Vegan pledge

This week, a friend told me about the vegan pledge.

As the name might suggest, it’s an opportunity for you to pledge to commit to veganism. You can try it for a week, fortnight or a month.

When you sign up you can request a mentor to cheer you on and you’ll receive a pledge pack with recipes, guidance and support.This ties in beautifully with World Vegan Day which takes place 1st November and is followed by a month of all things vegan!

While I’m not convinced a vegan diet is ‘natural’ (a vegan diet often needs to be complimented with vitamin B12 supplements), I am convinced we cannot go on eating in the unconscious way we are. Where a vegan diet scores on the health front is that it is usually higher in vitamins and minerals, thanks to using more fruits and vegetables and is lower in saturated fat.

Food has almost become a disposable commodity and intensive animal farming shows total lack of compassion and care. Eating huge amounts of intensively farmed meat is not good for us, the environment and certainly not the animals.

It’s time for us all to rethink the foods we eat, focusing on eating enough to be healthy, but not too much and to eat seasonal, local and organic food where possible.

While I admire my friend for agreeing to her 7 day vegan pledge, I’m not entirely sure it’s for me. However, when she mentioned her first day menu of:

Breakfast: Berry smoothie followed by mushrooms & beans on toast.

Lunch: Lentil loaf with roast dinner

Tea: homemade soup & bread with a small bar of vegan chocolate for pudding

A vegan diet suddenly didn’t seem so hard after all!