FOOD REPLACEMENTS AND SUBSTITUTES, ETC.
Hello All,
I was hoping you would help me and others that are clueless about food replacements the know how to cook dishes the vegan way by simply helping us understanding product replacements.
For example, I had no idea that there were eggs substitutes until these past days, So I deprived my family completely from cooking eggs in the mornings, which in the past had been a routine.
I'm a fresh at this and I'm learning more from when I shop at the whole foods market and my-organic-market by reading labels and asking the staff, but I really shouldn't be taking this much time in the store, especially when I have 3 kids with me! :P
It disturbs my whole routine.
I've been very creative in my cooking and have been picking up pieces here and there from your posts.
Also is there really such a thing as vegan margarine? ???
I was hesitant about posting this before because I don't want anyone judging me with thinking all this products are meat and animal anectodes. I just want to be more smart about this and effecient in my cooking, I had been taught a whole different way of cooking in the past but if I can do in a similar way with vegan replacement products it would be a lot easier.
Also as I heard here, which doesn't make sense there's such thing as vegan junk?
I'm trying to stay away from heavy pastry or two much pasta and sugar.
If you have knowledge of whole grain brandname products that would be great. If you have more knowledge of spices and what dishes they are good for. Please reply as well.
Also if it's okay I don't want to cook anything yucky,that would taste like cardboard as I attempted with ground beef imitations but I suppose there are more flavorful vegan kinds that I haven't explored yet. Please I hope I don't offend anyone here. I'm very non-judgemntal what's good for you may not appeal to me but I still want to learn about. In a different time I'm sure to give it a try as I do with anything.
One thing is for sure. I DO NOT WANT TO EAT ANY ANIMAL PRODUCTS AGAIN OR to eat anything processed after animal products or with hiding ingredients with weird names.
I prefer simple dishes but I still want to learn about extensive recipes and their elaborated engredients. If anyone here also knows about vegan nutrition and what to stay away from please reply.
Please feel free to mention brands because that is just easier to shop in a hurry.
You can make your post short, I don't want to take much of your time if you don't have any.
For example:
MILK=
BUTTER=
SAUSAGE=
CHEESE=
BOIULON=
ETC.
Thank you and please reply.
MILK= Silk or Eden Farms Soymilk, Rice Dream (made of rice) and Almond Breeze (made from almonds, of course) You may have to try several things before you find something that's OK with your family
BUTTER= Earth Balance or Smart Balance Organic (other Smart Balance types aren't vegan)
SAUSAGE= Gimme Lean (my husband bought this & I'm not totally sure it's vegan, though)
CHEESE= Follow Your Heart Vegan Gourmet Cheese is the best I've found but it's not a perfect substitute as far as taste goes.
BOIULON= Better than Boullion in "chicken" or "beef" flavor.
Thanks T.
I knew from you posts I could count on you. Keep posting if you think of anything else. Thank you soooo, so much for some of the brand names it will really help!
Milk= I like Silk products. Very Vanilla is great if you're still getting used to soymilk. It's like melted vanilla ice cream, it's that rich and delicious! Also, Almond Breeze vanilla is very good. I see T mentioned that, too.
Butter= Earth Balance is great! I also have Smart Balance Light, and Blue Bonnet Light.
Sausage= I really haven't bought one that was *great*. I recommend the tempeh sausage crumbles in Vegan With a Vengeance. So good!
Cheese= I'm clueless here. These products are hard to get where I live (2-3 hrs from nearest Whole Foods) I did once purchase the Tofutti singles, and wasn't too impressed with them. I may have just expected too much though.
Bouillon= I just use veggie broth
As far as eggs, if you're wanting something like scrambled eggs, use well drained crumbled tofu. For baking, the best egg replacer is going to depend on what you're baking. I really like using flax, personally. That's 1 Tbs of milled flax seed mixed really well with 3 Tbs of hot water.
If you ever have any questions, don't hesitate to ask! Don't feel bad, or worry about looking dumb. We all started out somewhere, too. And if there's anything a veg*n likes to do, it's to help out an aspiring veg*n!!
As far as eggs, if you're wanting something like scrambled eggs, use well drained crumbled tofu. For baking, the best egg replacer is going to depend on what you're baking. I really like using flax, personally. That's 1 Tbs of milled flax seed mixed really well with 3 Tbs of hot water.
Thank you so much Tkitty. You're the best.
Hey does that mean that egg substitutes are not appropriate for scramble eggs?
Also have you heard of Vegenaise, is that a sub for mayo? I was just browsing a recipe from someone and the person mentiones it.
Yep, Vegenaise is a sub for mayo. It's really good, too. Commercial egg replacers, such as Ener-G are useful for baking, because they are made up of starches and a leavening agent. They don't have the consistency of eggs. The closest you're gonna get as a vegan is tofu. Also, Ener-G is good in some recipes, but it is by no means *essential* in the vegan kitchen.
If you're looking for scrambled eggs, tofu's the way to go. There are tons of recipes for scrambled tofu floating around the www. Quite a few here, I know.
Thanks againTKitty!
I haven't cooked with tofu yet. I suppose I need to try soon. Do people use Tofu for consistency then? I heard it doesn't have any flavor.
