DAY 01.

SO today was not only my twenty-fourth birthday, but it was my FIRST of 40 days going vegan. I have to say, it was a lot EASIER than I thought it would be!! I woke up and had a piece of vegan toast with, get this, VEGAN cream cheese and strawberry jam. It was delish!! I used a soy-based cream cheese that I found at Whole Foods. The brand is Tofutti.

The container looks like this:


I imagine that you can find it at any store that sells the veggie/vegan options like Whole Foods or Trader Joe's. I actually when to Grocery Outlet with my dad and sister and was surprised to find some vegan-friendly options there. They had some vegan soups and soy-yogurt. You can really find vegan and vegetarian options at any grocery store if you really look.

For lunch I went to Panera Bread with a couple of my friends. I chose the Mediterranean Veggie Sandwich and got the deal to choose half sandwich and half salad. So I got the classic salad that has greens, lettuce, tomato, red onion and cucumber with a balsamic vinaigrette. And the sandwich has lettuce, tomato, green onion, peppers and a jalapeno/cilantro hummus. I asked for it without the feta cheese and got a green tea to go with it. It was VERY tasty!



AANNNDDD....

For dinner I cooked pasta. This is a common pasta that I cook often, it is vegetarian because you do add cheese but I just omitted the cheese and added extra spices to make it taste good. It's a veggie pasta that has green onion, garlic, zucchini, tomato, mushroom and your choice of pasta. The original recipe (I learned this recipe from my high school culinary class, lol) calls for linguine, but I used spinach penne today. YUMMY!



It may not look appetizing from the picture (I think it's because of the spinach penne, lol) but I have been making this same dish for YEARS, since high school... and it's delish! ;)

So that was my first day! Hopefully I learn more about what to substitute for non-vegan items. But check back to see my progress!