How do I make it vegan?

This is a section dedicated to helping out all the people that start on a vegan diet--and also to help those who have been vegan for a while, and wish to learn how to find replacements for animal products, for themselves or to help others go vegan.

If you're looking for a replacement for any animal products, and you don't really want to cook/prepare anything, check out the Vegan Alternatives section.

However, if you don't like any vegan replacements near you and/or you want to save money (and have a little bit of extra time to make things at home), this will teach you the basics on how to make food that has a similar taste and texture to animal products, from scratch and with basic healthy ingredients--very little or nothing processed!

This is all mostly whole foods.

How to make vegan cheese sauce at home

Vegan cheese sauce can be done in a few different ways.

Soy milk, nutritional yeast, miso paste/salt

This way is very easy and straight-forward, and uses whole foods ingredients, but requires cooking.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups soy milk
• 4 tbsp nutritional yeast
• 1 1/2 tbsp miso paste (or salt to taste if you have no miso, but miso complements the taste of cheesiness better)

Instructions:

• In a small pot, add the soy milk, the nutritional yeast and the miso.
• Let it simmer on low heat to reduce the water for about 20 minutes, or until it's thick enough to your liking.

Soy milk, nutritional yeast, flour, salt

This way is very easy and straight-forward, and uses whole foods ingredients, but requires cooking. Unlike the one above, this cheese sauce will be thicker.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups soy milk
• 4 tbsp nutritional yeast
• Whole wheat flour (amounts depending on how thick you want the cheese to be)
• Salt

Instructions:

• In a small pot, add the soy milk, the nutritional yeast and some salt.
• Turn on the heat, until boiling. Then turn the heat to low, and add 1 tbsp of whole wheat flour at a time, stirring to avoid lumps, until you achieve the wanted consistency.
• Simmer on low heat while stirring for another 2-3 minutes, to make sure the flour is cooked. At the end, adjust for salt.

See: Margherita pasta

How to make vegan eggs at home

Tofu, nutritional yeast, soy sauce

This is a way to make a scrambled eggs replacement. Very easy recipe, and healthy.

Ingredients:

• 250g tofu, crumbles to bits
• 4 tbsp nutritional yeast
• 2 1/2 tbsp soy sauce
• Garlic powder + onion powder to taste (or other spices that you may like) (optional)
• 1 tsp turmeric (optional, for color)

Instructions:

• In a small pot, add the tofu, the soy sauce and the turmeric (optional), with a little bit of water to steam until heated up.
• Turn off the heat, and stir in the nutritional yeast, until it forms a uniform paste.
• Add the garlic powder and the onion powder to taste, if any, and stir it in.

See: Scrambled tofu bowl

How to make vegan burgers at home

This will explain how to make vegan burgers, as bread buns are easily found/made vegan, and generally sauces are easily made vegan (cheese sauce explained above).

Meatballs

Lentils and oats based meatballs with gravy, Swedish

See: Swedish meatballs

The eggplants are there to mimic the texture that pieces of fat and tendons would have.

Lentils and flour based meatballs with tomato sauce, Italian

See: Meatballs with tomato sauce (polpette al sugo)

The eggplants are there to mimic the texture that pieces of fat and tendons would have.