Christmas cake

A quick shout out to Ruby Tuesdays of London for her amazing vegan cakes.  We bought the following delicious creation for Christmas:

It is Christmas evening and Julie and I have already finished half of it!

Yum +1

2 months on, a review

So here we are, nearly 2 months on from when I started this adventure.  My original intent was to try the diet for 30 days and see how hard it was, measured against the benefits delivered.  Let's take a look at the breakdown:

The Good

• The food is great.  Seriously, vegan food is better than omni food.  Without the overpowering taste of meat and especially cheese, the other flavours have a chance to come out to play.  
• Energy levels have stabilised and I no longer have the rollercoaster highs and lows from my big meals. I'm not as run down by the evenings and my gym sessions have been strong. Snacking really is the way forward folks.
• I've lost all the weight I wanted to. Now I need to make sure I am having enough calories to maintain that weight.  I have to eat more... Wow, I'd never thought I'd end up in that situation.
• I feel pretty good about my decision.  This is a weird one, but the psychological benefits of knowing you are doing something ethically responsible are quite tangible. 

The Bad

• The diet hasn't managed to magically stop me from injuring myself.  I pulled my calf when in Australia and 3 weeks later I'm still struggling with it.  So no super-human powers for me.
• It can be a hassle.  Seriously, egg and milk make their way into everything processed. This means either being careful by reading a lot of packaging or making lots of my own meals.  I've gone for a compromise between both - if you have ever tried my cooking you will understand why I still like packaged food :)

  

  Tanilba Bay, the best journeys off the beaten track!

The Ugly

• Looking back at my attitudes prior to "the conversion", I see a lot about myself I don't like to admit. I was bigoted and revelled in my meat eating ways.  I didn't think about or look into why people chose to be vege or vegan, instead I only considered how annoying it was to have one around.  To anyone I ever said anything stupid or insensitive to - I'm sorry.

So what's in store for me?  I'm sticking with the diet for the foreseeable future.  I can't see myself ever going back to meat eating and the more I learn about milk and egg production I don't expect to be including those back in my diet in a hurry.  The journey continues...