I say 'at work', but I also found these strategies useful when attending university as a student, and in many other circumstances where I had to be away from my own kitchen for long periods of time. Now, maybe you're chronically lucky and your canteen makes a conscious effort to have a clearly-labelled vegan option each day. Or maybe you're a little bit lucky and can put a meal together from side orders and get something proper one or two days out of five to vary the monotony. That's great - one day we will all be there,* but until that point here are a few tips for those who aren't so lucky. This includes me.
Tip 1: Packed lunch. If you have access to a microwave you're motoring - just stick a portion of leftovers in a microwavable tub to take in with you. Otherwise, you may end up brown-bagging it with sandwiches. Vary the fillings and types of bread you use, otherwise you'll get bored. Dress sandwich lunches up with carrot and celery sticks, soy desserts and fruit juice. Another cold lunch option is salad - by which I don't mean limp iceberg lettuce, I mean actual food. Tabbouleh, couscous and quinoa are great for this. Add chopped cucumber and tomato, maybe some grated carrot, plus beans for a protein shot. I've also been known to take in protein bars, flapjacks, sosmix rolls and bits of homemade apple pie. Oh, and there was the sushi-sans-seaweed episode, which may not have been my finest lunch hour** but did the trick of varying things a bit and using up leftovers. (See the packed lunch entries here for ideas, if you need any)
Tip 2: Snack. I don't mean gorge on crisps, that won't keep you full for long. Keep fruit, raw veg or nuts to hand to nibble on through the day. (Unless you work in a cleanroom or other environment where it's inappropriate to eat) These should keep you in energy even if your lunch is just sandwiches.
Tip 3: Establish what you can get. Even if the only vegan things in your canteen are plain crisps and overpriced apples, you may find these useful someday. The flapjack tends to be a standard - many of these are vegan, but not all, so you'll need to check the ingredients.
Tip 4: Lobby. Politely request that the canteen stock more vegan items. Ask any other vegans, vegetarians, people with dairy allergies, etc to do the same. Frame it as a good business move on their part. Play the meat-free Monday card if you think that'll be helpful. Raise the health issue. It's not the best tactic for convincing people to go vegan***, but in this instance it could be useful.
What are your favourite packups? Any successes in veganising your canteen? Answers on a postcard, or alterntively in the comments.
*In fact, one day all the canteens will be totally vegan :-D
**Not as bad as the cold latkes. Or the cold soy mince and cabbage, eaten that way because the staff microwave got too filthy to use safely. Trial and error folks...
***Or rather it doesn't do a good job of convincing people to stay vegan once they realise that we have the same potential to consume fat and empty carbs as anyone else.
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Friday, 12 August 2011
Thursday, 11 August 2011
Food staples
Having just published a post discussing how veganism is not all about food, I'm now going to do another long (and maybe not so interesting to those of you who already have these things sorted) post on - you guessed it - food. It may appear to some that I'm feeding - pun totally intended - the idea that vegans are obsessed with food.* However, this is (as I've said before) the main area where most people will feel the difference.** Readymeals, for example, are a whole lot harder to get as a vegan than a vegetarian - this means cooking for yourself more. It might take more effort if you're used to heating something up, but it will also save you money. Swings and roundabouts.
Vegetables - you know your favourites and what you can afford/store. Fresh stuff can't be kept for that long, so it's worth having a few frozen and tinned things around. I normally have frozen spinach (for curries and pasta sauces) and peas (curries and a side dish for burgers or roast things) and tinned sweetcorn (for chowder or an extra chilli ingredient).
Beans - either dried (and soaked, boiled and frozen) or tinned. (I think you can buy frozen ones now, but haven't explored that avenue yet) Standards chez Duck are kidney beans, chickpeas, blackeyed beans and the tins of mixed bean 'salad'. These are pretty versatile and encompass many options for chillis, curries, salads, homemade burgers - you get the idea. Don't forget to recycle the tins! ;)
Dried things - beans (if you're ok soaking them), lentils, split peas (need soaking overnight before use), soup mix (to bulk out stews and casseroles), stuffing mix (part of a roast dinner), rice, couscous, pasta.
Tins - veg (as above), beans (as above), baked beans, mushy peas (if you like them)
Frozen - veg (as above), chips, burgers - not the healthiest, but sometimes you need something quick. The freezer is also useful for storing leftovers.
Jars - yeast extract (e.g. Marmite - a bit of extra flavour and b12), pasta sauce (more are vegan than you might think) - and hang on to the glass jars because they're useful reusable storage.
