Being sober 24/7 means that you have loads more time to get boring, pernickety things done. Things that aren't remotely creative, but still require you to think in a structured, methodical manner.
So the chore my accountant has been hassling me to do for three months got done today. A hard-drive got reformatted. New LED bulbs were chosen and ordered. This is productive on one level, but utterly tedious on another. I usually spend Saturday mornings bimbling about with a mild hangover, either eating a bacon-and-egg bap or wondering when I'll get a chance to. Most of this Saturday I just wanted to be over.
The weekly shop was fun, though - buying anything which fitted my criteria of a) vegan b) two minutes prep time. I bought far too much and spent a fortune. It was great.
I did also make the Jamie Oliver veg chilli (see above and in the vlog below) which people on facebook recommended. It was very tasty, but took about 90 minutes to prepare, cook, eat and wash up. I spend most of my weekend catering for and cleaning up after small people, so I don't need to be doing the same for me.
I am on the look out for a vegan ready-meal supplier. If there isn't one - I have a business idea. The Lazy Vegan. Hit me up. It might catch on.
***************************
Weight: 11st 7.8lb
Exercise: None.
Food:
Two slices of toast, pure olive spread and marmite.
Handful of grapes.
Porridge with the last of the almond milk, thank god. Syrup.
Half a packet of lime salted naan chips.
Spaghetti and tomato and chilli.
Hummous and a carrot.
Jamie Oliver's vegetable chilli.
Hello special friends. I thought this newly reactivated blog would be mainly about not-drinking again. It's not. The vegan aspect has entirely taken over. I will admit to a couple of Friday night drink spasms which passed as quickly as they arrived, however the novelty of veganism has meant I haven't missed animal products at all.
I think what I particularly like is being able to eat as much as I want and still lose weight, though that will plateau for a bit, especially after what I ate on Day 5. It's all posted below, as is my daily vlog in which I admit to start feeling like something of a vegan imposter, but for the rest of this post I'm going to hand over to Mary Sweeney, a vegan who plays for the roller derby team "Soy Division" ("rad name, huh?").
Mary very kindly, on the back of a passing suggestion from a mutual friend, sent me a *load* of advice on sensible vegan eating. The volume of information and her writing style was too good to keep to myself so asked if I could post her email up here. She very kindly acceded. If you are thinking of going vegan (particularly if you live in London), here's the 101:
"DAILY TIPS
I know you're a journo and you're often out and about... chain cafés are getting their act together when it comes to offering vegans (and gf/coeliac people also) options. They're getting better with their labelling. Caffé Nero offer some kind of fruit-based crumble bar that's pretty scrummy. I tend to stick with soya milk at coffee shops. I've tried coconut milk at Starbucks and it's just a bit flat for me. Some indie coffee shops offer Oatly Barista milk for their drinks, which is the tits.
Pret - one of the few chains to open a 'Veggie Pret' - there's one in Soho just by the John Snow pub. All veggie and vegan. Proper impressed the community with that :) So they're definitely a company who are committed to providing more options. All of their stores do daily soups, and try and offer a vegan / gf option every day. Souper Tomato, I've also had a great lentil-based one that was scrummy. They offer some vegan sandwiches, but I am not often a fan of those.
SNACKS
Stock up on the likes of Trek bars (they're good), bags of nuts and pieces of fruit...on days off, I eat more avocados now, but that's when I have time to mash one up with a smidgin of garlic, lemon juice, and mash it all down on some toasted sourdough...mmmmm.
VEGAN CHEESE
I'll be honest, I miss cheese. It tastes great! But let's remember it's essentially breast milk from another mammal that we've been conditioned to think we need to have. We don't. Also - something else to put you off... lots of cows get mastitis (infected udders) so don't think it's just pure milk you're getting in your pint...and also, when do mammals produce milk? When they're pregnant. How comes we're drinking that milk? Because the calf is taken from the mother shortly after birth so we can rinse her for all of her milk. When her body is knackered from repeated births...she's sent off to be slaughtered for cheap cuts of meat. Now, I don't know about you, but that sounds pretty horrendous, just so we can have a cheese and Branston cob, right? There are lots of standard-style 'cheeses' you can get and I'd say try - on your first outing - Violife mozzarella style cheese..maybe melted on some toast, with some mushrooms on top and some fresh basil. Mmm... toastie goodness. There are also artisan 'cheeses' small vegan companies make...which taste great but are also rather expensive!
