Whether it's for health, ethical or environmental reasons, many people are eating less meat and dairy and heading towards a vegan diet. Charmian Smith talks to chef Tanya Hickman about the joys of, and reasons for, a vegan lifestyle.
Tanya Hickman loves to cook and eat, and she and her family enjoy a wide variety of foods, but she is often asked what on earth they eat as they avoid all animal products such as meat, dairy and eggs.
It's one of the funniest questions, the co-owner of The Joyful Vegan cafe and stall at the Otago Farmers Market says. She and her husband Ted Wise took over the caravan stall about a year ago, because, as a chef, she did not want to cook meat for others.
"The people who've gone vegan that I've known, their diet increases because you start exploring new options. All of a sudden you don't get a meat-centric plate. You don't focus on that piece of chicken or that piece of cow on your plate. You start to explore different vegetables and grains and whole foods and things that perhaps you had a chip on your shoulder about before," she said.
Hickman and her family have been vegans for five years and were vegetarians before that. They started for health reasons because their families have histories of heart and other lifestyle diseases and they didn't want to follow in their footsteps. They also considered themselves environmentalists, so it was a logical step to become vegan and avoid all animal products, she said.
"We did lots of research. I'm a rational person and now that we are vegan, it really has come down to ethical reasons as well, when I look at the impact on animals and the people who care for the animals."
Many of The Joyful Vegan's customers are neither vegan nor vegetarian, but they come because they enjoy the food. Everything is made from scratch, and one of their most popular items is a dish with tempeh, a fermented soybean cake, because it cannot be found anywhere else, she says.
"They come for a variety of reasons but I think the primary reason is that it's good."
Their children, whom they home-school, are part of the business. Taia (8) waits at the tables on Saturday mornings, and Palin (13) helps his father with the bread baking.
When the children visit friends, they maintain their vegan diet, either taking their own food or choosing vegan options, something that is easier now as so many people have food allergies and are on special diets, she said.
Palin is now old enough to decide whether he wants to add meat to his diet but he remains vegan, she said.
When she was veganising baking recipes, and talked to older people, she realised that it wasn't a new thing. During World War 2 people had to bake without eggs or butter because they were rationed or not available. Instead of butter and milk, she uses dairy-free margarine and soy, rice or oat milk. Eggs are easy to replace once you realise the egg's function in the recipe. If it's to bind ingredients together you can use a banana, apple sauce or mashed tofu, or a proprietary egg-replacer which is usually a mix of potato starch and arrowroot. If the egg is helping raise the baking, ground flax seeds and water produces a glutinous slurry which will work and is good for you, she said.
People often ask how they get enough protein without eating meat, eggs or dairy, something she finds amusing.
"Plants have a lot of protein and that's the reason the largest mammals are vegetarian. There isn't a problem getting it through plants and whole grains. I stress that too, sticking with whole grains, brown rice and so on, instead of white, is much healthier for you."
Her family eats a lot of high-protein foods such as beans, lentils, soy products like tofu and tempeh, and seitan, made from wheat protein, as well as vegetables.
However, it was important not to become a "junk-food vegan" and eat French fries, potato chips or too many processed vegetarian "meats", she says.
"I think a lot of people try those and write it off and say vegetarian and vegan food is terrible because I had a vegan sausage and it was dreadful. I encourage them to try alternatives. A lot of those processed foods don't taste good and don't have much flavour or texture."
One question that irks her is when people ask how they can live such an extreme lifestyle.
"I look all around us and I see people who have lifestyle diseases who are on medication for the rest of their life, or are undergoing surgery and getting triple bypasses, and that's not considered extreme! When you have people you love do these sorts of things, it's pretty hard to watch."
She believes that good diet and exercise and staying away from smoking and excessive drinking would have a huge impact on the lifestyle diseases that trouble the developed world.