I'm going to look it up for the scrambled recipes here. It never occurred to me they could be vegan, I though they were vegetarian meals involving eggs. ???
No problem!
Tofu's great. I love it. I think tofu has a mild, pleasant, slightly beany taste to it, but when I first went veg I didn't detect it. In baked goods, tofu can help bind your ingredients together; as part of an entree, tofu adds another texture that can be "meaty". You'll want to press tofu well, then let it marinate for a bit.
When I first went vegan, I too was confused by "scrambled" on websites. Then I realized they were using tofu!
hi mindwalk! :D
what kinds of foods do you like to eat? you said you like flavorful foods and want to avoid cardboard (don't we all!)
Omy gosh BayPuppy! I've been waiting for your reply all day. Your cooking looks great and your great knowledge. I have to try one of your recipes.
As far as it goes for what I like to eat. I like everything but cardboard...
You made laugh... ;) ;D
It's more like, to adjust my family, esp. my children. they use to love my cooking now they are great food critics. They used to love spagetty,chicken and baked sweet stuff, which kinda is a bummer because I wanna kinda cut that out (baked sweet stuff) for a bit and I'm trying to introduce more natural foods to them like vegetable dishes, soy yogurt, soy chcolate milk, hemp chocolate milk.
They get their sweets in the smoothies I make but I think they miss the crunch, and flavor they were used to have in chicken. I think.
I dunno. :-\
i will think of some recipes that i like a lot that your kids might enjoy. . i'll post those after i make some dinner.
Woman, please I know you're busy. My gosh from what I read, you teach and I'm sure wekends are your first break. DO NOT put me on your To Do's list. I would feel too bad. I rather explore your recipes and any advise you think in the future.
I will try Tofu in my cooking more, as you and TKitty suggested, now I know in WHAT to cook with which seems to be a lot of variety of dishes.
I will also try the delicious looking crunchies that I see here for the kids, that at least the ones th whole grain written on it. ;D
Thanks BayPuppy! :)
Thanks PrettyinPunk! :)
You know I have a bunch of vegetable boullions already before I decided to go vegan, but I haven't been using them, because I wasn't sure they were vegan and because they are not organic,I also tried this Indian Vegan vegetable curry gourmet sauce that I found at a regular store. It was really good.
I think it was called Maya it made a great vegetable dish. Next time I'll try it with Tofu.
I know a lot of you have mentioned Gimme Lean. I tried it already, my kids hated it! :-[
I'll definitely try the Earth Balance and other butters you guys had mentioned as well. I didn't paid any notice that they may actually be vegan. I used to use "Smart" Balance because it just sounded healthier than the other butters and that it had no trans fats but I had stopped buying butters because I thought it was dairy for some reason though... :-\
BayPuppy I just want to thank you for alll these links and the time you put in. You're awesome. :)
I'll be sure to give it a try to some things. It all looks like things my children will enjoy.
You mentioned that your kids might miss chicken. Frozen, thawed and pressed tofu (not as difficult as it sounds) has a consistency that some say is like chicken, I can't remember chicken well enough to compare. You can buy vegan chicken stock (I only know of Massels, but I'm in NZ). Perhaps you could experiment with marinating tofu in "chicken" stock, or making a "chicken" soup, with tofu as the "meat".
oh, Hi mindwalk! I have seen a few of your commnets around and thought you seem like a pretty neat person! Don't feel badly about posting anything here on vegweb. Some of my posts have gotten a little silly and everyone still tolerates it pretty well. I just became vegan back in March and found my way to vegweb. I was vegetarian before that. Still, I was SO overwhelmed by the number of changes I had to learn immediately. I can't imagine if I had the added stress or of raising a (vegan?) family! I know you said you want to try to avoid highly processed foods, but you may find that some of the frozen entrees are your best bet for the transition period. One thing I have to recommend is something called Tofurkey! it comes in log form in your frozen food section of Trader Joes and Wild Oats. It taste just like a thanksgiving turkey (at least, I think it does, hard to remember for sure) thats an easy meal to have meatless sides with (potatoes and green beans maybe?) Another safe bet is chili! I know its summer but chili is easy to veganize! I like the gimme lean sausage crumbles (now that T in Texas mentioned she didn't know they were vegan I'm nervous...)
One ingredient that tricked me for the first few months of being vegan was "casin" they throw that into a lot of soy cheese for some crappy reason. It is a dairy protein. I know "veggie sherd's" brand DO have it. Check out the possibility of ordering somethings on-line. Roads End is available at a health store near me but they also have a website. http://www.chreese.com/. One veg cheese I have heard great reviews on is called sheese. Its imported from Ireland, so its kinda expensive, but from what I hear pretty much identical to real cheese in consistency, taste and cooking quality. I guess its like 10 dollars? http://www.buteisland.com/
You will find that most of the relay cheap breads are vegan. (watch out for D3 added to the minerals) I'm not sure if the "wheat" bread is actually whole wheat or not. A lot of the ones that I know for sure are whole wheat also have honey in it.
Check out PETAs accidentally vegan webpage. It lists tons of common foods that are vegan. Some junky foods, others less junky. http://www.peta.org/accidentallyVegan/VeganShoppingQS-Staples.asp?Category=Staples
Stick around here and you will pick up loads of tips! Good luck!