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A Portable Vegan

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  • Bowl with Tea Bags
  • Packets of Miso Soup
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Travel FoodThe past two years I’ve spent more time in airports, airplanes and hotels than in the preceding five years combined.  Since I became a vegan, traveling – eating – has become a lot more challenging.  Major metropolitan areas usually have many vegetarian and vegan options, but sometimes I find myself some place that isn’t quite so “friendly.”  Or I’m going to be with non-vegan family members who – and I say this with all the love and affection in my heart – avoid meat- and cheese-less options like bird flu*.  Here’s how I do it and remain mostly well-fed and happy.  None of this will be new to vegans, but I share this mostly for the non-vegans out there.  They need to know what it’s like, don’t you think?  Restaurants and other eating establishments: get with the program!  Offer us some creative options!

Breakfast:
This is the meal that presents the most difficulties for me while on the road.  Looking over a typical restaurant breakfast menu, it’s a veritable barnyard filled with eggs, dairy milk and meat.  From omelets to pancakes, waffles, sausage, bacon and ham.  Even the oatmeal comes swimming in dairy milk.  Often I’m met with a blank stare when I ask if soy milk is available.  So I’ve pretty much eliminated eating out for breakfast.  Even worse are the “free, continental” breakfasts at hotels.  What is an appealing freebie for most is a minefield of bad choices for vegans.  Breakfast is confined to refined flour bread and pastries laden (and then coated) with sugar along with scary eggs-from-a-carton and processed meats swimming in grease.  I’m sorry – have I spoiled anyone’s appetite??

What I do to arm myself with healthy and portable breakfast options is before I leave on a trip, I fill a sturdy plastic bag with a combination of rolled oats, rolled wheat and barley, triticale and rye flakes.  I sprinkle in cinnamon, cardamom, allspice and throw in a few handfuls of mixed dried berries.  Usually I have a good stack of Justin Nut Butter Peanut and Almond Butter packs with me.  I love that they come packaged this way – saves me from buying a big jar and leaving it behind at the end of the trip.

As soon as I get to my destination, I find the nearest grocery store and pick up some kind of non-dairy, unsweetened milk, along with a loaf of whole grain bread, bananas, apples and a couple of coconut milk yogurts.   Before I hit the sack, I take out my trusty plastic travel bowl (see below) put about a 1/4 cup of those mixed grains in, cover with soy/almond/oat/hemp milk and put it in the mini refrigerator (I always try to book a room with one).  In the morning the grains are soft and plump.  Topped with sliced bananas and accompanied by a yogurt and toast slathered with peanut butter – beats a restaurant breakfast any day of the week.  Oh, and I always travel with tea bags and Truvia (crystallized stevia) packets.  I’m picky about the kinds of tea I like and a morning without green tea is a sad morning indeed.  In a pinch, miso soup from a packet makes a satisfying breakfast – or lunch or dinner for that matter.

Bowl with Tea Bags

Restaurants:
It’s true that being vegan can put a slight cramp on socializing when the socializing involves food.  I hate, hate, hate being the downer guest who is always asking: are there going to be vegan options?  Usually I just keep my mouth shut and do a little research behind the scenes.  If it looks as if the venue does not offer something I can eat, I’ll call ahead and talk to someone there and explain that I don’t eat meat or cheese.  It’s amazing how accommodating they usually are.  And calling ahead saves you from a plate of afterthought  “sides.”  To throw a further monkey wrench into the works, Kel and I also (mostly…) follow a no-added-fat diet.  This means asking the restaurant to go easy or even to eliminate adding cooking oils.  I kind of gauge the reception I get when I tell them I’m vegan, then hit them with the no-fat deal.  We could play the “doctor’s orders” trump card (which seems to make them more amenable to adjusting their cooking), but that wouldn’t be true in our case and as dumb as it sounds, I like to keep it honest – although we do follow the no-added-fat diet for our health.

When I make the restaurant choice, my heart and stomach really want to select a vegetarian or vegan place, but I almost always pick a place where my meat-eating friends and family can get what they consider a good meal.  But – I make sure the place has something delicious for me as well.  I’ve only managed once or twice to lure diehard carnivores to vegan places and, well, it’s usually ended badly.  I’m not sure if it’s because they truly didn’t like the food or if there is some mental resistance to enjoying a meal free of animal products.

One last comment about restaurants.  Often a vegetable soup of some kind will be on the menu, but this doesn’t mean it is vegan or even vegetarian.  More often than not, restaurants will use chicken stock to make their soups.  And on one occasion, after a long discussion (“What DO you eat?!”) with the proprietor of a cute cafe in Colorado about veganism, Kel and I were generously handed big chunks of cornbread.  After biting into them, mouths stuffed, the woman suddenly asked, “You eat cheese, don’t you?  The cornbread has cheddar in it.”

