Vegan For A Week... (5 days actually. shhh.)

In light of the upcoming IMBB #19 - I Can't Believe I Ate Vegan! hosted by Becks & Posh, I decided to challenge myself by eating vegan for 1 week. Well 5 days to be exact because I am catering for C's birthday this Saturday and you know I'm gonna have some sort of cheese all up in the mix. More on that later...

Anyhow, going from cheese-munching, meat-eating and daily-non-fat-yogurt consuming to vegan has been difficult! Here is how it started off...

I was originally supposed to start on Sunday but I woke up to my mom's delicious semi-homemade Doenjang Soup which had bits of pork in it. I devoured it and decided to start the whole vegan deal on Monday. Every Saturday and Sunday right when I wake up I goto the kitchen to fix myself breakfast/lunch and it's almost always Korean food. I couldn't break from my weekly ritual this time.

So what the hell have i been eating? odwalla bars, whole wheat toast with p&J, roasted almonds, white peach, concord grapes, blue-corn chips with salsa & guacalmole. i guess things i would normally be eating. minus yogurt. minus eggs. minus cheese. minus butter.

For lunch I've been making Arugula with Figs & Lemon-Tarragon Dressing and Baby Romaine with Ginger Dressing. I usually eat Korean for dinner when I stay in and since a lot of ban-chan (sides that accompany every meal) are made with just vegetables it was easy to put a vegan meal together. Here are my ban-chan in pretty Korean ceramic plates:



from top clockwise: pickled sesame leaves=ggaet'ip, steamed eggplant=ga-ji na-mul, and cucumber with gochujang (Korean chili paste made with bean paste and sweet rice).

The sesame leaves are really salty and the gochujang pretty spicy. I had cold Soft Tofu to counter those and also Steamed Kimchi to accompany. No rice though, trying to pack in protein instead.

I finally cooked something (besides the eggplants) because I needed my fix of a spicy and full-flavored meal. I made spicy Vegetable Brown Curry with zucchini, potato, onion, corn, peas, oyster mushroom, and tofu chunks. I served it with mixed rice composed of whole oats, wild rice, white rice (and some other grains I don't know)--delicious and filling. Just what I needed to get me going til the end of the week.

And I made it! Today is Friday and I have not strayed from my vegan food program. But I can't wait to have some blue cheese and prosciutto tomorrow.