Veganuary 2025

[kikisparks]

A thread for anyone doing this who might need any help or tips 😊 I’m already vegan but happy to offer suggestions or support if anyone wants it!

Wow yours looked much better stocked than ours! Main winner for me has been the dunkers but I thought margerita pizza was ok too.

Yes, but some people do still eat it and others have found substitutes. I'm not vegan, so make it with honey.

Oh no DH bought me a vegan Kit Kat and it's lovely! Not going to help my chocolate habit 🙈

Er well vegans don't eat it. Yes I use agave.

I’ll leave you to the thread then. Silly me.

Some vegans do use honey.
It's impossible in life to be 100% vegan- money isn't vegan, alot of medicine isn't vegan. Everyone will have their own personal 'exceptions'. Honey is one of mine.
I don't eat meat, fish, dairy, eggs, shellac, or wear leather or wool. But upon my own personal reasons I do use honey but I'd still class myself as a vegan. And i wouldn't want to put new vegans off by being overly dogmatic.

I think I’m off to Aldi tomorrow then making gochujang tofu, thanks to you lot! I’ve been vegan for 10+ years, it’s good to get inspiration.

I can vouch for the Lidl lasagne that’s in for veganuary, they’ve got lots of spreads, pestos and filled pastas which I’ve stocked up on.

Tonight I made a tomatoey vegetable stew with dumplings, but added sausages for DH and DD when serving, it was a very easy and popular meat/vegan meal

Also this is my go to, for the mac & cheese craving. It doesn’t use any fake cheese

https://realfood.tesco.com/recipes/vegan-mac-and-cheese.html

Thanks @Wavescrashingonthebeach

I’ll bugger off now.

It's a discussion as old as time. Simple fact really is that honey is not vegan. You can eat it it'll you like but doesn't make it vegan. That's not a criticism just a fact. Honey is an animal product made by bees for bees.

Use = eat

@despairnow exactly and the argument of comparing it to money or medicine is ridiculous, it's not like we can avoid those! Honey is completely optional. It's like saying oh I'm vegan but I eat bacon / cheese / yoghurt or whatever here and there.

Yes, honey isn’t vegan, (the definition of vegan is to avoid animal products as far as possible and practicable, so e.g. it’s not really practicable to live without a phone which may have involved animal exploitation, but probably is to live without honey)- but, whilst I don’t own the thread, IMO anyone is welcome in the veganuary thread as long as content of posts is not about consumption of animal products. Was hoping for this to be a support rather than debate thread. So @despairnow isn’t wrong for pointing out honey isn’t vegan but as far as I’m concerned those still consuming it are still welcome here, if they’re wanting to talk about efforts they are making towards veganism.

Not trying to criticise anyone either way, just wouldn’t want anyone looking for support not to be able to find it.

There's no issue with people transitioning that's great or just doing their own thing and eating more plant based stuff. But I'm not going to say honey is vegan just because someone wants to eat it. I'm sure everyone knows it's a very common topic along with eggs from your own chicken ( let's pls not go there 😀 )

Oh dear 😂 but also oh yes, I agree those vegan kitkats are magic, I had to exercise real self control not to add them to my online shopping order. I did buy more cauliflower rice (still not quite in space to make my own) and saw it’s actually not bad protein, 5g and just 70 cals in a portion.

I remembered something else my DH does to increase protein is to use Alpro high protein soya milk.

It's ok you don't need to feel you have to back me up or endorse me everyone who is vegan knows about honey. I'm completely sure and have been vegan for years.

@kikisparks have you tried switching some gram flour for wheat flour to increase protein? I do about 40% gram/60% wheat flour in the breadmaker plus seeds to make a loaf similar your DH’s protein bagels.

Fuck it. I’ll go and have a steak.

This was a nice thread OP - thanks for making people who were interested in maybe reducing their dairy and eggs welcome. Incidentally, a quick google showed several products called vegan honey, so one would hope a vegan could just read a recipe and make that cognitive leap.

Hey ho.

Of course- what's the big deal? There are loads of honey substitutes.. it's just annoying people trying to make their own definitions when it's not true and people saying it doesn't matter

Whatever. You go on being annoyed and I’ll go.

Sounds great! We are always pushed for time both working full time with a little one so rely on the convenience foods, but I do have some gram flour to try and make the vegan “omelette” recipe I linked up thread at some point.

Thanks for sharing. I use butternut squash in my mac n cheese too! I do use vegan cream cheese though as well as nooch. DH just found a recipe using cashews he wants to try as well which looks interesting and ups the protein content.

Please don't bugger off you are more than welcome here :)

I've been vegan for 19 years and for most of those I did not eat honey/ use bee products. It's only in more recent years I made a decision to include it as an exception for my own personal reasons. Its really not the same as bacon.
Bees are dying out and beekeepers are helping keep the population alive and pollinate plants which helps wildlife. From what I can see there is minimal cruelty involved if any. Not the same as poor pigs which I won't go into here as it's not the time or the place.
Of course it's optional.
Lots of things are optional. Should a vegan refuse to take the contraceptive pill because it contains lactose? Or painkillers because they couldn't find a vegan one?
If I'm less of a vegan in your eyes because of this exception then that's ok with me.
I won't derail the thread any further.

Maybe it might be worth making a separate thread in the vegan topic on honey and the extent to which it involves cruelty, exploitation and what if any positive impacts there are? I have my own views but I think going into them here is just really going to put people off. Veganuary is generally about exploring, yes both plant based food and the vegan moral argument about animals having thoughts, feelings and personalities and being worthy of our respect and not being harmed by us, but intricate debates on some of the more “fringe” topics might not be what people are looking for. If a back and forth on honey dominates the thread it’s going to be a real shame.