Flavouring - start with chilli powder, cumin and mixed herbs and go from there.
Baking things - flour and margarine (and water, but I'm assuming you have this on tap) are the basics if you just want to make pastry. For bread you need yeast (and preferably sugar and salt). Cakes require sugar and baking powder and a proper recipe - that's the only thing I haven't been able to ad lib on!
It's worth having a few meals in mind when you do a big shop (or get a delivery - worth thinking about if you don't have a car). This way you can take stock of what you have already, how useful it will be in the next few days and what you need to add to it in order to get everything to fit together. It also means that you know you are going to use all the fresh bits before they go off! You can get some great bargains with short-dated veg, but careful of buying anything that you aren't sure fits with what you want to eat in the next couple of days - if it goes off before you use it then it's a false economy...
*Personally I kind of am, but so are many omnis - and at least I indulge the obsession without eating whole baby birds or other animal products acquired in more-than-averagely horrible ways. That's a good thing in my opinion, as it helps to counteract the other false assumption doing the rounds that vegans are completely anti getting pleasure from food or indeed anywhere else. Rant over. ;)
**The exceptions being dietary vegans who are transitioning to full veganism. Bear with me, there'll be more about that soon.
Vegetables - you know your favourites and what you can afford/store. Fresh stuff can't be kept for that long, so it's worth having a few frozen and tinned things around. I normally have frozen spinach (for curries and pasta sauces) and peas (curries and a side dish for burgers or roast things) and tinned sweetcorn (for chowder or an extra chilli ingredient).
Beans - either dried (and soaked, boiled and frozen) or tinned. (I think you can buy frozen ones now, but haven't explored that avenue yet) Standards chez Duck are kidney beans, chickpeas, blackeyed beans and the tins of mixed bean 'salad'. These are pretty versatile and encompass many options for chillis, curries, salads, homemade burgers - you get the idea. Don't forget to recycle the tins! ;)
Dried things - beans (if you're ok soaking them), lentils, split peas (need soaking overnight before use), soup mix (to bulk out stews and casseroles), stuffing mix (part of a roast dinner), rice, couscous, pasta.
Tins - veg (as above), beans (as above), baked beans, mushy peas (if you like them)
Frozen - veg (as above), chips, burgers - not the healthiest, but sometimes you need something quick. The freezer is also useful for storing leftovers.
Jars - yeast extract (e.g. Marmite - a bit of extra flavour and b12), pasta sauce (more are vegan than you might think) - and hang on to the glass jars because they're useful reusable storage.
Flavouring - start with chilli powder, cumin and mixed herbs and go from there.
Baking things - flour and margarine (and water, but I'm assuming you have this on tap) are the basics if you just want to make pastry. For bread you need yeast (and preferably sugar and salt). Cakes require sugar and baking powder and a proper recipe - that's the only thing I haven't been able to ad lib on!
It's worth having a few meals in mind when you do a big shop (or get a delivery - worth thinking about if you don't have a car). This way you can take stock of what you have already, how useful it will be in the next few days and what you need to add to it in order to get everything to fit together. It also means that you know you are going to use all the fresh bits before they go off! You can get some great bargains with short-dated veg, but careful of buying anything that you aren't sure fits with what you want to eat in the next couple of days - if it goes off before you use it then it's a false economy...
*Personally I kind of am, but so are many omnis - and at least I indulge the obsession without eating whole baby birds or other animal products acquired in more-than-averagely horrible ways. That's a good thing in my opinion, as it helps to counteract the other false assumption doing the rounds that vegans are completely anti getting pleasure from food or indeed anywhere else. Rant over. ;)
**The exceptions being dietary vegans who are transitioning to full veganism. Bear with me, there'll be more about that soon.
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
The Joy of Pot
No, I haven't been sharing a Yoda bong with the Meatless Monday Unicorn - I'm very much of the opinion that (at least in my own life) pot is for cooking not smoking*. And that sort of pot, I am happy to push at impressionable newcomers to veganism. Raw foodists can probably ignore this post - for everyone else, even if you live alone with one gas burner**, this piece of equipment will make things a lot easier.
Of course, you may have been cooking for yourself for years, be used to making meals from scratch and just want to veganise that process. (In which case stay tuned or check out the recipes at Increasing Veganicity.) But if weaning yourself off readymeals and cooking after a long day or in less-than-optimal kitchen situations (e.g. shared housing where use of the stove is difficult at peak times) is your main stumbling block, a stockpot might be just what you need. If you can't or don't want to spend too much money at first, there are plenty of cheap options out there at the smaller end of the scale. Mine is a fairly standard one from Poundstretcher, and can produce up to ten helpings of chilli at a pinch. (If you want to go larger you might need to find a more specialist store - I want to get a bigger one at some point so can report back on findings when that happens!)
