Suffolk butchers becomes first in the country to offer vegan alternatives

From eadt.co.uk

   Alastair Angus, the owner of Thurston Butchers and the new vegan products they will be stocking.                                                             Picture: KRIS SANDERS

A butcher's shop which has gained award-winning status for its homemade sausages will soon be offering vegan and vegetarian plant-based products.

According to Thurston Butchers in School Road, they will be the first butchers in the UK to sell plant-based products alongside a range of raw meat.
From next Tuesday the popular business, which is headed up by Alastair Angus, will be stocking the vegan range 'THIS' - with no-meat bacon, chicken tikka pieces and sea-salt and black pepper chicken - all designed to be realistic 'mock meats' that closely mimic the taste and texture of their animal derived counterparts.

Speaking of the decision, Alastair said: "As daft as it sounds we do get asked by a lot of customers for vegan and vegetarian options.
"These people trust us as a supplier and know that we sell high quality products - so it seemed like an opportunity for us to do something different and help those who are trying to cut-down on the amount of meat they eat."

Alastair Angus, the owner of Thurston Butchers and the new 'THIS' vegan products they will be stocking as of next week. Picture: KRIS SANDERS

Plant-based startup THIS is a company based in London that has recently launched realistic vegan bacon and 'chicken' alternatives that staff believe will "fool carnivores".
Alistair, 32, took over the butchers in 2016 - and within nine months the business, which is made up of fairly young staff, received the top spot at Nottinghamshire County Show for its Woolpit sausages.

He added: "So far we've had a great response to the news on social media, as lot's of people are looking to cut down on their meat intake to help the environment.
"We get quite a few customers who are looking for a delicious trusted alternative for suppers and BBQs, so offering these alternatives works alongside our ethos.
"We have a very young team here and we want to be different - this idea replicates that and shows that we are not afraid of standing out."

The shop is also cutting down on its single use plastic and hopes that customers will understand and appreciate their decision of helping others to decrease their meat intake - all while aiding the planet.
Alastair said he hopes that customers will understand and appreciate their decision of "helping others to decrease their meat intake."

The products will be available from next week - with taste testings available in store.
For more information about the butchers, you can visit their Facebook page.

https://www.eadt.co.uk/business/thurston-butchers-vegan-vegetarian-alternatives-1-6202221

Should vegans bother having a go at eating a plant-based keto diet?

From metro.co.uk

Unless you’ve been under a rock for the past year or so, you’ll have heard people banging on about the wonders of going keto. Because it’s a high fat, high protein diet, devotees tend to plump for a sort of Atkins 2.0 style of eating – breakfasting on eggs and bacon, and dining on meat, cheese and nuts. There’s no denying the weight loss results many people experience in a super-short space of time – and that’s because keto is incredibly low in sugar. Zana Morris, founder of The Library gym, previously told Metro.co.uk that ‘any fat around your middle is entirely insulin-related’.

In other words, if you have a belly fat that you aren’t comfortable with, it could be down to your consumption or inability to process sugars. And as all carbs are sugar, that could mean going low-carb. So what happens if you’re a vegan who’s looking to reduce any sugar-related body fat or who simply wants to maintain their weight using keto?

Plant-based keto is possible
The problem with most regular plans is that they misunderstand what the ketogenic diet really involves. While you’re getting a massive gut full of protein (a lot of which your body cannot metabolise), you miss out on vital antioxidants and fibre from fruit and vegetables. According to scientists from Tufts University, an incredible one in 12 deaths world wide is caused by not eating enough veg, and one in seven are caused by a lack of fruit.

Far from being a zero-carb plan, you’re supposed to get all of your carb needs from green vegetables. If you ate a couple of portions of broccoli, spinach, kale, sprouts etc at every meal, not only would you not miss your grains or processed carbs, but you’d also be chock-full of iron, vitamin K, A, C, folate and fibre. And when you consider that half of your plate should be made up of those green veggies, it’s pretty easy to see how you could go vegan keto.

