My Vegan Journey Update + Favorite Foods

Hello guys. I'm so sorry for not posting this week, I was just so busy with tests that I couldn't even write a post. But since today is Friday, I decided to write a simple post just updating you all about how my vegetarian journey is going and how I am feeling.

Well, I have been vegetarian for a month and a half now. I don't consider myself as vegan yet, because I still have a lot to change and improve in my diet so I don't feel like I can receive this"title". But my goal is to become vegan, but it takes time that is why it is called a journey. 

Being a month into this journey, I have been feeling a lot more energetic, I don't feel so sleepy as often as I did before. And the number 1 thing I noticed that has changed completely was my bathroom schedule, but that is too awkward to talk about.

Let's talk about food!

I cant' lie, it has been a challenge to make food everyday, specially if you go to school in the morning like myself. But my mom has been helping me with my meals, so thank you mom. The biggest challenge for vegetarian/vegan people I think is to be creative, because sometimes so get tired of the same food every single day and that can discourage you to continue your journey. So I've been trying to get a little creative with my food, not like crazy creative, but try to vary my meals.

So first picture you can se if very simple and very tradicional brazilian dish. There are rice and beans (very brazilian), salad, some fried yucca (not so healthy but delicious) and the final thing is soy protein. This is like a holy grail products when you are vegan or vegetarian, it looks like meat, but is so much better. But a warning you have to season it right, so it tastes good. If you don't it won't taste good at all. I recommend you seasoning it with some shoyu or paprika, and of course put some vegetables in it like tomatoes, corn and onions...It will taste delicious.

Second picture is a breakfast that I had a few weeks ago, but I have been repeating this "recipe" like 3-4 times a week. It is just a slice of whole wheat bread with some peanut butter and bananas on top. I like to put some raisins,cinammon and  some oats on it too. It just keeps you full and energetic all morning, and with some coffee it gets a 100 times better.

Third and final food is this simple sandwich. But I made a special patty from soy protein that it looks just like meat, but better. I will probably write a recipe post on this patty, because I have to share with people how good it is. So, I made the patty and put in the middle of two breads of course, and then filled it with vegetables. Very simple and a healthier option from normal burgers.

So I hope you all enjoyed this simple post and that you are having a great day. If you have any questions about veganism or vegetarianism you can leave them down bellow. Or if you have any tips for a beginner like me please please leave a comment, I'd love to read what you have to say .

Ana

Vegan Journey | Week #1

Last year, I went to the nutricionist and I told her that I wanted to become vegan, but she immediately said no. It was something that I really wanted to do, meat just wasn't good for me, I felt awful after eating every meal that had meat inclueded. But my doctor said that it was better for me if I stucked with the diet I had, because I had already iron insufficiency and if I cut meat, it would become worse. So I decided to forget about becoming vegan and start a different lifestyle, to just focus on my healthy diet and gain the weight I lost because of my lactose intolereance  ( I lost 20 pounds by the way because of my intolerance, but now I'm better and recoverd 12 pounds).

A year past, and I never forgot about the vegan idea I had the year before. I got a lot healthier, got my pounds back and wasn't suffering with iron insufficiency any more. So I made the decision on the day of my birthday (last saturday), to become vegan. 

I will talk about the reasons I decided to start this vegan journey in another post, today I'm just going to talk about this one week experience, what did I do and what did I feel. Well, I decided to become a vegetarian/pescetarian first, so that I don't feel like I crave something. I think this is a easy way to reach the full picture, that is veganism. I actually didn't eat fish this week. I am eating only fresh fruits, vegetables, carbs , a lot of protein and other things of course. As I am lactose intolerant, I think it will be much easier not to eat the dairy products. So that is a step closer to becoming a vegan I think.

I've been feeling a lot better since last week, I don't get sick every time a eat lunch. I usually get very discomfortable after eating meat and I feel like the meat doesn't digest well in my stomach, and it feels like that until night time. And this week was a relived, a felt energetic and not hungry at all. A count my proteins, so that I don't miss them and get sick or something. And I cooked for myself this week. I love beeing in the kitchen with my mom, we usualy make lunch together, so this week we created some vegetarian dishes. I don't know how I am going to make food this week because my school starts tomorrow, and I usually am home by 12:30, the time we eat lunch here in Brazil. So I'm planning my meals for this week, so I don't bother my mom in doing my vegan meals.

This week was a week of research.I watched a lot of heartbreaking documentaries about animals and how meat is made. It was just awful, I cried while watching one of these documentaries. Is just so horrid how we know that this all happends and prefer not to think about it. And I watched I lot of youtube videos of other people talking about their journey and how they are healthier and happier than ever, after they became vegan.

This first week was great, I never felt this good before when eating. I feel like I'm doing something good for myself and my health,  for the animals and the environment. If the first week was this great, I imagine how the others are going to be. Even better I hope!

So I hope you all enjoyed this post. If you are vegan or pescetarian or vegetarian, comment down bellow your experience and when did you decided to start this journey.

Have a great week, 

Ana

Saturday Afternoon Coffee

I love Saturdays, probably my favorite day of the week, because I can stay up until late on Friday and sleep in on Saturday and then comes Sunday, it is a really good in between. My favorite part of Saturday is to sit down at 5 p.m and just drink my coffee while reading. It's so relaxing. I love my family, but I really like drinking my coffee alone on the weekends, it is just the way I found to put my thoughts together.

