My First Vegan Shopping Trip

Well, after yesterday’s big decision to do 6 weeks of vegan eating I decided I needed to clean out my fridge and go shopping.  I did some research first and found several recipes I wanted to try but even then I felt a little lost at the grocery store!  Parts of the store I usually get quite a few things in (the meat and seafood counter, the deli counter, the dairy section) were useless.

I’ll admit, I don’t think the options in my area are as good as in larger cities.  Without a Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, or other natural or health food store I can only rely on the “health market” section of my local grocery store.  Luckily, that’s about all I could handle for my first time!  And it did seem to have a decent selection.  I even braved the bulk food containers for the first time (well, the first time where the contents of the bulk bins weren’t candy!).

 

Turns out this is the place to get some weirder grains or raw nuts.  I bagged myself some macadamia nuts and some pine nuts.  Some of this stuff is NOT cheap!

Anyway, lets break down this shopping trip shall we?

Fruits and Veggies

I got a good variety of things, partly due to them being required in the recipes I want to make.  I’ve never bought parsnips before (the white carrot-looking things in the middle) so that’ll be interesting.  After taking the picture I realized I missed about half of the veggies I bought.  Not pictured are leeks, spinach, mini sweet bell peppers, cherry tomatoes, and red onion.

Grains, Nuts, and Legumes

This was a big part of the shopping trip because these are the proteins and bulk of the meals I’ll be eating.  There are at least 4 things in this picture I’ve never bought before!

The two bags at the top of the picture are the pine nuts and macadamia nuts from the bulk bins.  The lentils and whole wheat quinoa are also completely new to me.  Sidebar: I know it’s pronounced KEEN-WAH.  But my brain doesn’t care.  In my head I say QUIN-OHH-AHH.  Every.  Single.  Time.

It is kind of hard to find raw nuts.  The baking aisle has some and the bulk bins have some.  Everything in the regular nut section has oil and salt.  The bulk bins were out of raw cashews and I couldn’t find them anyway so I’m hoping that the lightly salted ones will work okay for my recipe.  If not I’ll have to try again.  Also, not pictured is Quaker old-fashioned oats, wheat thins, and pasta.

Vegan Substitutes

This is the stuff I’d have never bought before this challenge.  The stuff that is a replacement for foods I regularly eat or cook with.

Almond milk I’ve had before and I like it.  I have a pretty strong aversion to soy milk so this is the way to go.

Earth balance is a butter substitute that is made primarily of oil.  I’ve had it before and it isn’t bad but it doesn’t have the rich “buttery” taste.  Luckily in a lot of cooking you shouldn’t be able to tell.

The other two products I have never had and didn’t even really know existed!  The vegenaise is vegan mayo.  It’s made of oils, soy protein, other stuff.  It actually wasn’t part of my shopping list but I wanted to try it because I really like mayo.  Then the chips… non-dairy chocolate chips.  Who knew?  The ingredient list is short: evaporated cane juice, natural chocolate liqueur, and non-dairy cocoa powder.  I don’t really understand, but that’s okay.  I’ll give it a shot anyway.

So, that was my shopping trip!  I’m all set for some pretty interesting recipe testing coming up.

Now if only I could figure out what I’m going to eat for lunch tomorrow!