The reluctant vegan

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The Boy and I, despite our legion similarities, are very different in a few key ways.  I'm 5'3", he's 6'4"; I'm 36, he's 27 (that sounds terrible - does it help that he's almost 28?!); I'm an omnivore, he's a vegan.  And interestingly, rather than getting hung up on the height or age differences, the thing that people are most interested in is the dietary one.  How can a vegan and a meat-eater live together?

When I first saw The Boy's online dating profile, which listed his diet as 'Vegan', I was concerned.  Apart from a brief flirtation with vegetarianism in my teens, I've been a keen consumer of meat and dairy my whole life and I just didn't see how a long term relationship could work with someone whose diet was so hugely different to mine.  For his part, he had never considered entering a relationship with someone who wasn't at least vegetarian.  But the heart wants what the heart wants and, with strange synchronicity, getting serious with him coincided with a bad flare-up of my IBS.  Suddenly a lot of food - cream, butter, red meat - became verboten for me if I wanted to stay healthy.  And so I became, a couple of ingredients apart, a reluctant vegan.

This is the point at which those who know me will be giving the side eye because yes, when I go out for a meal with friends (perhaps once a month) I do sometimes eat meat.  And no, I really can't call myself a vegan when cheese is still a big part of what I eat (vegan cheese just doesn't cut it when you can eat the real stuff).  But our house is now entirely vegetarian and my diet has undergone enormous changes over the past year.  And you know something?  I've barely noticed.  Eating a mostly vegan diet has been an eye-opener about how little meat and dairy I actually want.

One of the stereotypes of vegans is that the food is indulgence-free, all steamed kale, lentils and brown rice.  Food without joy.  But I genuinely eat just as much exciting, tasty food now as I ever did.  In order to ensure we eat enough protein, our diet includes a lot beans, and tofu, yes.  But meat replacement products are the bomb: Fry's Chicken Strips are my favourite UK product and while soy mince is not quite as good as Quorn mince (which isn't vegan as it contains egg protein) it's still pretty damn tasty in a chilli or lasagne.

The main difference in my diet is how much of what I now eat is freshly made.  Although I never relied on ready meals, before meeting The Boy I'd never bother to make pesto or a curry from scratch, just making do with something out of a jar.  But with dairy sneaking into all sorts of pre-made things, my diet now is packed with fresh, homemade food: so far this week we've eaten 'chicken', black bean and roast pepper enchiladas, chilli sin carne* with a side of homemade guacamole, and an aubergine and tomato stew with pitta bread, houmous and a green salad.

However, I remain reluctant to commit full-time to veganism, not least because CHEESE.  I am also profoundly uncomfortable with some aspects of how the vegan lifestyle is presented by much of the vegan/alternative media and blogosphere, which promotes a narrow and very mainstream ideal of beauty and fitness.  Coming from fat positive/body acceptance activism, I find the focus on weight-loss quite alienating.  I am far more interested in finding great vegan pizza recipes than in the 'Lose weight and look great with vegan food' articles that proliferate.

Equally, although I have become increasingly more aware of, and in agreement with, the ethical arguments for veganism, I would struggle to align myself with organisations such as PETA. Nothing makes me want to go out for a rare steak more than their ghastly misogynistic adverts.  Fat Gay Vegan wrote a brilliant piece recently calling out those who use the vegan/animal rights cause as a shield against accusations of misogyny, homophobia or racism, and it's this side to the movement - the holier-than-thou vegans who think that not eating animal products makes them immune from criticism - that turns me off.

But for the all the flaws within the vegan community (and what community is without flaws?) I have been amazed and impressed at just how easy it is to eat a healthy, varied and delicious diet without using animal products.  If you're interested in going vegan for a day, a week or longer, good resources online for recipes without the health fascism are Rad Fat Vegan (the clue's in the name), the aforementioned Fat Gay Vegan, and A Beautiful Mess, who, although not exclusively vegan, post a lot of yummy vegan recipes.

* Yes, I did just have to look up the Spanish for 'without'.