This afternoon, I ate some lactose free biscuits and a piece of my mom's all crub banana cake (perfect with coffee), speaking of which I will write a post about it when she decides on backing it again. 

I like my coffee mostly black, just a hint of milk to give it some color.

The only time I have to read since the beginning of school are the weekends. The book I am currently reading is The Diary Of A Young Girl by Anne Frank, a really well known book and in my opinion a classic and must read if you are interested in history/ World War II. I got my copy at a goodwill, paid 80 cents for it, a beautiful find and edition.

I took a picture of two of the products that are really helping me through my lactose free journey, they are soy milk and a organic/lactose free peanut butter. I can't leave without them anymore, I put the peanut butter on every single thing, like fruit, breads, crackers and even on cakes.

I choose a song recommendation of the weekend. It's the song Hannah Hunt by vampire weekend. Such a calming song, I always heard people talk about this band, but never listen to them, and then one day I just fell in love with their songs.

Hope you all have a good weekend.

Ana

▼ Weekend Pictures ▲

Saturday/Sunday

This weekend was so good, I got to hang out with my family more and do one of my favorite things that is to visit museums. I love exploring my city and finding out the different cultural stuff that there is here, because it's a "small" city the museums are not that big and the exhibitions are not that diversified, but I still like it. I don't no how to exactly explain how I feel when I visit a musuem, the only thing I know is that I feel different, light and amused. It can be the simplest piece of art ever, and I will still certanly think is wondrous. I just think that art is so amazing, the way that it can have different meanings for different people makes it so unique and wonderful.

I really liked this museum because of it's architecture, it was a house before and the mayor's family used to lived their decades ago. And I found it so interesting that I was standing in a living room where a family used to sit and watch a B&W Tv or play board games, and see through the window where a little girl could have watched the sunset...

After leaving the museum, my mom and I went to the mall just to kill time, but I ended up finding something that was on sale. This denim jacket, I was desperately in need of one because my old one wasn't exactly a jean jacket, it was more like a jean blazer. And today (sunday) we went to a family lunch, it was very fun and the place was beautiful and quiet. It was my uncle's new place, I have to say the decor was on point. 

It was a great weekend, hope you all had an awesome weekend too.

Ana

Recipe: Orange Glazed Cake

This was, I think, the first cake I learned how to bake by myself. I found the recipe in my mother's old recipe book, I don't know where she got it from, but I can asure this is an amazing cake. Well you can see from other posts that I kind of love cake, and that is absolutely true, I love backing as much I like eating it after. I have a sweet tooth.

If you haven't noticed all of the cakes I posted are very easy to make, do to my lack of talent in backing, but they all turn ou pretty good and tasty. Like the others, this cake is all done by a blender, I just but all ingredients there and done. This time I am going to explain step by step for the cake.

1. First wash your orange well then cut it in to four pieces and take off any seeds and those white stuff that there is in the orange. No need to peel the orange, we are going to use the orange skin for this recipe, kind of crazy but it makes the cake taste totaly diffrent. Next but it in the blender.
2. Then but your sugar and eggs in the blender and blend it well with the orange. This step is very important because you don't want to have pieces of orange peel in your cake.
3. Next put the oil in the blender, then blend it for a minute. Putting the vegetable oil for last makes the cake a lot smoother and moist.
4. Next step is flour, put it slowly or it is going to get your blender stuck .
5. Last step is backing powder!

Of course then but your mixture on a cake mold and put it in the preheated oven. I'm lactose intolerant and this cake is perfect me and for everybody in the same situation. Feel free to substitute any ingredients.

     Ingredients:                                                    40min  

• 1 orange
• 1 1/2 cups of flour
• 1 1/2 cups of sugar
• 1 cup of vegetable oil
• 3 eggs
• 1 tablespoon of backing powder

     Glaze:

• 1 cup of powered sugar
• 2 tablespoons of milk 

(I use lactose free milk, feel free to use any type you want)

Hope you like the recipe and if you try it out feel free to comment your opinions about it.

       Ana

Recipe: Carrot Coffee Cake

This is the best cake ever! It is so soft, moist and very tasty.

It is the perfect coffee cake to serve for friends and family, or just to enjoy it yourself. I love putting some jam on top of my cake slice, it just gives it a lot more flavor and fills you up. 

This cake is like a tradition in my family, my mom always makes it to drink with our afternoon coffee. But as we are just five people at the house, we always end up with left over cake, and my mom always put the left overs in the oven and leaves it to roast. It might sound weird, but I assure you that is delicious, it is like like a cookie and it tastes like one too.

 It is also very easy to do, you just put it all in a blender and mix it up, but I recommend to mix the flour by hand or it is going to give your blender a lot trouble. I recommend cutting the carrots into pieces, medium to large pieces, that helps the blender to crush the carrots a lot easier and it makes it a lot faster too. Pour the flour slowly and paying attention if it's too much. you can use less or much more flour.

Feel free to substitute the ingredients, like switching the normal sugar to organic or brown sugar. Or switching up the type of flour if  you are gluten free. I hope that you like it if you try it out.

Ingredientes:

• 1 Large Carrot
• 2 Cups of Flour
• 2 Cups of Sugar
• 1 Cup of Vegetable Oil
• 3 Eggs
• 2 Teaspoons of Backing Powder