Post Punk Kitchen Forum

For me, it was the tofu egg salad from How It All Vegan. I was on the fence about going vegan and someone made it for a potluck. I was like "holy crepe, this stuff is delicious! I could be vegan!" And then I went vegan soon after.

But...wait! I just looked and the internet says that book was published July of 2002. I went vegan in May 2002. So, maybe it's all a lie. But that was probably the first recipe that made me feel like I could definitely stick with being vegan.

I was traveling around Sri Lanka with my Dad after graduation from college, and I realized that I hadn't eaten any meat, fish, eggs or dairy in 3 weeks without even noticing it.

This is kinda sad, but for me, it was Daiya. I'm not sure if I was already vegan when I tried it, but it definitely made me believe I could stay vegan. Cheese was my favourite pregan food.

ETA: I don't really eat Daiya often anymore. Funny how quickly your taste buds change...

That's not sad! It's great!

*************LIES***************

If there's ever a way I can successfully veganize my favourite tuna casserole recipe, then I'll be set for ever and ever and ever.

I think sampling Daiya helped, but I didn't have that sort of "aha!" food replacement moment.

ooh, tell us what's in this tuna casserole! I really like chickpeas as a tuna salad replacement.

I waffled for a full year. Then I decided if I could make cheeseless pizza and enjoy it I could fully go vegan. I haven't looked back for more than 3 1/2 years now.

I'm not going to lie. I veganized some cookies for a vegan friend.

It was this mac and cheese recipe from vegweb:
http://vegweb.com/recipes/best-vegan-ma ... dseriously
A cup of oil, a cup and a half of nooch...haha.

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/tuna-noodl ... etail.aspx

I know I am probably just being lazy in not attempting it. I used to use whole wheat rotini in it all the time, so that's not a problem. And there's vegenaise. But I am skeptical of chickpea "tuna" as a sub (I haven't tried it yet, so I'm probably just being silly) and I have no idea what to use in place of the cream of mushroom soup. I used to add dijon mustard to it which gave it a nice kick and this was by far my favourite lazy comfort food recipe. And lately I just want my lazy comfort casserole!

I bet a ton of seaweed and jackfruit simmered in a seaweed broth might make a good tuna replacement for a casserole.

I think jackfruit is an invention of the vegan higher authority to confuse Canadians!

You don't have the unsweetened in cans variety in asian import stores?

Not playing by the rules, but... Carrot Cake ice cream. I think it was Good Karma brand? I don't know if they even make it now, but I thought it was the best vegan ice cream ever. Kind of the best ice cream period. I was all, "Fork, I can do this."

No recipes. I didn't know how to cook anything when I went vegan. I could barely boil water. It took a year or two before I could really feed myself a proper diet....

When I first started contemplating giving up dairy, the one dish that I was afraid that I would never be able to live without was a pasta I used to make with roasted tomatoes, fresh basil, and either mascarpone or fresh mozzarella.

One evening, my husband was working late, so I was on my own for dinner and decided to experiment with all the different cooking tricks I'd read about in V'Con and online.

A glass of white wine in hand, I threw together a garlicky almond milk bechamel by trial and error, stirred in roasted tomatoes, tomato paste, blended cashews, and fresh basil, and tossed it with some linguini. The dish had all the richness and complexity of the dairy versions I loved, but, to my amazement, it actually tasted even better to me than the original. After the first bite, I actually said out loud to myself that this was it, I was gonna take the leap.

I think it was the chocolate chip cookies from VWAV. That was my first vegan cookbook, and still one of my favourites!

The black bean burgers from How it All Vegan (or was it The Garden of Vegan?). Those aren't cookbooks I turn to anymore, but they really helped me get started.

I remember making some accidentally vegan peanut butter cookie recipe and thinking "Hmm, this is awesome and there's no egg or dairy in this, interesting." But what really cinched it was having some sort of meatless sloppy joe sandwich... I can't remember now if it was TVP or seitan or what but it hit the spot just right.

pumpkin muffins and pancakes from VWAV!!

[before going vegan for real i had already bought some books that frankly didn't inspire me. the only real-life vegan i knew was back in college, a kooky roommate and she was such a wack-ball that she really turned me off from veganism. this book made me realize that vegan didn't necessarily have to mean AR firebomber or breathairian, that there were normal people who ate pancakes who were vegans too.]

How it all Vegan and Garden of Vegan made me realize I could be vegan long term. Originally it was the Betty Crocker Vegetarian book that was egg and cheese laden. I ran out of cheese one day and left it out of a pasta dish and it was AMAZING without. That's when I realized I should look into it.

Does it count if it was Amy's frozen cheeseless pizza? Later, it was sparkled ginger cookies that helped me continue, but it honestly was Amy's pizza that made me realize that vegan did not equal disgusting.

Tofutti vegan cream cheese was a big one. I was a cream cheese addict.

As for a recipe, it was just the simple fact of buying VwaV. Suddenly I was like, "holy fork, I'm only fifteen but I can totally do all of this!"

I had forgotten about this! Does it not exist anymore? I'm pretty sure it used to exist at Fred Meyer here back when they had like three brands of vegan ice cream, now it's all coconut everything and no Good Karma.