I didn’t care for the “beyond meat” so much. I don’t mind the old school bocca burgers. Throw it on a bun and dress tf outta that burger you’ll be alright. I’ve been big into beans. Making hummus. Bean salads. Enchiladas. They really are the magical fruit. Cheese is tough I hear ya.

And they’re not all elitists. Some are just really good environmentalists who maybe aren’t so good at communicating and have maybe been burned in the past. But ya some just like the smell of their own farts.

Noooo you have to breed for the economy!!!

No, we will not make kids affordable.

Get back to work.

Dairy contains a morphine-like substance so baby calves are drawn to it. Cheese is literally addictive.

While many scientists believe cats to be obligate carnivores, one study attempted to show that many of the studies conducted in plant-based diets to not show any detrimental effects, when the test wasn’t conducted poorly or there was already a selection bias in place.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9860667/

Just something to consider. This doesn’t cement veganism for domestic felines, but it does show that better studies need to be conducted.

That’s still a big improvement. Even if you don’t go full vegan, cutting out meat has massive benefits

Not who you replied to originally, but since you said you welcome tips:

Learn to cook tofu. There’s different levels of firmness, and an infinite number of ways to prepare and cook it. Try them all. Not everyone’s texture preference is the same. So the way I cook it and the way you cook it can vary drastically.

I hated tofu for ages until I found a way to cook it that yielded the outcome I liked.

Once you figure out the best way to achieve the texture you’re after, you can start worrying about seasoning it. Then you’re golden.

A fair amount of vegans might say that their experiences made them change overnight. I was not one of those people, as addiction is significant in me. When I was transitioning, I would go all in and keep abstaining from animal products as long as I could. Then I would mess up, and fall back into bad habits for a while. But the key thing that made the difference is that I never gave up. I’d track how many days I went without animal products and count that as my high score. Then when I tried again I would gamify it by being determined to get an even higher score.

As time went on I became more skilled at cooking plant-based, which helped keep me going since the food I was eating was beginning to taste better. Likewise my palette was growing more accustomed to plant-based foods. Eventually I messed up one last time by eating some pepperoni, but the experience was different. Because I had gotten so used to eating more wholesome meals, the pepperoni was such an intense salt bomb that I found it inedible (and that’s coming from a salt-fiend).

But the other thing that changed was in my mind. Consciously I was already well aware that vegan diets are entirely adequate nutritionally. But a lifetime of unconscious carnist societal conditioning gave me this constant feeling as if I could not survive on plants alone. That was one of the things that always got in the way - this strange feeling like I was missing something and had to eat the stuff that was missing or I would die.

But when I bit into that pepperoni I suddenly had this calm recognition: “I don’t need this. In fact this isn’t food.”

And things have only gotten easier over time. Hopefully this helps?

Same. I use the Forks over Knives app to find new recipes. But, with picky eating kids, it’s difficult to maintain a diet. Lots of black bean burgers. 🍔

I live in the US, so depending on where you live these may or may not be available to you.

Cheese for me depends on the application:

On a pizza, I like Miyokos liquid mozzarella. I’ll often get a chain pizza with no cheese, add a little on top and bake for a bit.

Melted in a quesadilla, etc., I’ll usually go for daiya.

Cold on something like a burrito bowl, I like Violife or Vevan. Violife also makes a great feta.

For parmesan and blue cheese dressing, I’ll usually go with Follow Your Heart.

For cheese sauces and mac and cheese, I like to make cashew cheese sauce.

My favorite non dairy for drinking and baking is oat or soy, I just like to make sure it’s not sweetened.

I started making my own yogurt in an instant pot with cheap Asian grocery store coconut milk and vegan cultures, and it’s fantastic.

Hope this helps!

Honestly, I’ve stopped chasing substitutes a while ago. Giving up meat and dairy is going to be a lifestyle change, that’s why people struggle so much with it. You can’t expect to just sub in imitations and keep eating the same foods. They’re not close enough to fool anyone, and they’re usually expensive and unhealthy.

The best way eat vegan is to fill your diet with minimally processed legumes, grains, fruits, and vegetables. Learn to cook a few staple meals from cultural cuisines where animal products are expensive (most cultures outside US/Canada and Western Europe) and you’ll realize how much great food you can make with a few simple ingredients and one or two pots. A huge number of them fall into the same basic formula, so if you learn one, you can easily make them all. Plus, it’s much, much cheaper than eating meat.