Ditch your meat or fish for grilled tofu or tempeh. Give a quarter of your plate over to avocado, hummus and nuts. Make salad dressings from lashings of olive oil and lemon juice. In other words, a vegan keto diet is more like a low-carb Mediterranean style of eating – full of heart healthy fats, proteins and fibre.

One person who is sold on its benefits is Liz – MeatFreeKeto on Instagram – a vegan keto blogger who shares her low-carb plant-based recipes and ideas with more than 12,000 followers. She turned keto for its anti-inflammatory properties. By ditching sugar and gluten, she found that her digestive system worked more efficiently and that her hormone levels evened out.

The benefits of a keto diet Overall the keto diet plan is positive. When you eat high in carbs, your body will produce glucose and insulin. Glucose is the easiest molecule for your body to convert and use as energy which means the fats you eat, your body stores. But when you go into ketosis, your body burns stored fat for energy instead of glucose and the benefits include:
Rebalancing the body
Reducing blood pressure
Resetting your insulin levels
Improving cognitive processes and mental stability
The ultimate benefit is that you totally change your eating habits to include more fat and eat healthier as you adapt to this diet. Geeta Sidhu-Robb, nutritionist

Restricting an already restricted diet may be dangerous
The issue, however, is the fact that any restrictive diet can involve missing out on vital nutrients. If you swerve colourful fruit and veg because you’re obsessing over sugar content, you end up missing out on vital vitamins and antioxidants that we know are absolutely crucial for maintaining good health. Plant-based foods tend to be much more quickly digested than animal based ones, so if you’re cutting out grains, root veg, dates and fruit, you could find yourself getting really hungry really quickly. And then, of course, you’ve got the fact that as vegans, we cut so much out of our diet already that any further restriction could cause issues with how we view nutrition and eating habits.

For true ketosis to be triggered (that’s the process by which your body starts to use its own body fat for energy), you’ve got to be eating a very low amount of carbs every day. We’re looking at around 5-10% of your daily calorie intake, which for the average woman is going to be about 20kcals. So that’s about a bowl of courgetti. Standard keto macronutrients are split into about 70 per cent fat, 20 per cent protein and 10 per cent carbs.

Again, think about that from a vegan perspective. You don’t have the help of oily fish or nutrient-dense fatty cheeses. You’ve got avocado, nuts (possibly nut cheeses), coconut products and yoghurt to get most of your daily calories from. Unlike lots of animal products, lots of plant-based proteins aren’t also rich in fat – they’re really low in the stuff. So vegan keto requires you to meticulously plan each section of your plate and to track everything.

If you can do that and you want to do that, cool.

Keto can help with metabolic conditions
We know that keto can help with certain conditions like type 2 diabetes and polycystic ovarian syndrome. Both of those are affected by insulin resistance. 70-80% of women with PCOS have insulin resistance. High levels of insulin increase testosterone which cause the facial hair growth, acne, hair loss, and missing periods – so anything that can help to bring down that insulin is worth looking into.

One study found that a keto diet helped to reverse Type 2 diabetes in 10 weeks and those results were maintained for up to a year with an average weight loss of over 2st. Claire Goodwin, AKA the PCOS Nutritionist previously told us that the most simple nutritional advice she’d give to all women with PCOS is to ‘just eat real food’. ‘And by real food, I mean anything that you can eat directly from nature, like vegetables, fruit, fish, nuts, oils, seafood and ethically raised, grass fed meat and oils.

‘Secondly, remove sugar and sweeteners. 70-80% of women with PCOS have insulin resistance (pre-Type 2 Diabetes), so sugar (and that includes natural sweeteners like dates and maple syrup) is only going to be exacerbating this.’ While she’s not vegan herself, it’s clear that she’s an advocate for very simple, no-fuss eating that focuses on whole foods.

