Today, I’m sharing some switching from veggie to vegan tips. Even if you’re a regular reader of my blog, you probably don’t know I’m vegetarian. That’s not because I am in any way ashamed of my choice. It’s more that I don’t class it as a defining part of my life. For me, choosing the meat free option comes as naturally as blinking. It doesn’t require any thought.

During the 18 years I’ve been meat free, I’ve never once considered going back to eating meat. It did take me many years to become dairy free though. So with that in mind, today I am sharing some switching from veggie to vegan tips. Read on to find out which products I recommend.

Switching From Veggie To Vegan Tips

Before I continue with this post on switching from veggie to vegan tips, I want to “disclose” that I became Vegan for Veganuary in 2019. I have remained dairy free, but have reintroduced eggs to my diet. I will refer to myself as vegan throughout this post as it is easier than giving the full description of my eating habits each time I mention them.

Why Did I Go Vegan?

For me, I had always felt that I was dairy intolerant. I would get stomach pains if I consumed cheese, and was bloated when I drank milk. Sometimes, I could go days between bowel movements, and I realised this issue went away whenever my dairy consumption was low.

If you think dairy might be causing you issues, you can always have an allergy test done like I did. My allergy test showed that I was intolerant to dairy and eggs, so it was a no brainer to try veganism. My daughter had suffered with food intolerances since birth, so I was familiar with the symptoms.

Mistakes I Made When Going Vegan

The first “mistake” I made when I became vegan was so silly, I literally had a face – palm moment. I blamed my mistake on the fact I am so sleep deprived. (My son is Autistic and not a good sleeper – 3 hours a night is a good night here). The rookie mistake I made was totally missing the fact that honey is not Vegan! It was only when my ex husband pointed it out that I realised my mistake – oops!

Despite being vegetarian for 17 years at the point I switched to veganism, I hadn’t realised I was also intolerant to soya. The first week I switched was awful. I felt more bloated than ever and was even vomiting after some meals.

It took me 8 days to realise it was the Soya milk which was making me so poorly. Within 48 hours of cutting Soya out too, I felt like a new person! A week after cutting out soya and dairy, I had dropped a dress size, thanks to finally losing all of the bloating.

If you find you’re feeling poorly when switching from veggie to vegan, it may be that you too are intolerant to whichever milk replacement you’ve opted for. I’m intolerant to almonds so I knew to avoid Almond Milk. In the end, oat milk was the best dairy free milk type option for me. This is one of the most important switching from veggie to vegan tips.

Sweet Treats

Don’t worry about missing out on sweet treats when you make the switch. There’s loads of vegan options now. If you’re into baking, these 3 ingredient vegan biscuits look and sound amazing too! Emma Reed has shared a review of Overherd oat milk recently, and shared what sounds like a delicious overnight oats recipe.

Protein and Iron

You need to make sure that you’re getting enough protein and iron or you could end up poorly. My own vegan journey came to an end when I realised I needed eggs to get my recommended allowance of protein.

I could have got this elsewhere but the fact I don’t eat nuts meant it was hard. (Plus I had 3 other people all with varying dietary requirements to cook for, so one common food was definitely needed)!

Finally, I do hope these switching from veggie to vegan tips have been useful! Also, feel free to comment below if you have any other tips to add!