OK, I have to admit it. This is my report on Day 7 about 2 weeks late... oops. My bad. I have some really interesting reflections at this point though so I actually think my busy schedule and procrastination have paid off :).
*photo and recipe credit Serious Eats
Lunch: We are eating at a friends house tonight for dinner and we're ordering out so to keep my 7 day cooking plan I decided I needed to cook lunch today - on a Saturday of all days. Aren't Saturday's for relaxing? Well, remember how I RAVEEEED about theVegan Chili on Day 2? Making lunch on a Saturday was OK because it involved all of my favorite things - including that chili, FRITOS, jalapeños, pickled onions and avocados! Who knew that vegan cooking included FRITOS? I love fritos. Seriously, I adore them - the scoops ones because once you eat scoops the other ones seem so puny! This was the best lunch I may have ever had and most of the prep work was already done!
*photo and recipe credit Serious Eats
Lunch: We are eating at a friends house tonight for dinner and we're ordering out so to keep my 7 day cooking plan I decided I needed to cook lunch today - on a Saturday of all days. Aren't Saturday's for relaxing? Well, remember how I RAVEEEED about theVegan Chili on Day 2? Making lunch on a Saturday was OK because it involved all of my favorite things - including that chili, FRITOS, jalapeños, pickled onions and avocados! Who knew that vegan cooking included FRITOS? I love fritos. Seriously, I adore them - the scoops ones because once you eat scoops the other ones seem so puny! This was the best lunch I may have ever had and most of the prep work was already done!
To make this 'frito chili pie' I did the following:
I pickled some onions by doing the following:
Now that I've had the chili this way, I may not go back to the original way - it's that good people!
I pickled some onions by doing the following:
- Combined 1/2 c white vinegar, 1/2 c water, 1/4 c sugar, and 1 tsp salt in a small saucepan. Brought it to a boil over high heat. Added 1 sliced (rings) jalapeño and 1 small red onion (diced into half moons). Cooked it, stirring frequently, until the onions had lightly softened and were translucent and the jalapeños became dirty green, about 2 minutes. Removed from heat and put in small bowl and then set the bowl in an ice bath because I was too hungry to wait for it to cool ;)
Now that I've had the chili this way, I may not go back to the original way - it's that good people!
Dinner: For dinner we were at a friends house who knew we were eating Vegan. Again, it required me to do my research on what I could and could not have. We ended up getting Thai food from a local delivery place. I didn't know how many vegan Thai options there were! I got a green tofu curry and the hubs got an eggplant curry. We also had some fried eggplant. I'm now hooked. It was so freaking fantastic that I had to make my own thai food a few nights later. DELICIOUS. Also, I'm hooked on tofu now. Woot!
My review of my 7-day vegan challenge.
I started the 7-day vegan challenge to, well, challenge myself and see how hard it was to live a vegan lifestyle. What I learned is I'm actually not as obsessed with meat as I thought I was and there are plenty of substitutes for good protein. I still miss me some cheese but not as much as I originally thought. I used to load my chili with cheese and I've come to realize that if you just make a really good batch of chili, there is absolutely no need for the cheese lol. Also, I've come to appreciate how much effort it takes to be vegan - you have to plan every meal and you can never trust others to know what 'vegan' means. Also, if you don't plan ahead and eat out - you can't really trust anything there either! I've also come to appreciate tofu and vegetables more and am craving them now over other meat counterparts. Now don't get me wrong - I'm not going vegan for life or vegetarian even, but I appreciate it now.
Update: It's been 2 weeks since the vegan challenge and I find myself integrating more vegetables into my diet. I've made the vegan chili (a double batch!) and eaten several black bean burgers. There are also days when I realize, especially when our milk has gone bad and I have to use leftover almond milk, that I've eaten vegan all day on my own lol. Overall, it was a GREAT experience and I recommend this to anyone out there!
*knowgirl Scarlett
I started the 7-day vegan challenge to, well, challenge myself and see how hard it was to live a vegan lifestyle. What I learned is I'm actually not as obsessed with meat as I thought I was and there are plenty of substitutes for good protein. I still miss me some cheese but not as much as I originally thought. I used to load my chili with cheese and I've come to realize that if you just make a really good batch of chili, there is absolutely no need for the cheese lol. Also, I've come to appreciate how much effort it takes to be vegan - you have to plan every meal and you can never trust others to know what 'vegan' means. Also, if you don't plan ahead and eat out - you can't really trust anything there either! I've also come to appreciate tofu and vegetables more and am craving them now over other meat counterparts. Now don't get me wrong - I'm not going vegan for life or vegetarian even, but I appreciate it now.
Update: It's been 2 weeks since the vegan challenge and I find myself integrating more vegetables into my diet. I've made the vegan chili (a double batch!) and eaten several black bean burgers. There are also days when I realize, especially when our milk has gone bad and I have to use leftover almond milk, that I've eaten vegan all day on my own lol. Overall, it was a GREAT experience and I recommend this to anyone out there!
*knowgirl Scarlett