Vegan Substitutes For A Healthy, Ecological And Compassionate Kitchen

Going vegan implies more things than eating only 100% plant-based: it is about rejecting all exploitation to which we subject animals in all areas (clothing, sports, leisure …).

The kitchen is where this change stands out the most, since we have to eat every day and each of these meals can represent a change for us as well as for the other animals.

I am not saying that it is the only thing or that it is enough, but I do say that it is the basics and that it has the greatest impact with just making a few modifications. That is to say, although right now you cannot dedicate yourself to activism, you do have every day in your hands the opportunity to make each meal an act of rebellion and of struggle for other animals.

Eliminating meat, eggs and dairy from our diet is easier than it seems, in fact it may be easier to eliminate everything at once than to do it gradually, since this way we do not make excuses such as “if I am already reducing consumption” . If you look back and carefully write down everything you ate, you will see that you have not really reduced anything.

Initiatives such as “Meatless Monday” are a way for you to understand this, that for a whole day you do not consume any meat and see the difference with respect to the rest of the days. And it shouldn’t stop there, meatless Mondays should lead to more meatless days within the same week until there are finally no days with animal-based ingredients.

There are many reasons to eliminate meat, dairy and eggs from our diet, for example the millions of animals that are exploited and slaughtered for it. Or the environment, which suffers from the large amount of resources that have to be allocated to these industries for inefficient production. Or for your health.

How to replace meat in our diet

The first thing we think of when removing the meat from a plate is that it is half empty. To fill that gap easily visually and culinary there are meat “substitutes” that imitate all kinds of preparations, from hamburgers to sausages, steaks, fish, pieces of meat, skewers, schnitzels … They are a good resource to use while diversifying your kitchen and learning to eat differently.

If your plate, when removing the meat, remains empty, you are already doing something wrong: it should contain other ingredients such as vegetables and cereals in greater quantity, as recommended by the Harvard Plate.

The substitutes are for sporadic consumption, not for daily consumption. It will always be much better, cheaper and more affordable to use legumes and derivatives.

Start with the chicken

It is the most consumed meat, and therefore one of the industries that kills the most animals.

• Instead of buying chicken, buy textured soybeans. It is cheaper, has a very good texture, is high in protein and will last you for a long time in a tightly closed container. Textured soy is just as good for burgers as it is for lasagna.
• Instead of buying chicken, buy seitan or gluten to make the seitan at home. Complete any dish with a seitan fillet or chunky seitan. Make sandwiches with slices of seitan instead of cold cuts.
• Instead of chicken, buy tofu. Now they sell it in almost any supermarket. Also in vegan stores, some herbalists and in oriental food stores. You can use tofu in many ways. For example, it can be used as is for salads and sandwiches, it can be browned, it can be fried, it can be marinated, and it can be made into meatballs if needed.
• Instead of chicken, buy legumes. Legumes are not just for stew. If you have little time, buy them already cooked, by boat. You can make them sautéed, beaten (like hummus), stuff cabbage leaves with them, make salads, sauces, creams … Legumes are the cheapest and most versatile and you can turn them into anything.

Do not worry, you do not have to learn all the recipes in a single day, it is about trying but always changing the meat for one of these options.

The rest of meats

Do with the rest the same as you did with the chicken. It will be very easy for you. Little by little, day by day, try a new recipe.

Leave yourself food for the days you don’t have time. Always have things in the pantry that can help you, even if they are vegan substitutes, vegan frozen croquettes and things like that. Over time they will cease to be a useful item to be something for very occasional consumption.

Find new recipes and use spices to mimic the flavors you like.

Dairy: we have plant-based alternatives to milk, yogurt, and cheese

The unsweetened soy drink is the most similar to cow’s milk nutritionally, although we usually drink milk only with coffee or cocoa, or to make a sauce. The soy drink works perfectly for these applications because of its high protein content, white color, and rather neutral taste. There will be no bechamel that can resist you.

You also have other vegetable drinks such as oatmeal, rice, almonds, coconut, etc., which also serve you both to drink as a drink and to cook with them.

In the case of yogurts, we mainly have soy and coconut, in supermarkets and vegan stores, which are made the same as the traditional ones, so their flavor is almost the same. They are fermented, but do not contain milk, they are made with vegetable drinks.

These yogurts can also be used exactly like dairy to make sauces, curries, etc.

Substitute the eggs

I understand that it seems very practical to make a fried egg and that’s it, but for the hens it is hell and for you a birria of food. In the time it takes to make a fried or cooked egg, you can make a well-stocked salad, with legumes, with tofu, with all the vegetables you want. Also at the same time you can brown seitan in the pan, make a tofu scramble or heat some vegan burgers.

When we have according to what deeply ingrained customs at first it seems strange, we do not see what other things we can do, we see the empty plate. Actually we just have to look around and see that we are surrounded by hundreds of vegetables and vegetables, that we have a lot of cereals (rice, corn, quinoa, spelled, wheat, millet …) and legumes, and on top we also have vegan preparations such as hamburgers , sausages, croquettes, pizzas and vegetable meats.

Make the change as soon as possible, and you will get used to it much faster.