Food, Fashion, and everything good.
Food
Food is one of the best things in life! Switching from a fastfood, hot dogs, chicken fingers, and steak-loving, vegetable-hating, meatavore diet to a vegan diet may sound crazy - but it's the tastiest and healthiest decision I've ever made. The funny part is that I practically eat the same thing thanks to the invention of delicious and healthy mock meats and mock-any-kind-of-animal-product-ever like soy milk and cheese. The catch - I'm healthier, I've lost weight, and I don't get the flu or colds anymore (I used to constantly get colds - so it feels amazing to live normally). Oh there's also the other benefits like saving the planet, stopping world hunger, saving an acre of the rainforest and over a hundred animals in one year - but whose counting. Below I've included my top 10 favourite vegan things that make me drool.
#1: Veg/Health Section in the Grocery Store & Health Food Store
Visiting the Veg section is one of my favourite past times - I would buy the whole store if I could. Here you will find all the mock meats and soy cheeses, mayonaisse, butter, sour cream, cream cheese, and ice cream...plus a whole lot more. Long story short - every single thing you eat now can be made vegan by simply substituting the animal product for a plant-based healthier option. Hey, they never said it was hard. Take your Thanksgiving dinner - swap out the Turkey for a Tofurkey Roast, use mushroom gravy, and soy milk and vegan butter for the mashed potatos. Voila! It's vegan! There's also great vegan recipes for anything else you usually have for dinner - Ceasar dressing? Yum yum yum!
#2 Mock Meats
Considering I was the kind of meatlover that would eat the meat out of the stew and leave the rest (aka veggies), mock meats are this vegans best friend. They make every colour of the rainbow too: hot dogs, burgers, deli meats, ground round, sausages, breakfast links, breafast patties, chicken breasts, chicken strips, buffalo wings, chicken cord en bleu, bacon, tofurky roast, beef jerky, shrimp, and so much more. . Annnnnd...you can get it all at your local grocery store, check it out:
Taste the rainbow
Taste the rainbow
Are you drooling yet?
#3: Cheese
As of very recently, Canada has been graced with Daiya Cheese. It melts and tastes amazing. Grilled cheese, pizza, cheese bread, cheeseburger, poutine, lasagne, nachos? Yes! Fun fact: made from tapioca not soy. If you grew up on the snack cheese, crakers, and a granny smith apple like me - I've come to love soy cheeses as well. They taste nothing like cheese - but it has it's own taste which I'm quite addicted too.
#4: Dairy
I think there may be more brands of dairy alternatives than there are real milk options. Rice milk, almond milk, soy milk, chocolate milk. It will be hard for you to find a milk alternatives - plus there's no pus like real milk which is a huge bonus! I only really drink the chocolate soy milk by the gallon - otherwise I use soy milk for smoothies, cereal, and baking. Then there's all the other all-star dairy alternatives like butter, sour cream, cream cheese, mayonaisse (which can pass for sour cream in tacos), and for you coffee fans - dairy creamer!
#5: I Scream, You Scream, We all Scream, For Soy Ice Cream!
All I need to say is it's sooooy good and you have to try it.
#6: Sorbet
This healthy and delicious alternative to ice cream is already vegan! 
#7: Smoothies
And milkshakes made with soy milk :)
#8: Chocolate
Dark chocolate is vegan most of the time, and most chocolate chips are vegan. Chocolate companies are starting to make dark chocolate versions too <3
#9: Recipes!
Other than the fact that you can take absolutely any cookbook and easily make the recipe vegan (using the dairy alternatives and simple tricks like substituting half a banana for 1 egg), there are also great vegan recipe cookbooks and free delicious recipes available online here. Even if you have soy or gluten allergies - there are so many amazing recipes that you don't even need a trace of soy, tofu, or wheat. You can make the most amazingly cheesy and delicious Mac N' Cheese using only cauliflower, squash, and noodles.