WHOLE FOODS / HEALTH SHOPS
They offer a lot of great 'equivalents' if you wish to go down that road. Worth a visit if you're not busy to go and have a gander. I visit them to get odd things to supplement my diet. There is a school of thought or some vegans who really avoid all that 'fake meat / cheese' stuff and just go full on for the leafy veg, fruit, grains, pulses, etc. Definitely go for the natural stuff whenever you can.
COOKING
TONS of recipes on the internet for a plant-based diet. And you can veganise existing recipes if you're any type of foodie / someone that's good with cooking.
EATING OUT
There are SO many good restaurants catering for vegans nowadays, whether it's a regular 'omni' style place offering a few options, or, even better, dedicated veggie & vegan places. Here's a short list of a few of my faves:
Mildreds - branch in Soho, I hear there is a branch in Marylebone too now Tibits - off Regent Street, on Heddon St. Buffet-style but the food is good if you're around W1 and want a plate of decent food quick. I think they're Swiss originally. The Gate - Hammersmith. Round the side of the Apollo, heading down towards the river. I take a few Omni mates there who are happy to eat veg occasionally and they all love it. Food is soooooo good. You won't be disappointed. Check out their website.
DIRTY FOOD
If you're craving some down 'n' dirty vegan fried 'chic'n' at some point and you can be arsed to go to Hackney, try the Temple of Seitan! :) - a 5 min walk from Hackney Central Overground, on Morning Lane. I believe they're planning a second branch in Camden at some point.
If you're doing this for weight loss I'd also advise getting some chia seeds into your diet. You can buy them in supermarkets - usually stocked in the same area as Trek bars, energy bars, all that wholefood type stuff. When I say supermarkets I mean Waitrose, I think Sainsburys, Tescos. Morrisons... probably not. Otherwise good old Holland and Barrett. Used in South America by people on long treks you can add water to them and they swell up into this gel. Really really good for you. I sometimes add oat milk to them and a touch of cinnamon and shake it up and leave it for 30 minutes for a healthy breakfast style smoothie. Could probably put a teaspoon of chocolate protein powder in there if you wanted for extra flavour.
CRISPS
Lots of crisps have milk in. I KNOW RIGHT WHAT'S THAT ABOUT?!?! It fixes the flavour. Kettle Chips are good with labelling their products as suitable for vegans. Walkers - not so. I was overjoyed at Ikea Wembley today (!!) to find their sour cream and onion crisps are vegan.
PROTEIN
As you can't fill your body with animal stuff, you may get hungrier initially. We don't need as much protein as we're often told we do, but you do need to think about where you are getting your protein from. What I do tend to have in is a chocolate vegan protein powder for days I am active. Sometimes I add a spoonful of peanut butter and a banana to it and blend it up. Usually have that combo if I'm playing roller derby that day. The powder I use is called Amazing Grass which Whole Foods stock. I asked my vegan pals in the roller derby challenge team what they would recommend and they suggested looking at supplements and shakes from Huel, the vegan range from Protein Works, Jacked on the Beanstalk, Simnett Nutrition, Soy Protein Isolate from Bulk Powders and Vivolife.
SUPPLEMENTS
B12. Get a decent B12 supplement from Whole Foods. Makes like Solgar, or BioCare, Viridian, or Terra Nova are decent companies who should do a B12 supplement. I've bought Solgar's before. Some plant milks are fortified with B12, but not sure all are. I think Alpro fortify all of their milks, but I tend to stick to Oatly now, and not sure they do. Apparently some breakfast cereals are fortified too but cereal is a big barrel of nonsense as far as I'm concerned so I don't touch the stuff. B12 is also in Marmite, so if you love it and don't hate it, have that too. But for a regular supply a B12 nugget is probably best.
