Soyagera journey into healthier living

The biggest question I see (not hear, because I never hear it in real life) concerning veganism is, “How do I become a vegan?”  I am a regular poster and/or lurker on a few message boards that are geared toward eco-friendliness, and the topic comes up quite often, including issues of “safely” converting to a vegan diet and how to feed children in this way.

There are many, many resources online to aid in the transition to a veg diet/lifestyle, which I have listed at the end of this post. However, I’ll share my personal experience, too, in order to show how it can realistically happen. Our transition to this type of eating was certainly done in stages, so I’ll organize it as such:

Starting Out (Fall 2005)

We naively thought that eliminating animal products just meant substituting soy for dairy, veggie burgers for meat, and tossing any products/foods that didn’t comply.  When we found that all we were eating was a lot of soup, bread, and snacks (and gaining weight in the process!), we picked up a few vegan cookbooks and started learning more. One thing that made it tough was we tried to go, excuse the pun, cold turkey and ended up craving meat and cheese periodically. We called giving in to these cravings “meat cheats.”

Tip: Don’t try to go completely vegan right away. Start slowly, eliminating one thing at a time. For example,  start with soy milk in place of cow’s milk. Or, try getting rid of cheese but keep your eggs and milk for awhile.

Getting the Hang of Things (2006)

We began to understand how to cook without animal products and began building a small repertoire of dishes that worked for us, mainly using processed soy products (like soy “cheese” or “sausage”). We genuinely liked the taste of these products and didn’t miss meat. However, I’m pretty sure there were times when we were more vegetarian in our eating as we couldn’t totally get rid of cheeses.

Tip: Accept the fact that vegetarian/vegan processed foods aren’t always meant to exactly replicate the carnivorous version they represent. Enjoy these foods as they are. Enjoy a veggie burger as a veggie burger and not as a hamburger substitute. These products should make the transition easier, not painful, so choose things that taste good to you!

Really Learning, Really Eliminating (2007)

Here are some common questions (with my answers) about maintaining a vegan diet:

1. How expensive would it be in comparison to vegetarianism?  I really have to watch our budget.
I can’t really say much about cost in comparison. We spend A LOT of money on food and nutrition per month, but we also live in an area with limited options. We’re lucky enough to have an organic market that stocks many items, and there’s a chain grocery retailer that sells much of what we use, but we live in a resort area and pay high prices for everything, it seems. Like anything, there are ways of going cheap, and there are ways of going big. If you’re constantly buying processed, pre-made vegan food, it will add up. If you want, you could live off of rice, beans, and veggies and be fine!

2. What are the staples of your diet?
This is basically what we always have on hand, and consider it’s winter in the fruit/veggie dept:

Protein:
tofu (use this for everything, for any meal, including desserts)
nuts (not just for snacking–I use them in place of meat to make everything from stuffed cabbage to meatloaf to patties)
quinoa, soy milk, soy yogurt, avocados

Grains:
quinoa, long grain brown rice, cous cous, rice pastas, enriched pastas (the only thing we buy that’s not organic), hemp or other whole-grain breads, wheat tortillas, polenta

Fruits (right now we always have): apples, bananas,  citrus, papaya, mangoes, frozen berries

Veggies: Spinach (fresh and frozen), cabbage, leafy greens like kale, carrots, celery, onions, potatoes (technically not a veggie for us)

Supplementary items (this is where it adds up): greens drinks (for extra veggies), nutritional yeast (for necessary B vitamins), flax seed oil, good quality cooking oils, tamari, minced garlic, ginger, good spices, Earth Balance margarine, rice milk, etc.

Supplements: probiotics, enzymes, high quality multi vits, pre-natals, vit E, cal/mag/zinc liquid supplement (the only thing we take regularly is the vitamins and calcium; Hubs is better about taking enzymes and such–not really required for vegans, just something we do for good health)

3. What is a good place to start that is comprehensive but not overwhelming with vegan info?

The bottom of this post has a good list of places to start.

This is For Life (2008 to present)

We finally learned the right way to eat: we balanced our food groups, got the right nutrients, and eliminated processed soy products (which are no better for the body or the environment than any other mass-produced food).  A supportive and informed naturopath was essential in this process.

