Can't find Vegan food in my town
Posted by anrh7727 on Aug 05, 2012 · Member since Aug 2012 · 1 posts
I am really having trouble finding vegan friendly food. Of course I've found vegetables, fruit, beans, nuts, and the simple things. My problem is I can't find tofu or anyhting to make an actual meal with. In my town we have Wal-mart, Krogers, and K-mart along with a few little family owned grocery stores.
Is anyone else having this problem, if so how are you dealing with it?
I would suggest that you take a look at the bean recipies here. Many are suitable for a main dish. Personally, I don't eat much premade veg*n food because it is either too expensive to feed 2 teens/young adults or has so much salt in it that I find it unpaletable. My DD was the first in our family to give up eating meat and I had a rough time adjusting my cooking for her but we have found things here that even my meat loving DH and DS will eat that do not contain tofu or other premade meat substitutes.
Also, have you asked at the stores about those items? Although I live in a vegetarian/vegan friendly area, I can not follow the logic of where some stores stock those items.
We live in a small town and our Kogers has a big selection of vegan food. You might ask one of the clerks or look for Bob's Red Mill Products. Tommie
You can order directly from Bob's Red Mill's website. For a while I wasn't alble to get TSP (slightly different than TVP) and I ordered it from them. You can also get large bags of vital wheat gluten so you can make your own seitan. For the tofu, Mori-Nu is shelf stable, so you can probably order it online as well. You can use it just as you would regular Chinese-style tofu as long as you freeze and thaw it first. The Mori-Nu website has many good recipe ideas.
I am very surprised your Krogers or Wal-Mart doesn't have ANY veggie patty, boca sort of thing.
You should ask them if their distributor carries them and, if so, if they would order them for you.. Don't feel like this is a huge burden to them--it is not and stores do it all the time.
Also, do you have any good cookbooks? It sounds like you already have a lot to work with but maybe could use some ideas.
You can order some food online. Also, would it be possible to travel to the nearest urban centre to stock up?
I agree with Semiveg.I think also if you look in the meat/diary alternative section on this site you might find something of interest.You will also feel much better sticking with beans as your protein.
I am new here and have to say although I am fortunate enough to live a large city and have tons of stuff available to me, I'd still prefer to make all my meals from scratch. I do have the benifit of being a certified cook but even so I found this site had some fantastic recipes that one coild make without having premade vegan foods such as tofu available. If you can buy dried beans, seeds nuts fresh herbs etc your good to go
We don't have a huge range of stuff in New Zealand but my flat mate used to buy a lot of stuff online. The only problem is the cheese substitutes... I just get creative with what I do find and also Asian Grocery stores sometimes have interesting Vegan options. Got any of those near by?