Fair February

To kick-start the month, I thought I would dive into the topic that will probably dominate throughout this project: food. There are a few food-related challenges on the list, such as vegan weeks, wasteless cooking (using everything, including scraps) and covering groceries only with Too Good to Go (surplus of goods from shops and restaurants) for one week. And, since I need to eat every day (even if sometimes meals are replaced with coffee), why not talk about what I would like to properly incorporate into my diet – that is, reducing the amount of animal-derived products.

This is not exactly a brand new territory for me as I quit meat in 2018 for ethical reasons. My motivation at the time was straight-forward: I should only eat food that I am able to source myself. Why eat beef if I would not have the heart to kill a cow? It was a matter of (moral) principle. Later on, environmental issues associated with food production also resonated with me: agriculture is one of the most polluting industries globally, primarily due to large-scale, unsustainable operations (I will save this particular topic for a future post). With that in mind, I started revisiting my eating habits across the board.

And why wouldn’t I? The Netherlands makes vegetarian and vegan cooking easy: just look at the two pictures below. Despite the relatively small size of the supermarket where they were taken, the shop had several isles specifically dedicated to vegan cheeses, spreads and sandwich fillers (left pic) as well as meat and fish substitutes (right pic). This should not come as a complete surprise, though. A recent report claimed that within Europe, NL has the highest consumption of plant-based meat per capita while ranking 6th in absolute figures. The proportion of vegetarians remains stable, at just under 5% of the Dutch population. I would conclude that for a country where nearly half of the population allegedly eats meat daily, this increase in veggie/vegan consumption is pretty impressive.

Last year, I happened to attend a pitch event co-organised by the country’s largest food retailer, where participants were invited to come up with creative and impactful brief to inspire people to eat more plant-based. The idea was not to convert carnivores into veggies overnight. Rather, it wanted to appeal to a broad group of consumers, making the idea of flexitarianism (whatever on earth that means) more attractive, especially to those who might otherwise be put off by products promoted as vegetarian or vegan. The winner’s proposal apparently would come to life sometime in 2024.

Of course this goes to show that business are tuning in to understand their customers’ changing demands. It also might indicate that the city’s efforts in this area are paying off: Amsterdam aims to shift towards a more plant-based diet even further. More specifically, it has set a target of 50% plant-based consumption by 2030 and 60% by 2040, to be achieved through accessible alternatives of animal-based items in supermarkets and advocacy for the adoption of meat and dairy substitutes.

Back to the challenge! I have never tried to follow a vegan diet intentionally before, so my main concern was whether there are many foods and ingredients that I *mistakenly* consider vegan? What should I look out for?

A couple of quick google searches helped me put together a rough list => click to expand

Oreos (they use milk as cross contact)

Jelly (can contain bone and connective tissue)

Very dark chocolate (may still contain milk or milk powder)

Bananas (if preservatives such as chitosan are used during farming)

Miso soup and curry sauces (usually contain fish sauce)

Gum (may contain gelatin or glycerin)

Lactose-free prodcuts (can still contain casein or whey)

Alcohol (may use egg whites, milk products, crustacean shell, bone and connective tissue, fish bladders in the filtration process)

Brioche (contains eggs, dairy milk and butter)

Mass-produced bread and dough (if made with L-cysteine, an amino acid made from duck feathers and human hair follicles)

Fruit (if coated with beeswax and/or shellac, insect excretion)

Refined beans (often made with lard)

Gelatin (often made from the skin, tendons, ligaments and/or bones of cows, pigs, or other animals)

Carnime or E120, aka red colour dye (made from the crushed cochineal insect)

Whey (dairy-derived)

Equipped with this list and some apps to scan ingredient lists with, I started brainstorming meal plans for the upcoming few days. My biggest fear was (still is) the lack of dairy cheese, which I would probably sell my soul for on a good day. Another concern was related to proteins, especially in the context of a work out schedule. So, I decided this first vegan week should commence on Monday (still in January) to allow for a smoother transition and better self-audit.

The first couple of days were easy as I had some leftover soup (an interpretation of this recipe) and beetroot pesto (all-time fave) to live off. This morning I made coconut oats with oat milk (tastes better than it sounds!), and my super late lunch was a take on this recipe – I highly recommend swapping cherry tomatoes for jarred sun-dried ones (left pic below). However, I will definitely need to step up my game over now and start raiding my cookbooks for some inspiration.

Other challenges that I tackled today were composting (more on that tomorrow), five-minute shower (failed miserably), no waste (failed due to the plastic wrap of the salad bag and protein bar), and collecting rainwater. It rained quite a lot last night, but the bowl must have been placed quite awkwardly because it barely collected any water while my plants were completely drowned (poor things look so miserable right now — that’s winter for you).

To sum up, this is today’s progress:

SUCCESS	FAIL
Vegan food	Five-minute shower (still at 9 min 😔 )
Compost (coffee)	No waste (food packaging)
	Rainwater collection (big lol)

P.S. If you have a favourite vegan recipe, please share away 🙏