We started this diet together when we were dating, and I wasn’t in love with meat enough to hang onto it, so I supported Hubs in his quest to live a healthy, heart-friendly life, so I did most of the cooking. It was a learning process, for sure (still is). However, I advocate it not only because I learned about the horrible food-industry practices in this country, but because we have read SO MUCH about how a vegan diet is better for your health, hands down. The body cannot process all of the protein and dairy that generally comes along with a Standard American Diet, and it leads to other health issues.

Mainly, I found this: when I stopped eating meat (dead energy), my world got brighter. I believe it is because I stopped ingesting dead things. When we started eating more cleanly, more natural foods, we stopped getting sick. When I stopped eating dairy, my chronic sinus problems went away. And when I stopped eating things that most people eat, I was no longer tempted to buy into our consumerist society. Changing the way I ate changed the way I thought about life–and so much for the better.

Excellent Resources:
Veg for Life–excellent easy-to-read site about making the transition to veganism
Go Veg–in association with PETA; tons of info
Farm Sanctuary–a wonderful organization which is a wonderful reminder of why people choose to eat vegan

Books to Check Out:
Becoming Vegan: The Complete Guide to Adopting a Healthy Plant-Based Diet,  Davis & Melina
Food and Healing, Annemarie Colbin
The China Study, T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D.
The Great Cholesterol Con, Dr. Malcolm Kendrick
Eating Animals, Jonathan Safran Foer

Favorite Cookbooks:
Vive Le Vegan, Dreena Burton
Veganomicon, Vegan with a Vengeance, Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, Isa Chandra Moskowitz
Vegan Soul Kitchen, Bryant Terry
La Dolce Vegan, Sarah Kramer
Vegan Yum Yum, Lauren Ulm

The diaper bag I won! I love it!

A few weeks ago, I posted a giveaway for a Maxwell Designs diaper bag.

Well, as it turns out, I WON! I am so in love with this diaper bag: it’s perfectly functional and practical, it’s just my style, and moreover, it’s COMFORTABLE. Baby Soyager hasn’t yet arrived, but I’ve been stuffing the bag with baby things so that my parent’s dog will get used to scent of baby items. We’re teaching him that it’s “not his.” The bag’s strap is perfectly sized for me, but the bags are now available with adjustable straps, which is probably great if you share the bag with someone who isn’t your size.

Well, Maxwell Designs has a new blog, and in honor of this fact, Maggie (the genius behind these lovely products) is hosting some fantastic giveaways! Check it out by clicking here!

I’ve ALWAYS hated Valentine’s Day. If you’re not in a relationship, it sucks. If you are in a relationship, there’s pressure. If you’ve been with someone for awhile, well, there’s still pressure. My hubby and I long ago decided that Valentine’s Day just wasn’t for us. It is the epitome of consumerist thinking: stores flooded with paper cards, mylar balloons, polyester stuffed animals and cheaply-produced candies, all marketed in a way to elicit a feeling of guilt in those who choose NOT to recognize who they love with these “special” gestures. Blah.

Of the millions of dollars spent on Valentine’s gifts, a large chunk of that goes toward chocolates. Now, I am not about to bash chocolate.  Chocolate is one of the finest foods produced and all the recent hype about its antioxidant properties is true if one buys the *right* kind of chocolate. So, what is the right kind of chocolate?

For this blogger, excellent chocolate has to meet the following criteria:

1. Fair Trade
Cocoa (along with coffee, cotton, and other crops) is one of the world’s most exploited products. Small farms and farmers have lost business and wages due to larger conglomerates taking over, growing in amounts that no single farmer could keep up with, and selling at amounts that no farmer could afford to match.  Just as the private farmer is disappearing in America,  such is the case in parts of the world where there is no other option for income than farming. It’s just good ethics to buy Fair Trade. Wouldn’t you rather consume something that was grown as someone’s livelihood, cared for, tended, and something that received positive energy versus a giant crop used only to support Big Business?

To learn more about Fair Trade cocoa specifically, click here.
To learn more about the Fair Trade Federation, click here.

