One Week Down: Veggie January

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I love Christmas. And I love, love, love Christmas food.

But come January 1, I'm dying for some fresh foods. I'm all down for salads and roasted Mediterranean vegetables and definitely don't want to see any sprouts. Nor any sort of desserts with raisins in. Stollen, Christmas Cake, Christmas pudding... why so many raisins?!

The other thing I get bogged down with at Christmas time is the amount of meat I seem to consume.

On Christmas Day, we're not just happy with a turkey, sometimes we'll even have three-bird roasts, and not content with the amount of meat we're necking we then have pigs in blankets, delicious meat-wrapped-in-even-more-meat concoctions. And sausage meat stuffing, this year ours was covered in bacon too!

After all the big meals and the leftovers, I'm definitely in need of a break from meat come New Year. So it's time for a month off.

I feel like there are a lot of very good reasons to eat less meat - ethical, environmental and for health reasons - and January seems as good as any time to do it.

A few years ago a colleague of mine did 'veganuary' and she did really well on it - but just seeing her plough on with it every day convinced me I'd be no good! I have a lot of digestive issues and just wouldn't be able to eat a lot of vegan foods. Plus - cheese. And chocolate! How do you survive a whole month with neither of those???

All of the cheese...

However, I was veggie for eight whole years so figured it would be a doddle for a month.

Phil had originally suggested the idea - and I was fully on board - though I think he secretly didn't think I'd go through with it haha! Too late sorry bubba!

Homemade mushroom and red onion risotto with veggie parmesan

This is what we've found during the first week -

- Quorn chicken nuggets are a very, very, close match to regular chicken nuggets - but not quite as nice as McDonald's

- Cooking on an evening means you can have all kinds of different foods - we even tried a meat-free chicken Kiev from Morrisons and it was lovely, and had loads less calories than regular ones.

Meat-free Kievs were the same as chicken ones!

- Lunches are a bit harder, we've both eaten lots of soup, but this week I'm cooking roasted veg with mozzarella and pesto for something different.

- Eating out is a challenge. There are so few inspired options for veggies. You're lucky if they have one or two things on some menus - I have no idea what vegans must eat!

The nutroast from the Dog and Duck at Walkington was delicious!

- I missed pork crackling on my Sunday roast, but Yorkshires and roasties basically make up for it!

- Some veggie food is very expensive - but other bits aren't too bad - we've found frozen over fresh for the best bargains.

- Not all veggie food is healthy! You have to watch the amount of fat and calories in things - four cheese tortellini was way more calorific than any of the meat versions!

One week down and it's all good so far - the only thing I have craved randomly is Chorizo - but I know Phil struggled when he had to make do with a veggie burger from Maccy Ds when his friends all had meat!



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