The main purpose of a large pot, unless you have a pretty large household, is to spread the load a bit by making double/triple/whatever quantities at one meal. The extra veg chopping can make it take a bit longer that day, but every extra helping is another meal you don't have to worry about. I nearly always make chilli with the intention of refrigerating it (in the stockpot) overnight and having it two days in a row - the prep happens on one day, the potwashing on the other! I usually do the same with curry, stew (mostly in the winter) and any other meal of a similar consistency.
If you're more ambitious and have sufficient freezer space, it is worth making even more so you can stick a couple of helpings in the freezer as a homemade readymeal. (This is also worth doing for non-stockpot meals such as lasagne, moussaka and homemade pizza - my motto is that if it takes extra faff to make it can also stretch to an extra meal or two!)
A bigger pan also means you have more capacity for soaking and boiling beans - in some places this can work out cheaper than buying them tinned, and is certainly easier in terms of getting beans home from the shop, but it would be a major time-consuming hassle to do every time you wanted a small quantity. If you have a fridge you can do a couple of extra helpings - store them in water, salted if they'll be hanging around for a while, in a tightly-closed screwtop jar - while a freezer allows you to do a bag or two at once. When I lived alone I froze single portions in empty (Alpro in case you're interested) yogurt pots - now a margarine tub makes more sense.
Just to balance things out, I'd suggest that a single person or couple keep a 'milk pan'*** around the place - one of these holds enough rice for two people to have about one and a half helpings. They don't come with lids, but a side plate does the job ok. Erzatz, me?
*Paprika categorically IS for smoking, I love the stuff!
**Let's assume that relationship is platonic, for the sake of everyone's sanity...
***That's what they're sold as. Mine sometimes gets soy milk in, if I want white sauce. Better names on a postcard please ;)
Of course, you may have been cooking for yourself for years, be used to making meals from scratch and just want to veganise that process. (In which case stay tuned or check out the recipes at Increasing Veganicity.) But if weaning yourself off readymeals and cooking after a long day or in less-than-optimal kitchen situations (e.g. shared housing where use of the stove is difficult at peak times) is your main stumbling block, a stockpot might be just what you need. If you can't or don't want to spend too much money at first, there are plenty of cheap options out there at the smaller end of the scale. Mine is a fairly standard one from Poundstretcher, and can produce up to ten helpings of chilli at a pinch. (If you want to go larger you might need to find a more specialist store - I want to get a bigger one at some point so can report back on findings when that happens!)
The main purpose of a large pot, unless you have a pretty large household, is to spread the load a bit by making double/triple/whatever quantities at one meal. The extra veg chopping can make it take a bit longer that day, but every extra helping is another meal you don't have to worry about. I nearly always make chilli with the intention of refrigerating it (in the stockpot) overnight and having it two days in a row - the prep happens on one day, the potwashing on the other! I usually do the same with curry, stew (mostly in the winter) and any other meal of a similar consistency.
If you're more ambitious and have sufficient freezer space, it is worth making even more so you can stick a couple of helpings in the freezer as a homemade readymeal. (This is also worth doing for non-stockpot meals such as lasagne, moussaka and homemade pizza - my motto is that if it takes extra faff to make it can also stretch to an extra meal or two!)
A bigger pan also means you have more capacity for soaking and boiling beans - in some places this can work out cheaper than buying them tinned, and is certainly easier in terms of getting beans home from the shop, but it would be a major time-consuming hassle to do every time you wanted a small quantity. If you have a fridge you can do a couple of extra helpings - store them in water, salted if they'll be hanging around for a while, in a tightly-closed screwtop jar - while a freezer allows you to do a bag or two at once. When I lived alone I froze single portions in empty (Alpro in case you're interested) yogurt pots - now a margarine tub makes more sense.
Just to balance things out, I'd suggest that a single person or couple keep a 'milk pan'*** around the place - one of these holds enough rice for two people to have about one and a half helpings. They don't come with lids, but a side plate does the job ok. Erzatz, me?
*Paprika categorically IS for smoking, I love the stuff!
**Let's assume that relationship is platonic, for the sake of everyone's sanity...
***That's what they're sold as. Mine sometimes gets soy milk in, if I want white sauce. Better names on a postcard please ;)
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