Newbie vegan shopping - weekly essentials?

[CupOhTea]

Hello!

I’ve decided today that I am not buying any more animal products for myself. I will eat what I’ve got in already, but when I do my next shop, next week, it would be good to have an idea of what to have in?

Any guidance much appreciated .

what sort of food do you enjoy at the moment? Do you like to cook from scratch?

Watching with interest

Thanks.

I do like cooking from scratch, but mainly easy things like one pot dishes and salads etc.

My family like pasta, but I steer clear of the wheaty kind and have courgette ribbons instead. Dh and I are very partial to a curry too.

Lunches are usually wraps / sandwiches / omelette / salads.

veganuary.com/starter-kit/accidentally-vegan-products-uk/

This may help for telling thing that are vegan, with the rest of the website including a beginners guide.

veganuary.com/starter-kit/

I have started bit by bit and begun with vegetarianism. Sometimes it's a big step all in one go.

The book Bosh is great, and they have a big youtube channel with lots of ideas:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqmn-vEmYbZ4wqMHt2ndZdQ

waves at cup

Yay welcome to the vegan boards, we’re all lovely over here.

I would recommend completely avoiding cheese to begin with otherwise vegan cheese will be awful for you. I love it now but I had to detox from the real thing.

Soya cream for sauces, I use coconut oil instead of butter, I eat a lot of hummus and I would literally die without my slow cooker as we tend to live off lentil based food and chickpea curries.

The sacla vegan pesto is nice too

Thanks all !

I’ll have a look at those links.

Hiiii @furrytoebean .

Chickpeas, butternut squash, aubergine, coconut milk curry paste and mushrooms. I also make big pots of vegetable/lentil and bean soups really chunky and flora buttery as a spread but it has palm oil in it.

So basically loads of veg, beans, pulses, rice and oat milk for a brew.

Oh and some dark chocolate as a staple treat

Thanks @NearlyVegan!

I’m starting a new shopping list, which makes it official .

Peanut butter. Almonds. Marmite for the vitamin B12. Vegetable stock. Coconut yoghurt maybe. Vegan pesto (the saltiness can be a good substitute for cheese eg on pizza I find).

Are you having plenty of other carbs if not wheat, be wary of cutting too much out.

Ok thank you @eveharknessrose.

I’ll make sure I include plenty of other grains .

Bah! I mean @EvaHarknessRose. Blimmin autocorrect!

I suggest a butternut squash and chickpea tangine and cous cous (you can buy harissa paste or make your own). Mixed bean chilli with rice and guacamole. Red kidney bean and mushroom curry with rice, pasta with aubergines ...

This all sounds lovely! Does everyone make their own guacamole or is there a vegan variety in shops please? I know a lot have cream.

I just make my own, I’m too stingy to buy it ready made

It may take some experimentation to find a plant milk you like. Lots of choices, almond, cashew, oat and soya for example. Then they come in either fresh or UHT form. Plus unsweetened or sweetened. Personally I make almond and cashew milk, but I've heard good things about Oatly Barista Style for use in tea and coffee.

I get through a lot of nutritional yeast as it gives a lovely cheesy flavour. I blitz it with cashews and sea salt to make parmesan or soaked cashews, lemon juice and apple cider vinegar to make sour cream.

Normal pasta is every bit as vegan but as you said you steer clear of tge wheat stuff, try red lentil pasta. The napolina one is gross but Sainsbury's do a lovely one.

When I have detoxed myself sufficiently off dairy cheese, I am definitely going to try those cheese and sour cream recipes.

Thanks for the wheat free pasta tip! I haven’t actually tried any and just have courgette or sometimes broccoli ‘rice’.

I really like the vegan soft cheese

Is it the coconut based one @furrytoebean? I nearly bought some of that recently, just to try it.

I like both the violife one and Tesco’s own brand

I'm not vegan, but my son has allergies to milk, egg and soya, and we do our best to eat vegetarian (and therefore vegan) a lot of the time.

I find it's much cheaper to cook naturally vegan dishes from scratch rather than try to sub in vegan versions of things. So, Jack Monroe's kidney bean burger costs pennies, compared to pounds for ready made ones. Also we can't eat a lot of the ready made stuff because it's all soya based.

I use oatly barista in tea and Koko yogurt. I agree with pp re the cheese. I didn't start using vegan cheese for a long time, and when I started it's really not that bad. I use violife now, which in my head tastes a bit like cheese strings. It melts ok too. I don't like the supermarket versions - unless they are flavoured heavily they have a strong aftertaste.

I reckon I could happily go full vegan, if it weren't for the soya issue. It's possible to avoid but it's in something like 60% of products and most vegan marketed food, so I often follow vegan recipes and swap the tofu/tempeh/etc for meat or pulses if possible.

DH & I like the Zest brand vegan pesto. We aren't vegan, although I used to be, & I still eat vegan a lot of the time.

One of my favourite meals is stuffed vegetables: a cross between this recipe and this recipe, sometimes I put a few potatoes in the pan around the edges too. They make a sort of sticky caramelised sauce from all the vegetable juices. I usually use a beef tomato, I cut the top off as a lid, although it works with aubergine or peppers as well, I cover with sliced tomato to keep the contents moist.

I need this thread.

I’m trying to eat vegan 2 days a week (I’m easing myself in slowly).

I made this today www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/spinach-sweet-potato-lentil-dhal

Ate it with some toast, it was fab.

Does anyone have any suggestions for making a bechamel sauce? There’s loads of suggestions on the web using all sorts of milks and oils. If anyone had any advice it would be much appreciated.

Do not forget a visit to the supplement aisle.

You MUST take vitamin B12 supplements, and it wouldn't be a bad idea to buy some iodine drops as well.
A good book about vegan nutrition would be a must-read. Look for brenda davis on youtube so you learn how to get your minerals from your diet.
Malnutrition is quite common amongst vegans, especially those eating "alternative" products. Try to be plant-based more than industry-plant base.