But not all keto is quite what is seems
That doesn’t mean binning fruit and rice, it means eating everything in moderation and filling up on unprocessed grub. If it’s been milled, refined, sweetened, give it a miss. ‘Keto is played up in the media as being the thing that helped people to lose their weight,’ Claire and James Davis, also known as the Midlife Mentors, say. ‘It’s a lifestyle, not a diet – you can’t dip in and out of ketosis so you have to kiss goodbye to eating out or being social around food. It’s not sustainable for most people.

‘The Lancet did a massive study on it (over 15,000 people) and there are all these advocates of keto dismissing their findings! ‘There’s lots of dishonesty around it too. You see influences these days claiming to be vegan, posing with beers going “oh, I’m still enjoying beers on keto!”. No, you’re not.’

Eating healthily doesn’t have to be complicated
Just remember that eating well doesn’t have to be this complicated. You can get similar results from eating a properly whole food, vegan diet – balancing hormones by ditching refined foods and working out regularly to stimulate your metabolism.

https://metro.co.uk/2019/08/05/should-vegans-bother-having-a-go-at-eating-a-plant-based-keto-diet-10512897/

DEBUNKED: Tabloids Claim Vegan Restaurants Are Struggling To Survive

From plantbasednews.org/opinion

Vegan entrepreneur, Loui Blake, challenges the current narrative that plant-based business face inevitable closure

'There are so many variables - it's not simply down to it being vegan' (Edit: Plant Based News)

Vegan restaurant, Miami Burger, announced its closure last month - resulting in a slew of major tabloids insisting vegan restaurants across the UK are struggling to survive.
But award-winning marketer and prolific vegan entrepreneur, Loui Blake, has swiftly debunked the claims - branding the plethora of articles as 'weak'.

"First thing that I notice in the article is that it doesn't state a specific study proving that vegan restaurants are closing. All it does is reference one burger restaurant that shut in Reading," Blake told Plant Based News.
"It loosely contains a quote from a UK hospitality group that I've never heard of, saying that vegan restaurants are going to struggle if they purely market to vegan customers. Well of course they are. Any restaurant that targets a niche group will have the same problem."

Blake, the brainchild behind plant-based eateries Erpingham House and Kalifornia Kitchen, also noted the many variables that play a part in a restaurant's success.

"Location, rent, size, opening times, offerings. There are so many variables - it's not simply down to it being vegan," he explains.

"Location is a huge role to play in it. In London, it's much easier to be a purely vegan restaurant for vegans but places outside of London, like Reading and Norwich, it has to be a restaurant that caters for a wider audience.

"It can still be vegan, and it's not necessary just the food offering that allows it to appeal to a broader market, it's the way the offering is presented, it's the decor, it's the wording, the branding. It's a whole host of things that go into making it appeal to a bigger audience than purely vegans."

'Economic uncertainty'

The business owner also draws attention to the hospitality industry's decline - stating 'more restaurants are closing than ever before'. The Guardian attributed this to 'rising costs and economic uncertainty' last year - stating on average, two restaurants a week closed from the beginning of the year to the end of March.
"But that's consistent across the board: it's not purely vegan restaurants. It's a consistent theme throughout all types of restaurants," Blake affirms.
"On that note - the articles reference one vegan restaurant that has shut, but fails to mention the number of plant-based restaurants that are remaining open and flourishing.

"You've got places like What The Pita and Biff's Jack Shack - and a whole host of other vegan restaurants that have opened in the last two years but continue to thrive and open additional sites."

American food chain, By Chloe is another strong example. The eatery has opened two vegan restaurants in London as part of its $13 million expansion outside the US - stating it received 'thousands of requests' to come to the UK.

Appealing to a mainstream audience

Blake's success speaks for itself - with his three-story vegan restaurant in Norwich outliving high-street chains such as Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Carluccious, and Prezzo - all of which have closed in last few years.

"The thing that I have noticed with Erpingham House and Kalifornia Kitchen is in order to be successful: you have to appeal to a mainstream audience," Blake adds.
"You can't simply appeal to a vegan audience. So what we've done to mitigate that is make our restaurant offering based around health and sustainability (which happens to be vegan). Not a 'vegan food for vegans' approach - and I think that's the important position to take."

