Goodbye Beef Feast?

Tiffany, the so far fantastically amazing girl I'm dating, is vegan. "Which," as Jules (Sam Jackson's character) from Pulp Fiction puts it, "more or less makes me a [vegan]." When the two of us eat together I've eaten vegan every time, but even without her present I have eaten vegetarian for about three weeks. I gotta be honest, it feels kinda good. I have more energy, I feel better, I sleep better. . . . Granted, many of those effects could have been achieved by simply eating healthier, with or without meat and dairy, but so far I don't have much of a desire to eat either. I know three weeks isn't very long, but I wanted to share a few things that have made it easier for this meat-lover to go meatless.

Eat as little fake meat as possible. The right way to eat vegan in my opinion is to eat vegan things that are good, not vegan wannabe non-vegan things. To put it another way, it should be "good food" not "good vegan food." For example, the worst thing I've had so far was a "Philly Cheese Steak" sandwich from the Vertical Diner. At the suggestion of my (telephone) server I got it with the imitation chicken. I probably should have gone with the portabello mushroom, cuz the "cheese" sauce was actually pretty good. Why does vegan food have to pretend to be other food? It doesn't, and I don't think it should.

Pick somebody's brain. Find someone who has been vegan or vegetarian for a while and ask them questions. Better yet, date someone who has been vegan or vegetarian for a while, this makes everything easier. Also, it doesn't hurt if your persons works at Mazza and used to work at Sage's. Or any other delicious vegan-friendly restaurants.

Cook. A lot. You'll eat healthier and cheaper, and you'll know better how much protein etc. you're getting. Tiffany and I have made some kick ass meals, spring rolls with peanut sauce, stuffed pasta shells with homemade marinara, mole, some blueberry muffins.

Diversify. It seems like a lot of vegans eat a lot of soy. (Literally, a shit-load.) For proteins choose mushrooms, non-soy tempeh, beans, whatever - I mean, man cannot live on tofu alone. Also rice, almond, and oat milk are good alternatives to soy milk. I'm gonna say it again, cuz it's important for new-comers to vegan eating like me, make sure you don't eat too much soy. Not only will it mess with your digestion, but I understand you can build up a weird sort of tolerance where your body starts to reject soy proteins.

Thanks for humouring me on this one, this is by no means a comprehensive list of things to keep in mind, just a few that have made a transition pretty good for me. I have no idea where I'll go from here, whether I'll cut out dairy all together or how long I'll stay meatless. But this experience has definitely changed my perspective, it has made eating vegan a joy rather than a burden.