You'll also do yourself a favour if you have Omega 3. Tbh, EVERYONE could benefit from Omega 3 from all I've read - I think a typical Western diet has too much Omega 6 and 9 but not enough Omega 3. The aforementioned chia seeds are good for Omega 3s. You can also get Omega 3 oils. I sometimes - every few months - get a bottle of hemp oil from the chilled section at my local health food shop in Ealing.
FRUIT AND VEG
...ah, Nature's goodness. You'll be eating more of that I reckon. Fill your boots. The more you eat raw, the better, your gut will thank you for it. Look up the idea of 'crowding out' - it's about 'crowding out' the bad foods with so many good / filling / fibrous foods that couldn't eat toxic nonsense even if you tried! Great huh? :)"
Thanks Mary. I went back to Mary and asked her about vegan booze, just to complete the set, not that I'm wavering or anything (honest!) and I will put together an end of Dry January Vegan Booze Celebration list at the end of the month. Maybe we should have a party or something...?!
Two slices of home made toast with Pure olive spread and Apricot Jam
Hike Christmas pudding bar
Granny Smith apple
Raw cashew and date bar
Entire bag of roasted unsalted cashews
Wagamama meal including veggie gyoza, a vegan curry and vegan sorbet
Finished off the Montezuma Black Forest Gateau chocolate
My first day without almond milk, which is a start. I'll finish off the sweetened stuff tomorrow, but I still have some of the unsweetened muck to go. I received a tweet from a Criminals: Caught on Camera fan who works in an almond processing plant in California in the light of my last blog post so I will be careful what I say.
It was my third 5am start on the bounce this morning. I know I used to get up at 3.45am five days a week, but I was usually done by 11am. This last few days I've been putting in the hard yards, culminating in a day covering the row about rough sleepers in Windsor for ITV News.
This was initially powered by another Christmas Pudding Hike bar. I was working all day with top ITV cameraman Marc Smith today and he joined me for a 10.30am lunch at a cafe in Windsor after two hours pounding the pavements.
There was a felafel salad in the cafe fridge which was vegan but I was cold, so we had baked potato with beans (no butter) and shared a packet of Tyrell's crisps which didn't contain milk (or whey powder). The first few I picked up did. But this one didn't. Vegan-tastic. The owner of the cafe was great. He had a brief period of homelessness before managing to sort himself out and ended up running a business which can still make a healthy profit despite having to hand over tens of thousands in rent and business rates to pay for his prime position near Windsor Castle. He was a thoughtful, caring man and his equilibrium remained totally intact even when Marc tipped a full cup of boiling hot coffee all over his counter.
Marc and I shared my Paleo Macadamia and Coconut bar on our way to interview the Thames Valley Police and Crime Commissioner in Newbury. Whilst in the car I got a call from "getsurrey" re my contribution to their film and article about veganuary. I will record it tomorrow if I get a chance. The head of Surrey Vegans has also added me to her secret list, which is very exciting.
At Newbury station I was hungry, but everything I thought I might be able to eat at the station cafe had some kind of milk extract in it, so I got home on a soy americano and diet coke. Dinner was an itsu pot noodle and more Montezuma chocolate.
Oh and I have gone from 11st 12lb to 11st 8lb in four days. They aren't very reliable scales, though.
Exercise: 10 mins cycling (and a lot of walking around Windsor)
Food:
Christmas Pudding Hike bar
Half a Paleo Macadamia bar
Granny Smith Apple
Baked potato, beans, lettuce, brown sauce
2 x soy americano
itsu vegetarian pot noodle
Handful of grapes
Montezuma cherry chocolate
It's been another long day. Yesterday's train journey into Waterloo was nearly deserted, today it seemed very busy, even on the 0555. Before I left the house this morning I had a bowl of Malted Wheaties (Shreddies, basically) and chilled (this time), sweetened almond milk. I saw somewhere that vegans have to watch their Vitamin B12 levels and Malted Wheaties, like most cereals, have them added.
