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Easy Vegan Swaps You Need To Try Today.

January: the first month of the year. It’s also referred to by some as skint January, the month which lasts a year and of course Veganuary. 

This year over 580,000 people pledged to take part in Veganuary, including Love Island stars Eyal Booker and Amy Hart and the scheme had extra backing this year from the likes of Ricky Gervais, Paul McCartney and John Bishop. 

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Believe it or not, we’re now well into February and lots of people are choosing to maintain the switch to a vegan diet. We are here with some of our best buys and fave vegan swaps to help you out on your journey to a plant based diet. 

Fake meat... better than the real thing?

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Popular phrases from meat eaters include: “I’ll never be able to live without chicken”, “Fake meat just doesn’t do it for me” and “What about when I really just fancy a burger?”. It’s time to move away from this attitude because the range of ‘fake meat’ out there now is so extensive that there really is an alternative for everything.

First up, veggie sausages deserve an article of their own - there are so many great ones out there. Who doesn’t love bangers and mash drowning in gravy? Fun fact: Bisto original gravy is in fact vegan! Some people prefer an obvious veggie sausage, if this is you go for ‘The Beet Goes On’ sausages from the Heck vegan range - full of green goodness. Alternatively, there are some veggie sausages out there which actually taste scarily like the real deal. It would be wrong not to name drop the Tesco Plant Chef Cumberland Style sausages here. Get your non-vegan friends to do a taste test and we guarantee they won’t be able to tell the difference!

Fake it till you make it.

M&S also have a banging vegan range if you feel like splashing the cash. The melt in the middle no-fish-cakes are an absolute winner. On a similar vibe, the no-chicken kiev is also delicious. They also do vegan feta cheese cubes so you can still join in on the TikTok feta pasta hype!

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We all love a BBQ in the summer, think beer in one hand and burger in the other (this day soon will come!). The Beyond Burger is the saviour here! You’ll probably second guess yourself thinking you’ve picked up the beef burger from the grill - it’s that good. Another hidden gem is jackfruit: a great ingredient to incorporate into a plant based diet. It works as a substitute for pulled pork, in salads, on pizzas or even in a sandwich. It is quite literally, as the name suggests, a fruit, but has a meat like texture once cooked. 

Sweet like chocolate.

Now we all know how important it is to be able to curve those chocolate cravings, fear not, vegan chocolate is on the rise and there are some great choices out there. Firstly, a lot of dark chocolate is actually vegan anyway, like Bournville for example, so you might not even need to make a switch here. But if you do fancy a switch up, the following options are our faves!

A play on the idea of getting ‘Fomo’, Nomo chocolate is an absolute game changer which definitely does not make you feel like you’re missing out. The caramel and sea salt flavour is a personal fave. Another bonus is they’re all also nut free, including the ‘hazel-NOT crunch’. Another big player in the vegan chocolate game is Galaxy. Already a dark horse in the normal chocolate race, Galaxy takes a podium position when it comes to its dairy free range. Vego is another great brand, they do a delicious organic hazelnut bar if you’re feeling like a real treat. They also do a gorg vegan spread which is a great alternative to Nutella. 

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Plant based heaven.

This is one of, if not, the easiest switches you can make and one which many non-vegans are doing. Whether your go to alternative is oat, soya, almond or something even more boujee, this is a great way to move towards a more plant based diet. Our personal fave is cashew milk - trust us, try it!

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Your local coffee shop will almost definitely have one alternative but probably even a range for you to choose from. Most of them also don’t even charge you any extra which is a bonus. There’s also way less calories in these alternatives. In your standard 200ml serving of semi-skimmed milk, you’re looking at around 105 calories but this drops to 34 cals in the same amount of almond milk - win win if you ask us! PSA: Try vanilla Alpro in your porridge and thank us later. 

Whether you’re vegan from this day forward, try it out one day a week, or simply just start choosing almond milk on your daily coffee run, every little really does help and makes a positive step in the direction to a happier and healthier world.