I’m not vegan but I do eat 95% vegan because my wife is and I agreed to buy and cook solely vegan in the house. I come from a culture with plenty of (accidentally) vegan home cooking already, so it wasn’t hard at all. But those substitutes are gross to me. Apologies to those who like them.

Well milk is easy. Just get soy milk or almond milk as a drop-in replacement. There’s even weird ones like cashew milk. Depending on where you are at though that might be too expensive compared to dairy milk.

So all the carnivorous predators are also evil?

I’m not even trying to be a jerk about it, but I’ve never been given a single good answer on this.

They do in my experience. I’ve never once criticized someone else for eating meat, but I get made fun of a lot for looking for vegetarian/vegan options.

LMAO yes they fucking do!

They absolutely do. Endless repetitions of the same tired jokes, unprompted self justifications, odd assumptions. Happens all the time. They take offense at the sheer mention you are a vegetarian or vegan, you dont even have to try to convert them. Just be there, rejecting meat on your plate during dinner.

there are entire whole-food plant-based communities who routinely report the near-miraculous benefits they gain after adopting the diet, such as cholesterol levels that aren’t deadly.

That is a far more complex topic than just meat consumption though. People don’t just go vegan but completely change their diet and actually look at what they consume.

I’ve never had high cholesterol even back when I ate meat daily. Always ate lots of salads and veggies though and didn’t snack sugary shit all day.

Ok mooOOOOoOom. Geez.

No, you’re right, mass-produced meat comes from livestock with all kinds of deficiencies itself.

As I said I reduced my meat consumption - to maybe 1-2 times per week. And I try to avoid cheap mass-produced meat and aim for quality instead.

Not sure what’s worse though: cheap meat or ultra-processed vegan meat alternatives (often severely lacking protein too) filling the shelves nowadays.

There would be other animals there instead

This is very true. Look at pigeons, for example. Used to value pigeons as a tool for communication and they even saved lives, but when technology advanced with things like the telegram, we abandoned pigeons. Cows have been domesticated for tens of thousands of years, meaning they are dependent on us for survival, and even if we don’t use then for food, we will still have to take care of them as cows have many things wrong with they’re biology such as the fact that they will die if not milked, and no, the calf can’t keep up with that as the modern cow produces far more milk than they did in the wild so long ago. In essence, cows would either become white elephants or go extinct if we didn’t care for them.

People eating less cows would drastically reduce the cow population. I’m sure they would be culled, with entire plants electing to kill the cows rather than sustain them unprofitably.

Most farm animals have been selectively bred for traits that fit human needs, at the expense of the animal’s own quality of life. For example, chickens being bred to produce so many eggs that they become calcium deficient and their bones break under the weight of their own bodies. Sanctuaries provide safe spaces for these animals to live out the rest of their lives in the most comfort possible, while going vegan is important for a future where we’re no longer breeding these poor beings into an inherently hellish existence.

I’ve posted more in depth responses to ‘reducitarianism’ elsewhere. In one comment I made an analogy to quitting smoking, and how ‘reducing’ my cigarette count only led to a rebound where I smoked even more than before.

It’s well known in the scientific literature that people are so inaccurate at self-reporting what, and how much of what, they eat, that questionnaire-based studies are specifically designed to compensate for these inaccuracies. So anecdotal claims of people reducing their animal consumption mean very little, particularly when data seems to indicate the opposite.

And like Ed Winter’s post gets into, you need to put the concept of reduction within the concept of justice. Fewer animals being bred and slaughtered sounds nice, but what about for the animals still being abused and murdered? Do you find it acceptable when corporations promise only to reduce carbon emissions by about 10% by 2035? Or how would you feel if police unions claimed they would disproportionately arrest black people 20% less than they used to?

Sorry but ‘reduction’ is nothing but a self-soothe to make people feel like they’re doing something good, when in reality they are just continuing their injustice while assuaging their own guilt. Just another form of cognitive dissonance.

https://ourworldindata.org/meat-production

I’m in the same boat with a lot of commenters here, of trying to reduce my consumption for ethical reasons. Throughout my life I’ve tried being vegan and I’ve tried being vegetarian and always failed and now am just minimizing and it’s working very well for me.

Nonetheless, that picture gave me a chuckle. Life’s a ride, might as well have as good a time as possible and that usually coincides with being uptight as little as possible.