Loui Blake is a serial entrepreneur, speaker, and consultant. He currently owns the UK's largest vegan restaurant Erpingham house, and London restaurant brand Kalifornia Kitchen. His main interest is in popularising a vegan lifestyle through business and communications.

https://www.plantbasednews.org/opinion/debunked-vegan-restaurants-struggling

Veg Out At London’s Biggest Vegan Festival

From thehandbook.com/blog

We know what you’re thinking. When will these vegans give it a rest with their vegan exclusive festivities? Well not just yet. Believe it or not, for the next two weeks Brick Lane is being transformed into a veggie heaven as another vegan festival making its way into the city.
VFor kicks off on 3rd August for a two week celebration of all things vegan, taking over the Truman Brewery. Think rooftop yoga, climate and sustainability talks, vegan fashion shows, and, of course, a whole lotta foodie endeavours.

Let’s face it, we’ve got all that one vegan friend who’s constantly preaching and re-posting PETA videos on Facebook, but they’re not all like that. I mean, did you know I’m a vegan? (Oh crap, I just told you I was vegan before introducing myself…). Although vegans have a bit of a bad rep, our hearts are in the right place. With our main focus being, helping out Mother Nature.

Which is where VFor comes in. For two weeks, VFor will be providing a platform for various exhilarating events. They’ve got dedicated vegan days and nights powered by all things plant-based. Expect veggie street food dedicated to the latest seitan craze, and we’re sure you’ll see some jackfruit knocking about too (it’s literally everywhere!).

All the ethical brands are jumping on the bandwagon too. You’ll find vegan cosmetic brand, Lush pop-ups, vegan fashion boutiques (even some showcasing their range on the catwalk!). I mean there’s even a vegan dating event allowing veggies can find potential suitors who share the same passions for animal rights and veggie delights as them! Um, has it gone a little too far?

Reading beet-ween the lines, whether you’re veg-head or not, this one’s going to be a beanormous festival of veggie fun!

VFor arrives in London 3rd – 16th August at The Truman Brewery, 91 Brick Lane, Spitalfields, E1 6QR, www.v-for.co.uk

https://www.thehandbook.com/blog/2019/08/veg-out-at-londons-biggest-vegan-festival/

6 Ways Vegan Restaurants Can Better Support Their Community

From vegnews.com

From planting trees to welcoming omnivores, restaurants around the globe can learn a few tricks from progressive vegan restaurant, Fig + Farro. 

Vegan restaurants are hot right now, but our planet is getting a lot hotter, a lot faster. While the word is beginning to spread the word that a vegan diet can dramatically slow the march toward climate change, at this pace, we need more than individual action. Fig + Farro, a chic vegan restaurant in Minneapolis, is setting an example for a larger-scale shift toward plant-based eating and environmental stewardship. The business goes above and beyond to integrate sustainable practices, both in its kitchen and the community beyond its walls. Here are six attainable tips all vegan restaurants should implement to become leaders in the fight against climate change. 

1. Attract (and welcome) all eaters
According to the University of Chicago, if every American ate one less meat meal per week, it would be the greenhouse gas equivalent of taking 500,000 cars off the roads. So while those self-proclaimed “carnivores” and “cheese addicts” may not seem like the target audience, they are the ones who can have a greater impact on the planet by patronizing a plant-based restaurant and reducing their animal consumption every now and then. Fig + Farro believes that vegan restaurants have a responsibility to reach outside their bubble and attract every kind of eater, then turn on that hospitality charm and educate them on how incredible vegan food can be—both on the palette and the planet. 

2. Educate with Instagram
While restaurants might have a love-hate relationship with Instagram, there’s no denying it serves as a powerful (and free) marketing tool. However, it can also be used to educate. Compliment a mouthwatering post with a quick fact about sustainability or how a customer can easily lower their carbon foodprint. You’ll grab their attention with the image and give them something to ponder over—other than which vegan cheese board they should order. 