#10: Restaurants
You can go to any restaurant and find something vegan when you need to. But why miss out on an amazing veg restaurant - where you can eat every mouthwatering item on the menu! The website Happy Cow allows you to search any city around the world and it will show you the veg restaurants and health food stores. There are world food restaurants that have many vegan options too - Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Indian...
You can get veg options at most fastfood chains too - veggie burgers, fries, and even faux chickens sandwiches.
For a free vegan starter kit and recipes go to GoVeg.com
Fashion
You can help animals in a huge way by buying clothes and beauty products that are not made from animals or tested on them.
Clothes
Synthetics have taken over leather, wool, fur, and exotic snake and alligator skins.. Pleather jackets and boots, faux furs, and polyester peacoat jackets are everywhere because consumers are choosing cruelty-free and more eco-friendly options. They don't get animal skins from already dead animals as I used to think - undercover investigations into fur, leather, and exotic skins trades show animals are routinely skinned alive and all suffer immensely their entire lives. Even wool sweaters and jackets involve extreme suffering for sheep - they undergo a painful mutilation called mulesing and are usually shipped from Australia to the Middle East to have their throats slit while still conscious. The feathers in down jackets are from ducks who are forcibly and painfully plucked time and time again. The label will tell you what it's made of :) For a free shopping guide to compassionate clothing click here.
The symbol in the top right of this label indicates the shoe would be made of animal skins.
Beauty & Cosmetics
Cosmetics, beauty products, and household cleaning products are unnecessarily tested on animals - painful tests. Thankfully there are many companies that have signed a 'no animal testing' pledge. It's as easy as switching from Covergirl mascara to Revlon mascara, L'Oreal shampoo to Body Shop shampoo, and Tide washing detergent to GreenWorks. Click here for a cruelty-free shopping guide - and an online guide to companies that do and don't test on animals. Often "not tested on animals" will be written on the back of the product or a jumping bunny symbol indicating a cruelty-free product (although not all cruelty-free companies, like makeup, will indicate this on their packaging).
Fashion
You can help animals in a huge way by buying clothes and beauty products that are not made from animals or tested on them.
Synthetics have taken over leather, wool, fur, and exotic snake and alligator skins.. Pleather jackets and boots, faux furs, and polyester peacoat jackets are everywhere because consumers are choosing cruelty-free and more eco-friendly options. They don't get animal skins from already dead animals as I used to think - undercover investigations into fur, leather, and exotic skins trades show animals are routinely skinned alive and all suffer immensely their entire lives. Even wool sweaters and jackets involve extreme suffering for sheep - they undergo a painful mutilation called mulesing and are usually shipped from Australia to the Middle East to have their throats slit while still conscious. The feathers in down jackets are from ducks who are forcibly and painfully plucked time and time again. The label will tell you what it's made of :) For a free shopping guide to compassionate clothing click here.
Shoes
About half the shoes that look like suede or leather in shoe stores today are actually vegan. Here's how to tell: either the label reads "All man made materials" or the shoe label on the bottom of the shoe does not have the symbol for 'cow hide' on it (it's the one that looks like a puzzle piece). Also watch out for fur, wool, and snake or alligator skins on shoes. The cheaper stores like Payless Shoes often only sell vegan shoes which is just wonderful :)
The symbol in the top right of this label indicates the shoe would be made of animal skins.
Beauty & Cosmetics
Cosmetics, beauty products, and household cleaning products are unnecessarily tested on animals - painful tests. Thankfully there are many companies that have signed a 'no animal testing' pledge. It's as easy as switching from Covergirl mascara to Revlon mascara, L'Oreal shampoo to Body Shop shampoo, and Tide washing detergent to GreenWorks. Click here for a cruelty-free shopping guide - and an online guide to companies that do and don't test on animals. Often "not tested on animals" will be written on the back of the product or a jumping bunny symbol indicating a cruelty-free product (although not all cruelty-free companies, like makeup, will indicate this on their packaging).
