Vegan Venture: I was vegan for a week, here’s how it went

Going vegan. I swore I’d never do it. I love my chicken nuggets, my morning bacon and eggs and my vanilla sweet cream cold brews way too much to give them all up. However, after researching how a vegan lifestyle lowers your chances of heart failure, (possibly) some cancers and has environmental benefits, I decided I would at least try it out for a week. 

I began my vegan journey by heading to the first place that came to mind: Trader Joe’s. With its vegan mac ‘n’ cheese, rice pasta, plantain chips and huge assortment of fruits and veggies, it became this week’s holy grail. 

Out of all the goodies I snagged at Trader Joe’s, the vegan mac ‘n’ cheese and coconut-milk-based chocolate ice cream were by far my favorites. While I was there, I also picked up some items like firm tofu, plant-based burgers and more almonds than I’ve consumed in the past five years.  

The pre-made vegan meals required less than 10 minutes of prep time and nothing more than a microwave, making these meals a convenient option to grab throughout the week. Speaking of convenience — fast food: a vegan obstacle that proved to be more difficult to navigate than I imagined. To my surprise, most of my main fast food chains offer zero vegan options, and upon research, I was stuck with only Burger King and Taco Bell. 

At Burger King, I got the Impossible Burger, which I realized had non-vegan mayonnaise on the bun after I’d eaten three bites. I stripped everything from the burger to try the patty alone and it was honestly tasteless — I’ll stick with the Trader Joe’s plant-based burger. 

At Taco Bell, I went for a bean burrito with no cheese, and a side of nacho fries — without the nacho cheese dipping sauce. They offer plenty of vegan options, but I chose to take off the sour cream and cheese, along with replacing the meat with beans in order to make my burrito qualify as vegan. The nacho fries brought a refreshingly familiar flavor of my normal food routine, but the bean burrito was not my favorite — even adding salsa didn’t make it better. This meal definitely had me missing my typical crunchwrap. 

While I loved digging into these pre-made vegan options, I realized how hard this challenge truly was when I started making my own meals. I turned to TikTokers @iamtabithabrown and @plantyou for recipes and advice. I made every type of meal, from chicken fingers out of tofu — which was maybe a five out of 10 at best — to vegan brownies, but found myself constantly whipping up a chickpea pasta dish in a vegan vodka pasta sauce, which quickly became my favorite. 

Found on @plantyou’s page, the recipe contained Banza chickpea pasta, tomato paste, coconut cream, spinach, vodka and lots of spices. It tasted almost identical to a classic penne vodka, and the prep and cooking time only took 20 minutes. 

New challenges were presented every day, from not being able to eat the same dinners as my family to not being able to grab food with my friends as much as I normally would. But overall, I found the vegan lifestyle to be pretty worth it — despite it being hard to see my parents dive into a steak dinner or go out for ice cream throughout the week. 

As I got to the second or third day of being vegan, I noticed changes in how my mind and body were feeling. I felt significantly more energized, no guilt about anything I was eating and much less bloated. Overall, I felt healthier and happier. Since I’m lactose intolerant — despite cheating almost daily and accepting the tummy aches — cutting out the dairy in all shapes and forms definitely had me feeling better physically. 

Even though this was meant to be a week-long test run of veganism for me, I think this is something I’ll continue long-term. I can’t promise I won’t reach for a slice of pizza when I’m out with friends, however I think the (mostly) vegan lifestyle is just right for me.