3. Become a social hub
Some restaurants—vegan or otherwise—put on an air of pretension. When that restaurant happens to be vegan, some assume that vegans are uppity, annoying, and high-maintenance. Break the stereotype. Allow your restaurant to be a gathering space of love and community. Host events, offer “date night” deals, and get the community talking. It is crucial to be as inclusive as possible, because we can’t fight climate change on our own. It takes a village—and delicious vegan food. 

4. Reduce food waste
About a third of all food in the U.S. is wasted, which means all the energy, water, and packaging that went into production is also wasted. Restaurants are notorious culprits of food waste, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Keep portion sizes manageable (that means no “stunt food” such as mountain-high vegan nachos or any food measured by the foot), get creative with food scraps (a la fried potato skins and carrot tops), and learn how to compost. Investing in sustainable to-go containers also helps to diverge food waste by encouraging customers to take leftovers home. Leave no seitan piccata behind! 

5. Plant a tree
Deforestation that occurs as a result of livestock production is one of the biggest threats to climate change. Restaurants can help bring back greenery by partnering with local or global tree-planting projects such as Trees for the Future or the Trillion Trees Campaign. Fig + Farro plants a tree for every guest, and in just the first few months of the operation, the business planted over 27,000 trees. If every restaurant even committed to one tree a night, we’d see a lot more green and the threat of deforestation would be history. 

6. Excel in the kitchen
Not to state the obvious, but great vegan food should be at the core of any restaurant. The goal is to keep people coming back, not just for the bottom line, but to ensure they eat plant-based. The more enticing and enjoyable the menu is, the more customers will associate excellent food with the plant-based diet. Come up with specials, keep the customer favourites, and listen to and apply their feedback. Whether the customers believe in climate change or not, they can all agree that dessert is not to be missed.

Fig + Farro is happy to work with any restaurant that wishes to implement these environmentally friendly practices. To get in touch, contact hello@figanfarro.com

Michelle Courtright is the founder of Fig + Farro and was part of a business delegation to the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP24). 

https://vegnews.com/2019/8/6-ways-vegan-restaurants-can-better-support-their-community

A week on a vegan diet

From theboar.org

I went into this week determined to stick to a vegan diet, but I was unsure what to expect. I was pescatarian for over five years and, even now, I tend to eat mostly vegetarian food when I’m cooking for myself. I’ve even been to a vegan restaurant before. But there was one thing I instantly knew I would struggle without: cheese. With some drinks nights on the horizon, how would I survive without cheese and carbs in those early hours? Stay tuned.

Day one went fairly smoothly. I was ready to face the challenge and went out food shopping. Seems pretty simple, right? Wrong. Turns out almost everything has milk powder or eggs in it. Any food branded ‘vegan’ is ridiculously expensive and the options are limited. While my friends chose from twenty different pizzas for dinner, I had to decide between three ready meals. These were all some variation of stew with rice and cost the same amount for one portion as the pizzas did for three.

I learnt three lessons while food shopping. Number one: if going on a vegan diet, don’t look for the vegan branded stuff. Two: know that the chances are you’ll have to cook almost everything yourself, because processed products are rarely vegan. On a more positive note, three: Indian food is generally a good place to start – Sainsbury’s samosas were vegan!

Despite a more challenging food shop than normal, it was much easier to stick to being vegan once I had more of a variety of things I could eat at home. I imagine that with time, once your cupboards are stocked with vegan alternatives and essentials, it would be much less difficult. Unfortunately, I was vegan for a week at home, where three other people were still eating animal products. This meant every time I went to grab something from the fridge, or took out an item I would normally not cast a second glance at, I had to examine the ingredients list.

After watching my family devour some mustard chicken while I ate a sweet potato burger (nice but a bit dry), I decided I deserved a glass of wine to help me through the vegan adjustment period. Just as I went to get the bottle out of the fridge, I was met with my Dad’s smug face. Oh yes. Apparently not all wine is vegan. Something to do with the ‘fining agents’ wine can be clarified with. Guess I’ll be hitting the hard stuff this week.

