vegan food
vegan food

How To Make Your Favourite Recipes Vegan

Follow these simple tips to smash Veganuary.

If you’re thinking of trying a vegan diet, you might be worried about giving up some of your fave everyday go-to meals. While there are plenty of vegan options out there, giving up your fave recipes can seem like a big sacrifice but luckily the majority of recipes can be easily adapted to vegan recipes!

Here are our top tips for simple vegan cooking and how you can make your favourite meals vegan.

Substitute eggs in baking

vegan recipes

If you want to bake a cake and have a go-to recipe, you might feel a bit stuck on what to do instead of using eggs. Luckily there are lots of great alternatives, including banana, aqaufaba, apple cider vinegar and even a can of coke or lemonade!

Find the right alternatives

Whether the recipe requires chicken, bacon, beef or even salmon you’ll be able to find a vegan alternative with a bit of research. If you can’t find a good alternative you can substitute chicken in most recipes for tofu instead, which is super versatile to cook with. Maple syrup and Agave are also good alternatives for honey too.

Learn what ingredients aren’t vegan

vegan

This might sound like an obvious one, but even experienced vegans can accidentally slip up sometimes. While meat, fish and dairy are all avoided as part of a vegan diet, this also extends to honey, beeswax, gelatine and certain vitamins. Some everyday foods such as cereals, spaghetti hoops and pasta sauces can have non-vegan ingredients in that aren’t clearly labelled, so familiarise yourself on what to look out for when doing your shopping and if you’re not 100% a quick Google search should help you.

Get a hold of a good double cream

Double cream is a standard ingredient for a lot of creamy pasta sauces or curries, but no need to fear as popular brands such as Alpro, Oatly and Elmlea sell vegan double cream alternatives which can be a staple for cooking vegan recipes.

Make your own sauces

vegan food

If you like to use pasta sauces from a jar (hey, it still counts as cooking) you may find that they have non-vegan ingredients in them, such as milk or cheese. You should be able to find vegan versions in the free-from section of your local supermarket, with pesto and carbonara sauces being quite easy to find, but if you want to save some money, making your own could be your best bet to put a twist on your fave recipe.

If you’re thinking of going vegan make sure you’re clued up on what everyday items are accidentally vegan and check out these tips on how to get started.