"When I was first vegan I felt that it was a personal decision and I shouldn't inflict it on anyone else, but I've come to realise it's not a personal decision, but a decision that impacts on everybody. If you choose to eat meat and dairy and eggs you are inflicting it on a lot of people around you. You are inflicting it on me because I pay the taxes to help cope with the illnesses that come out of this lifestyle. You are also inflicting it on the people who farm these animals and kill these animals."
In the US, where they lived for several years, huge factory farms polluted entire communities and children had diseases that were unknown elsewhere, she said.
Tuna fishing is the greatest threat to albatrosses and other sea birds, farm animals produce more greenhouse gases than fossil fuels, and beef feedlots are the cause of large amounts of deforestation - and that's not considered extreme? she asks.
"The animals aren't living in Old Macdonald farms like everybody wants to think they do. Anyone who has visited a factory egg farm will realise it's not an Old Macdonald farm.
"They are awful places and I challenge anyone to go into them and still say it's OK to eat meat or eggs from these chickens. It's not about them dying for you. It's how they are living for you, and they are living in a way that is unethical and inhumane, and I think that as a race we are better than that."
She believes we have become so far removed from the meat we eat that people are horrified when they travel and see whole carcasses or animal heads in markets or butchers' shops.
Some people tell her they'd like to become vegan but couldn't give up cheese or some other favourite food, to which she replies, well be vegan and just eat cheese. You don't have to give away all the rest of it to maintain a healthy lifestyle just for a sliver of cheese you have occasionally, she said.
A growing trend?
• In June 2010, the United Nations Environment Programme's (UNEP) international panel of sustainable resource management recommended a global shift towards a vegan diet was vital to save the world from hunger, fuel poverty and the worst impacts of climate change.
• Almost all necessary nutrients can be obtained from a healthy vegan diet, except vitamin B12 which is only found in animal products.
However, many plant-based milks, such as soy, oat, or rice, are fortified with B12, and supplements, which many vegans take, are readily available.
For more information and recipes, visit www.vegansociety.co.nz
The Joyful Vegan's coriander cream
450g medium (silken) tofu (I use Jia He Tofu, available at the farmers market)
2 tbsp lime juice (either fresh squeezed or 100% juice, not fake).
½ tbsp caster sugar
¾ tsp salt
3 cloves garlic, sliced
¼ cup neutral oil (canola, grapeseed, rice bran)
2 cups coriander leaves (thinner stems are OK too)
Drain tofu and place in food processor with lime juice, sugar and salt and blend until smooth.
In a small pan, gently cook garlic in the oil until fragrant and lightly golden. Do not burn! Add to food processor and blend again until smooth.
Wash and dry coriander. Roughly chop and add to food processor, process until mostly smooth. Taste and adjust for salt and lime juice.
The cream will taste mostly of tofu at this stage as it needs to sit and marinate for an hour or so to take on the different flavours.
This cream is perfect with Mexican food; nachos, burritos, tacos, etc. It can also be used just as a dip with corn chips.
You can easily adapt this recipe by replacing the coriander and lime and making for example a basil/lemon cream.
Makes 3 cups.
Gluten-free chocolate brownie.
¼ cup canola oil
1 ½ cups raw sugar
300g apple sauce
1 ripe banana, mashed
1 Tbsp tapioca flour mixed with 2 Tbsp cold water
1 cup cocoa powder
½ cup brown rice flour
½ cup quinoa flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp guar gum
¼ tsp salt
½ bar (125g) 62% dark chocolate (I use Whittaker's which contains no dairy)
¼ cup walnut pieces
Both flours and guar gum are available from Taste Nature in High St.
Gluten-free browniesPreheat oven to 175degC.
Grease or line a 20cm square baking tin.
Beat together the oil and sugar.
Add apple sauce, banana and tapioca slurry and mix well.
Sift in cocoa powder and mix. Sift in brown rice flour, quinoa flour, baking powder, guar gum and salt and gently mix all together until well combined. Roughly chop chocolate and walnut pieces and fold into mixture.
Bake at 180degC for 35 minutes. This brownie tastes best slightly undercooked. Your toothpick should not come out clean but still have a few undercooked crumbs on it.
Cut into 16 pieces.