One factor a lot of people discuss when it comes to veganism is how the diet works if you’re a regular gym-goer or into sports. How can you eat the right amount of protein? Do your muscles take longer to repair? I can’t say that I gave veganism the proper opportunity here, because I went to the gym for the first time in about two months and doing circuits almost killed me off. I know that I can get a bit sore after an intense workout, and the time off from working out probably made this worse, but I would say that I felt significantly sorer than I usually do after the gym. I can’t say for certain that this was the vegan diet, however it is something to consider.

On Thursday, I went out for lunch with some friends. Fortunately, we went somewhere where I knew there was a vegan option and had actually opted for it out of choice before. It’s a delicious vegan curry, coconut-y with chickpeas and mushrooms and it comes with pickled vegetables. However, I found this usually tasty dish somewhat marred by the fact that I had to have it. Eating it without really choosing it put a bit of a damper on the situation.

I wouldn’t say that eating vegan food was particularly horrific. I didn’t dislike anything I ate – almost everything was stuff I would eat anyway. It’s just that I was left feeling a bit limited. I didn’t have a lot of options and I was getting a bit sick of vegetables. So, to cheer myself up, I went onto Pinterest and decided to make myself some vegan banana pancakes for my final breakfast. They were incredibly easy to make (as all pancakes should be) and honestly, they tasted amazing. I don’t doubt that I’ll make them again moving forward, despite not becoming vegan.

So, I can safely say that I ate some pretty good food this week as a vegan and that most of the things I did eat were not any different from a normal day for me. It just involved more label checking and elements where cost was a significant factor. I did enjoy the week, but I don’t think that veganism is for me. It’s expensive, and sticking to a vegan diet is not something that is possible for people with medical issues or already limited dietary restrictions.

Is it hard? I’m not going to lie, there were times when I took some cheese out of the fridge and stared at it, wondering why I decided to do this when everyone else was having Maltesers, and mayo on their chips. Despite this, by the end of the week, I was used to checking labels and cutting out a lot of processed food. It definitely takes some adjusting, but in many ways, it was much easier than I expected.

https://theboar.org/2019/08/week-vegan/

Where to Buy Vegan Shoes for Children

From vrg.org/blog

It can be difficult to find vegan shoes for babies and youth. The online companies listed below offer vegan shoes for children.

Baby Nanya located in the USA offers vegan baby and toddler shoes. The shoes’ exterior is made of microfiber, while the inner part is made of cotton. They also have rubber sole grips. See: https://babynanya.com/

                                                                             Baby Nanya

Clamfeet, an American company, offers adorable baby shoes and matching shoes for mothers. They have an eco canvas exterior, organic cotton lining, and rubberized grip sole. They are washable. See: https://clamfeet.com/

Happy Little Soles, a company out of the United Kingdom, offers a vegan section of shoes for boys and girls. See: https://www.happylittlesoles.co.uk/

                                                                      Happy Little Soles

Jambu & Co. sells a few shoes for girls and toddlers in the USA. See: https://jambu.com/kids/feature/vegan/

Keep Shoes, an American company, offers some shoes for kids. See: https://keepcompany.com/collections/kids-shoes-1

Pediped offers a large selection of vegan shoes for kids of all ages that can be shipped internationally. See: https://www.pediped.com/vegan

                                                                               Pediped

Softstar, another American company, offers moccasin-like ramblers made from soft vegan Ultrasuede with rubber soles. They are available in baby and youth sizes. See: https://www.softstarshoes.com/child-youth-vegan-rambler.html

Tom’s sells vegan shoes for children worldwide. In the USA, see: https://www.toms.com/vegan/category-baby?N=322592991+873760282+218521578+3893857130&&Nrpp=70&

In the United Kingdom, visit: https://www.toms.co.uk/kids

Vegan Chic, an American company, offers a few options for children including The Kid’s Ramos by Keep. See: https://www.veganchic.com/kids/vegan+shoes/search.aspx

https://www.vrg.org/blog/2019/07/31/where-to-buy-vegan-shoes-for-children/