Huh. Didn’t know lots of pills have lactose in them. I’d think I would have noticed, seeing as I’m lactose intolerant. But I guess they’re in such small amounts per pill to not notice?

https://www.vegansociety.com/go-vegan/definition-veganism

Veganism is a philosophy and way of living which seeks to exclude—as far as is possible and practicable—

One step ahead of you.

Edit: You really think this is a gotcha, eh? Given that you’ve posted the same thing at least six times?

Alright if you want to go that way, there was a legend of a Buddhist monk who let a hungry tiger eat him, if you really want to go all out just lay on the ground and let the earth take you.

Funny thing is that Meat is waaay more expensive to produce then any Vegan alternative but why is Meat not seen as a luxury?

Which response(s) came across as very toxic? I see six responses to your parent comment and they all seem quite civil.

So in what way is it a luxury?

Yes but I think those vegans don’t go wrecking havoc because their cause is “good”

Lots of people don’t agree, but we have data to support the benefits, and the legislation to ensure it is enforced. Yes, in an ideal world we’d all be vegans, and nature would balance itself. Maybe some day that will be the world we have, but it is not the world we have now.

However, not everyone agrees with that and that is also fine

It’s even finer because in those situations those people would just die

You could have just googled the doctor’s name and found the study yourself. Somehow I doubt ‘your own analysis’ is as unbiased as you think. https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1523119113

Except it’s not? Half-measures get half-results.

Every doctor I’ve ever seen talk about diet, says that we should reduce our meat intake. They never suggest nor imply that people should go vegan as an alternative.

At least, from my limited experience.

I would argue that if someone has no intention of giving up meat, of which, there are plenty of people who are in that situation, then reduction can help improve the situation.

If someone is considering, or at least would consider going vegan, then veganism is the right choice, reduction may make the transition more difficult in the long term.

Thoughts? I’m happy to discuss. I just don’t have the time right this second to do a ton of reading/watching content about the other side of this discussion, so I’d like to know what you have to say.

True, but my point still stands. Most people don’t go vegan overnight.

The word easier here is a choice. What is more comfortable is easier, but eating a plant based diet is very easy. It’s cheaper and widely available in most countries. What you mean by easier really refers to more comfortable, not really to there being less physical obstacles

It’s kind of hard to approach this in a tactful way. I think a lot of why vegans don’t appreciate this approach is because it often doesn’t work in actual practice. I’ll give a personal example as an analogy - I used to be a smoker. I tried quitting at least 50 times over the time period I was addicted to nicotine. One of the tricks I would use was to reduce the amount I would smoke each day. It would help briefly, but what would always happen is that I would get to a point where it was too hard to reduce any further, and then after plateauing for a few days, I would rebound and smoke even more than I used to.

Reduction still played a role in my effort to quit, but there were a lot of other tricks I had to employ to make it stick, and the overarching point is that reduction as a goal went nowhere, but reduction combined with the intent to stop all together did eventually work.

And that’s what also happens with dietary changes. Reduction starts with halfway good intentions, but when it’s the goal it becomes a temporary self-soothe that simply ends up rebounding in the end. In fact the people who run wfpb health coaching clinics have stated in interviews that people are most successful when they go all in with the dietary changes - because it turns out that people often feel dramatic positive changes to their health within only days of going plant-based, and those positive changes reinforce their motivation to keep going.

And as this article points out, reducitarianism can never achieve justice. It’s like when suits-wearers promise to reduce their carbon emissions by 10% by 2035 or something. It’s better than nothing, but will never solve the problems that need to be solved.

https://www.surgeactivism.org/reducetarianism

Your comment is about looking down on people… tongue in cheek or not, this is always the kind of stuff people post before complaining that the big mean vegans are alienating them… victim complex much?

best is the enemy of better.

why are you giving vegans advice on how to market veganism? if the facts won’t change your mind then it’s not the fault of the vegans.

If you feel facts are “aggressive”, the problem is you, not the facts.

Vegans don’t see themselves as perfect. It’s all about doing the best you can, where you can

Just because they do one good thing doesn’t mean they have to live the perfect life. It’s pretty hard to live in the modern world without a smartphone, while its realy not that hard to not eat animal products.

Or animal abusers can just mind their own business and stop abusing and murdering innocent animals?