What I learnt from Veganuary: It’s easier than you’d think

During Veganuary, I took the leap to cut out all animal products from my life. I was vegetarian beforehand, and I knew what was coming, but there were things that surprised me.

Whoever you are and wherever you're at on the spectrum – whether you're one of the 400,00 or so Veganuary vegans, or vegetarian, or think that veganism is 'too difficult', or 'sucks the fun out of food' – here's what I learnt from Veganuary, and why I'm carrying on:

Vegan food can be shockingly good.

Bear with me on this. Have you ever tried the Sainsbury's own ginger tiffins, rocky roads, or dairy-free chocolate orange bars from their Free From aisle? Arguably better than dairy chocolate, in my not-even-slightly-biased opinion. There's also a wide range of milks, meat alternatives (like 'facon' – fake bacon), cheese and more.

There's also plenty of accidentally vegan foods out there that I'd never really appreciated. Sultanas, for instance – I can't think of a better study snack, and I always find it better to buy something you can get in the thousands – more bang for your buck. Oreos, the majority of biscuits and crisps (including, weirdly, bacon-flavoured Frazzles) all make the cut, too. Just rejig your snacking habits, reinvent yourself, and keep eating!

Avocados are simply a must-have for vegans..

It's really not that hard.

Yes, I did come into it from vegetarianism, so I've more or less forgotten what meat tastes like (or so I keep telling myself). However, I did find that making different choices in transitioning from a meat-eater to a veggie really wasn't too hard – possibly because meat is far more visible than dairy or egg, which still made up a huge part of my vegetarian diet. Making different choices may also sound simple but it doesn't feel simple before you've taken that leap of faith. Thankfully, taste buds and habits change in no time (a few days to weeks), and choosing veggie or vegan food rather than your 'usual' pretty soon becomes the norm.

However, I struggled an awful lot with cheese. I love cheese. I ended up endlessly experimenting with different dairy-free cheeses, occasionally sprinkling 4 different sorts of cheese on different quadrants of a beans-on-toast to find what works best. Such a broad, ubiquitous food group deserves to be treated with utmost respect. Don't rule them all out for one brand that falls short of the mark. Find your vegan cheese, your vegan milk, your vegan snacks, and after that, veganism is easy.

The snack section of the Free From aisle in Mainsbury's that has been(very thoroughly) tried and tested by yours truly

Everyone reacts to veganism differently.

I've had the 'veganism' conversation with a number of friends and family now, and the responses vary from a good-for-you kind of pat on the back to a hostile raising of the hackles. Although there have been no major incidents concerning flung avocados or spilt oat milk, that's not to say there hasn't been a little tension where morality is concerned. Veganism can be seen by some as a new-age, moral, hippie-dippie fad to be flaunted in the face of the masses. To be eating a stuffed mushroom while sat with someone tucking into a lamb chop is easily mistaken to be silently flaunting the 'virtues' of your lifestyle. On both sides of the dining table, it's important to remember you're (probably) both environmentally aware, nutritionally sound, ethically minded students who likely have good reasons for doing what you do; that many approaches to solving the same problems may not all revolve around individuals simply boycotting huge industries based on animal products. That issue is very much open to debate in the Union or on the streets, maybe, but try to keep it out of Hall.

Nutrition is complicated.

I never realised how little I knew about it before Veganuary. As a meat-eater, I naturally assumed everything I needed would be there; I didn't know how I got calcium, but I had bones and teeth so I unconsciously assumed it just kind of happened. It was the same with all my vitamins. I didn't have scurvy and my eyesight was fine, so why would I need to know how to correct a deficiency if it wasn't there? Vegetarianism was much the same – I just now knew that for protein I needed more beans, lentils and nuts instead of meat, and other than that I was probably not going to die.

When it came to veganism, though, I realised I was cutting out a little too much from my diet to entirely ignore the possibility of becoming seriously unhealthy. Oreos and fruit would only get me so far. I needed to learn how to get calcium, iron and B12 in particular – all common deficiencies for the careless vegan. Calcium comes from leafy greens, fortified alt-milks, bread, dried fruits and some fortified vegan cheeses. Iron you can get from nuts and most of the above, too, while B12 is from fortified cereals and Marmite, of all things. Check out the multitude of online sources on living healthily as a vegan – it's more than possible (according to multiple leading dietetic associations). If not, just have a quick gander round a supermarket and look for the word 'fortified' for a first-order approximation of healthy vegan foods, though I'd obviously recommend far more research than this for a long-term vegan diet.

Handy hint: the fruit & veg at the market is far nicer and cheaper and comes with less plastic packaging than from supermarkets

Ultimately, it's all about choice. There are, of course, obvious moral, environmental and nutritional implications for however you choose to live, but what you choose to eat is just that: a choice.

I'm not here to argue the pros and cons, to convert you, or to provide you with any of the arguments that convinced me to keep the ball rolling with veganism. The main take away, I think, is that it's usually very possible to go vegan; there's far more out there to eat than meets the eye. Don't restrict your range of foodstuffs – try new things, expand your horizons, experiment and keep your variety. It doesn't have to be instantaneous, either. It certainly wasn't for me.

On the flip side, it also wasn't nearly so hard as I'd thought.

All photo credits to the author