2. Organic
Let’s just take a look at what one can find in any given Hershey’s chocolate (taken from Hershey’s allergen info). For the sake of brevity, I have taken the obvious ingredients (milk, butter, cocoa) off the list:

• Acid whey
• Anhydrous milk fat
• Butter oil
• Calcium caseinate
• Casein
• Reduced minerals whey
• Sodium caseinate
• Sweetened condensed whey
• Whey protein concentrate
• Defatted peanuts
• Hydrogenated peanut oil
• Partially defatted peanuts
• Peanut flavor
• Hydrogenated lecithin
• Soy protein
• Hydrogenated vegetable protein
• Soya
• Soya lecithin
• Soybean oil
• Hydrogenated vegetable
• Modified food starch
• Hydrogenated coconut oil
• Enriched flour
• Hydrogenated starch
• Wheat flour hydrolysate
• Malt
• Modified food starch
• Corn fiber
• Corn oil
• Corn syrup
• Corn syrup solids
• Cornstarch
• Dextrin
• Dextrose
• Flaked milled corn
• High fructose corn syrup
• High maltose corn syrup
• Hydrogenated glucose syrup
• Hydrogenated starch hydrolysate
• Maltodextrin
• Xanthan gum
• Modified cornstarch
• Foodstarch
• Hydrogenated vegetable oil
• Vegetable oil

Compare it to chocolate products from one of my favorite companies, Liz Lovely

Sandwich Cookie (Organic Unbleached Wheat Flour, Organic Sugar, Expeller Pressed Canola Oil, Organic Peanut Butter [Organic Roasted Peanuts, Organic Palm Oil, Salt], Partially Defatted Peanut Flour, Organic Palm Fruit Oil, Organic Cocoa, Cocoa [Processed with Alkali], Salt, Organic Unsweetened Chocolate, Natural Flavor, Organic Corn Starch, Baking Soda, Soy Lecithin), Organic Fair Trade Dark Chocolate (organic cocoa liquor, organic cane sugar, organic cocoa butter, organic cocoa powder, organic vanilla).
* Certified Organic

I’ll let you research all the above ingredients and decide for yourself whether you’ll choose organic chocolates next time!

3. Vegan
For me, this is big. It’s actually not as hard as you might think to find vegan chocolate. I was never a milk chocolate fan, so I don’t miss that (although great vegan “milk” chocolate is available), and high quality, dark chocolate is easily found in most grocery stores. My local store even sells fair-trade options. Vegan chocolate is just cocoa and cocoa butter, maybe some sugar. That’s it. It’s not adulterated by milk or milk by-products. The taste is pure, chocolatey goodness.

Some of my favorite chocolates, cookies, and other fantastic goodies come from Liz Lovely, which I mentioned above. All of their products are fair-trade, organic, and vegan. What could better for YOUR valentine?

Right now, you can get free shipping on orders over $29 (so easy to do; everything is so yummy!)by entering the code: TRUELOVE. And join the Fanclub! The Liz Lovely crew offers deals and fun contests (for free cookies, of course!) all of the time.

Check out this blog’s eco-friendly, baby-lovin’ giveaway!
Once Upon A Baby

You can win an awesome ERGO carrier!

Check out this great giveaway for a hemp diaper bag on one of my favorite blogs, The Eco-Friendly Family.

The holidaze is through and, hopefully, the inevitable craziness of a marketing onslaught made everyone reflect on what’s really important. I generally don’t make New Year’s resolutions, but I found an interesting site that makes creating and keeping resolutions much easier. The best part is that it isn’t so much about resolutions but life improvements.

This blog is The Happiness Project (great title-hm?). Read through to get the gist of the philosophy, then check out The Happiness Project Toolbox to put a plan into action! There is even a space for Group Resolutions where people can motivate each other for a common goal. If you’re interested in resolving to “Go (even more) Green!,” go to my user page and add yourself to the Group Resolution list! First goal: turn off lights when leaving a room. (We’ll start off easy, okay?) Look, as an known procrastinator, the fact that I’ve even created a profile and written ONE resolution is progress for me, so let’s support each other for change!

What are some future “go green” goals you’d like to add?

It’s been a busy year! My last post was in June since Hubs and I took a cross-country trip from the end of June through July (I’ll post on veg road tripping later). When we returned from our trip, we enjoyed a few weeks of East Coast summer until we returned to work at the end of August.  In August, we got an incredible gift: the Soyager family is having a baby! Since then, we’ve been entering the adventurous world of pregnancy, preparing for birth (and baby), and taking in what a life change this will be. Additionally, we relocated to a new home at the end of November and have been kept busy making an older home more of our own.  I’m excited to post about some of our eco-friendly home improvements and the products that make it all happen. And, of course, I’ll have to share what it’s like to be an earth friendly, vegMama, too! Our little sprout is due in April, so I’m making it a goal to get this blog on a regular schedule from now on!