My mid-morning snack was an Aldi Raw Pecan bar, which wasn't as nice as yesterday's Aldi Raw Macadamia bar, and an Aldi Hike Christmas Pudding bar, which was amazing and twice as nice as my usual Aldi Hike Cacao bar. And then I had a Granny Smith apple which was just the same as yesterday's Granny Smith apple. Oh and my first black coffee for a while from the ITN machine, which was good.
I pulled together a package for the lunchtime news, working with ace new ITV news picture editor Danae in edit cave 31 (Danae did some waving in the dark in this vlog here). I think she is actually half my age.
Then, thanks to a journalist friend of mine, the head of Surrey Vegans (like the Masons but more jolly) called me up and discussed me being a case study in an article about long term and temporary veganuary vegans by the Surrey Advertiser, or "getsurrrey" as it now appears to be known. I am at pains to point out to all the lovely vegans that I am doing this as a challenge, not as a permanent lifestyle change, yet they remain enthusiastic and helpful despite knowing I am, at heart, a horrible meat eater.
This afternoon I got sent out on a live story for ITV London in Harrow. When this was being mooted I was half way through eating an Aldi bag of sultanas and unsalted nuts (because I couldn't be bothered to go foraging for my lunch).
After researching the story for a while I ended up running late, and rather than go downstairs and get into my under-thermals in the changing room in the basement I thought I'd save time by nipping into the disabled loo. I absent-mindedly brought my nuts into the disabled loo with me, and then absent-mindedly left them there, along with the IKEA plastic clip I had used to close my half-finished bag. I suppose it will make a nice present for whoever next uses the disabled loo.
I might attempt a meal when I get home. But I have to go to bed soon. UPDATE: I made a meal (see below)
Breakfast
100g malted wheaties
Yet more bloody almond milk
Day grazing
Raw pecan bar - average
Hike Christmas Pudding bar - ace
Granny Smith apple - mm, crunchy...
Half a 450g pack of sultanas and nuts
Dinner
Some Aldi crispy naan snacks
Packet of Quorn lemon and lime chicken fillet style snacks (not vegan, I now discover).
Pepper and brussel sprout stir fry in soya and hot chilli sauce with rice noodles.
More Montezuma chocolate.
Ah the joys... Well, first thing to say is that I woke up this morning with a very vague idea of what I was, who I was and why my alarm was ringing at 5am. I think it took me a full five minutes to remember. That's what staying off the booze does to you, kids.
By the time I got up, I was running late. I managed to stuff my bag with an apple, a packet of sultanas and unsalted nuts, an Aldi "Hike" protein bar, an Aldi (other supermarkets are available) Raw bar, and then ran out of the door.
I got the 0555 to Waterloo and had the carriage to myself, so I knocked off a vlog which was mainly me being aghast at how much I now weigh and wondering where everyone was.
Breakfast involved the Hike bar, the apple and some water, but I was soon out covering a story for ITV News this morning - an 8am interview on the rail fare increase.
In between interviewing the General Secretary of the RMT and the Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, I went to buy me and ace cameraman Marc Smith a coffee from Pret. He wanted a cappuccino. I got a soy Americano. After yesterday's almond milk disaster I didn't feel optimistic. But it was okay.
Me actually enjoying a soy Americano
I finished my newsgathering commitments at King's Cross then switched stories to cover the Public Health England advice on healthy eating for children. We found a newsagent willing to let me film a piece to camera in his shop. Then I was sent to edit in Millbank. It was the lead story on ITV Lunchtime News and my favourite element was the two mums at a soft play who dismissed the whole 2 x 100 calorie snacks a day idea out of hand.
Lunch was the vegan noodle option at itsu washed down with a diet coke (see top pic). Once home I didn't really fancy dinner so I had two corn cakes and an almond milk instant coffee, which was worse than yesterday's tea.
Right now I don't feel hungry. I feel ready for day three, which is rapidly approaching.
My profound thanks to everyone who has taken the time to comment on this experiment, either with advice, encouragement or bemusement. I'm also very interested to hear what other people are up to for January, 2018 in general or have been quietly doing all along without feeling the need to go on social media and be all attention-seeking about it, like me.
