy | Sep 17, 2014 | Food Guide
Cooking vegan you'll need loads of tricks to cook or at least that is how it looks in the beginning. After you have some experience it gets easier and easier; still when we find recipe with milk, honey, butter or cheese we don't give up, we just replace the foods. I think we have all tried to make our own cheese some with good result and some with lesser result, here are some good suggestions.
1. Make Your Own Honey Replacement
You don’t have to be a bee to make your own honey. Just mix 1 ¼ cups of granulated sugar with 1/3 cup of water and you have one cup of vegan honey. Replace the honey in a recipe with an equal amount of your homemade sweetener.
2. You Don’t Need a Churn to Make Butter
Believe it or not, making your own butter is pretty easy. You just need some specialty ingredients like lecithin, coconut oil, and xanthan gum and a mold to shape the butter in. Vegan butter can be made with soy milk or for a soy-free version, try my cashew-based vegan butter. You can even make it fancy by adding your favorite herbs or using cocoa butter to make a heavenly chocolate-flavored butter.
3. Avocados Can be Used as Butter
There’s a trend going on right now for avocado toast. Just mash up some avocado and season it with your favorite herbs, spices, or even hot sauce and spread it on your toast as you would butter. Besides toast, avocado can substitute for butter in baking or in puddings. Just be aware that you will taste the avocado, so be sure it’s a good match for your recipe.
Continue to read 7 remaining the hacks http://onegreenplanet.org/
Photo Credit: Mattie Hagedorn