Thanks for reading!

Okay, so why 1950? I really just chose that year because it seems like a good estimate. I’m sure chemical cleansers and petroleum-based products really became the rage following the war, with all the new-fangled technology to clean and polish. And as I’ve figured out, chemicals must make things disintegrate faster…

I’m in the middle of a huge cleaning job. (I’m taking a needed break by blogging. Don’t tell Hubs. He’s still cleaning the basement…heehee.) Hubs and I leave for our cross-country trip in a week. We’ve got a few errands left to run, a few days of work left to bear, and a few items left to buy. Today is CLEANING DAY EXTRAORDINAIRE. And since we gave up chemical cleansers months ago, we’re finding out that we need to increase a few variables in our (natural cleanser x H20) + (elbow grease) = Clean equation.

The proper equation should be
(natural cleanser X H20)+ 100(elbow grease) =Clean!

I’m not complaining. I just now see why women of the working class always had incredible arms. So far today I’ve:
-cleaned out a cooler that was getting mildew-y
-scrubbed my outdoor basement stairs and cement pad (Thank you wet Spring for the mildew you’ve brought. It’s so pretty green!)
-scrubbed my kitchen floor with a rag and a scrub brush
-scrubbed my carpeted stairs with castile soap, water, and borax using a scrub brush

And I’m worn out! I know my back will kill tomorrow. One thing that will not burn, though, is my lungs. Neither will my heart (with the pain of tossing chemical compounds into the water supply).

I suppose I should get back to work.  I’m moving on to my bathrooms and bedroom. A scrub brush is sort of a necessary tool for me, I’ve found. Do you have any natural cleaning tricks that you find magical?

From what I’ve read ABOUT this book (I haven’t read the actual text yet), it seems that the title is purely for attention-getting. And it works pretty well, no? The Vegetarian Myth is written by Lierre Keith, a former vegan, who conjectures that veganism/vegetarianism isn’t any better for the planet than a typical omnivore’s diet. Her argument is for sustainable communities, sustainable living, sustainable eating. And maybe wants to knock a few vegs off their high horses?

::putting tack and saddle away::

I’d like to read this book to see if Keith gets into a deeper argument or rouses any larger points beyond the obvious. In my personal experience, eating a meatless diet can certainly be just as harmful to your body as to the environment, and I’m not just talking about getting one’s vitamins and mineral intake down properly. I mean that there is a lot of processed vegan food out there contributing to the environmental problems just as readily as a bologna factory. This is why I have such a hard time explaining my diet to those who ask or think they understand. It’s not just about eliminating meat and cheese (though sometimes that is how to say it with brevity). It’s about eating organic, WHOLE foods and, when possible, locally produced foods.

I have a feeling that I’ll agree with many of Keith’s musings, and now I’m off to my state library’s website to see if it’s available (what’s your guess?).

…that will take DECADES for Americans to even wrap their heads around.

I recently read the following article in UTNE Reader mag and it made me think more about WHY this concept of granting the Earth constitutional rights (I know–sounds funny. Read the article!) sounds, well, sounds funny to Americans.  Hubs and I were discussing animals, creatures of this Earth like us, and how many people fail to see spiritual and emotional similarities between humans and animals. Hubs conjectured, “most people don’t understand things unless it’s in their face. ..” Mistreating or disrespecting animals isn’t something they can comprehend because it’s not affecting them directly. “It’s the same reason why people aren’t concerned with genocide or bombings,” he said, “they care only if it’s happening directly to THEM.” Ah, my wise husband, right again.

And it’s the same with the Earth. A dog craps on someone’s lawn, he’s angry about it. A power plant dumping toxic substances into natural waterways? Fuh-get-about-it!  Whether it’s apathy or ignorance, it’s annoying and enraging, and part of the reason I get frustrated living where I live. The majority of the population is in the “fuh-get-about-it” category. Or, more appropriately, the “I ain’t care” category.

George Orwell says in 1984, “the hope lies with the Proles…” Where do we go from here?

Check out this article: The Emancipated Earth