Thanks to:
Jack and Kim for the recommendation on Oatly instead of almond milk.
Anna for the Koko milk recommendation and Veganuary website tip.
Anna and Will for the Bosh recommendation.
Gordon for his offer to turn this into a weight loss competition.
Cordelia for the Swedish Glace soya vanilla ice-cream tip.
Mike F for putting me in touch with the editor of Vegan Living Mag.
Janey Saunders for adding me to a Vegan supermarket tips group
and finally Marnie for the invitation to the all-you-can-eat Brazilian BBQ in York for when this is all over.
Good luck to Myfanwy Bournon, Alex Barnett and Tom Greenard who are all being abstemious to varying degrees and a special props to old friend Claire Berliner who is going for a full six months off the sauce. What fun we are all having.
**************************
Weight: 11st 12lb (ouch!)
Exercise: 2 mile walk, 10 mins cycling.
Food:
Aldi Cacoa Hike bar
Alid Raw Macadamia and Coconut bar
Fruit tea
Granny Smith apple
Americano with soy milk
itsu veggie gyoza with udon noodles
2 x Sainsbury's corn cakes (see, I told you other supermarkets were available)
Well, it has come to fruition. Pun intended. And I've already messed up.
First thing I did was pour out a bowl of Aldi Benefit (their version of Special K), read the ingredients, noted they contained skimmed milk powder and tipped them back into the packet.
I checked our cornflakes. Aldi cornflakes do not contain animal products. So I had them with warm (I forgot to chill it first) sweetened, almond milk. That was disgusting.
I washed it down with some tea containing more almond milk. This tasted okay, but looked disgusting.
Then we walked up the Thames path to Weybridge to see the in-laws at their traditional New Year's Day drinks party. I had a fruit punch, some veg crudité and chowed down on an olive, which had been stuffed with anchovy. I wasn't about to spit it out. Oh well.
Dinner was three slices of Aldi malted bloomer bread, some vegan olive spread ("Live free!") and a packet of crisps. Then I had a baked potato and beans with brown sauce. Yum.
Yesterday I weighed myself (before the excesses of NYE) and was 11st 10lb - a full half stone heavier than I was in June. We'll see if this vegan, no-drinking fun has any effect.
If you want to see my daily Vegan Dry January vlog, it's here on youtube, or hopefully embedded below.
Further updates tomorrow.
****************
Weight: 11st 10lb (minimum!)
Exercise: 4.5 mile walk
Food:
Tea with sweetened almond milk
Bowl of cornflakes with almond milk
Carrots, cucumber, celery, pickled cucumber, olive with anchovy (by mistake)
3 slices of Aldi malted bloomer
20g olive oil spread
Packet of reduced fat plain salted crisps
Baked potato
Beans
8 squares of Montezuma orange and ginger chocolate.
Mint tea.
I've spent a year not drinking, so doing Dry January doesn't really appeal. However, if you throw in a bit of dietary fun, I'm your man.
January 2018 will therefore be Vegan Dry January for me, yes it will.
I'm not going to be too fierce about this. I have an energy bar I like which doesn't have any animal products in the ingredients, but nonetheless claims it "may" contain milk. Same for a bar of Green and Black's which I was given for Christmas. Things like this are fair game.
I don't have to worry about the veganality of wine and beer as I won't be drinking and I'll just get me some almond milk to put in my tea and cereal and I should be fine.
I make vegan bread by substituting the butter for olive oil, which I prefer. And I love nuts, which I wouldn't normally eat because they are so calorific. But January 2018 is going to be cashew-tastic, believe me.
So I'll be fine! Won't I?
These are the foods I already eat which I think are vegan (obviously i'll have to go check the ingredients on some of them):
Bread.
Breakfast cereal.
Fruit.
Vegetables.
Nuts.
Tea.
Coffee.
Montezuma chocolate.
Rice.
Noodles.
Onion, garlic and tomato pasta sauce.
Crisps.
Chips.