Packets of Miso Soup

Airports/Airplanes:
Even when I ate meat, airport restaurants depressed the hell out of me.  But there are times when I absolutely need to pick up something or the cranky, hungry beast within may escape and I’ll be whisked away into the bowels of TSA purgatory.  When I can, I’ll bring a PB & J sangie with me, a cut up apple, mixed nuts and a homemade cookie or two.  Perfect airport/airplane travel food.  But by the return trip, I’ve got nothing and if I’ll be flying during a meal time, I need food  I avoid salads; pizza doesn’t travel well, is made with refined flour and it’s kind of icky at airports.  Bagels are all well and good but are uninspired.  So what I do (and this is not rocket science) is have a sandwich made with either all of the veggie “fixings” (lettuce, tomato, onion, etc., if that’s all the place can offer) or get a roasted veg minus the cheese and any oily dressing.  It gets the job done.  And I always, always get a soy mocha to cheer myself.

When traveling – even when just out and about locally – nothing makes me more nervous than the thought of being without food.  But a little advance planning, however, assures that I’ve got something delicious and healthy stashed away.

*A brief story: Recently I was in Salt Lake City visiting my brother and as it was nearing time for dinner, I asked him where he’d like to eat.  He very generously replied that I should pick the place, “wherever I wanted.”  That was just what I wanted to hear and I knew exactly where I wanted to go.  Ever since having a delicious lunch with Kel at Sage’s (a vegetarian place in downtown SLC), I’d wanted to go back and sample more of their creative cooking.  “Sage’s!”  I said.  His face gathered into a horrible grimace.  We went somewhere else.  Where my dear brother ordered…a salad.  (Incidentally, I did get him finally to go to Sage’s where he and I both ordered their nut burger.  Delicious.  He, sadly, did not agree.)

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  1. A Tablespoon of Liz says:

    I loved this post! I’m not entirely vegan, but I like to stick to it as much as possible. I hate going out to eat with new people, because I don’t want vegetarainism/veganism to sound difficult by asking the waiter so many questions about what’s in the food. I love your idea for breakfast though, it sounds better than the breakfasts I make at home, and definitly better than any restaurant!

    • Thanks, Liz! It can be a minefield – is the bread made with butter? any hint of cheese in the sandwich, etc.? When I’m in a restaurant about to order, I usually start by saying: I’m going to be the problem child at the table. Fair warning, ya know?

  2. The Vegan Kat says:

    It’s funny how being vegan forces you to be more resourceful especially when traveling! A refrigerator in a hotel room is definitely helpful. I’ve also used an electric kettle in a hotel in Germany to make ramen noodles with broccoli and soy sauce on a particularly desperate day with almost no vegan food options. We were lucky to stumble across an outdoor market as well and found mangoes and strawberries for dessert. It wasn’t fancy, but hit the spot because we were so hungry! I’ll also often some of these: http://theprobar.com/ which are great in a pinch when you can’t find anything vegan. Thanks for the travel suggestions!

    • Thanks for the link – the bars look delicious (peanut butter chocolate chip…). I’m heading to WF next week and will definitely have those on my shopping list. Good idea to stash a few of those in my purse.

      Amazing what tastes good when one is famished! Thank goodness for ramen noodles…

  3. tearoomdelights says:

    It must be really difficult, especially the breakfasts. I’m mostly a vegetarian (I do eat fish, because otherwise I’d starve offshore where the choice is generally meat, meat, meat or fish) and even then it’s not always easy, but for a vegan I can see it’s much harder. It must be so nice when you do find a proper vegan restaurant that does excellent food, and you’re right that there needs to be more choice for vegans now, as there has been for vegetarians in recent years.

    • I really do think we will see more and more options. It seems that there is a slow trend towards plant-based eating – especially in light of the obesity problem here in the States.

      • tearoomdelights says:

        That’s a good point. A lot of people are becoming more concerned about what they put into themselves these days and the health issues connected with eating meat. I’ve certainly noticed over the last few years that the vegetarian options in restaurants are becoming more varied, less predictable and far better in general. I would be very interested to try a completely vegan restaurant.

  4. infinebalance says:

    I love this post,,, it’s full of great advice for those of us that travel. I travel for work alot and I find myself compromising dietary preferences far too often and end up feeling badly about my choices -and then my tummy hurts. Which makes work travel all the worse — when you want to be on the top of your game you feel yucky and bloated. It is interesting that our non vegetarian friends truly don’t like vegetarian / vegan food. Do you think their taste buds work differently than ours? :)

    • I’m a control freak – which explains part of why I bring breakfast with me – and like you, when I compromise, I just end up feeling lousy. And yes – our taste buds work differently (correctly): they aren’t effed up ;-)!

  5. estherslaff says:

    You should put your comments, recipes and photos in a book. You would sell it.

    Esther Slaff

  6. veganelder says:

    What a great guide…excellent! Thanks so much. (ps…there’s another Oklahoma vegan blogging…visit http://heathersvegandiary.blogspot.com/) :-)

  7. estherslaff says:

    Ann,

    I made your Indian-Spiced Roasted Squash Soup tonight. It was a big hit.

    Thank you for the recipe.

    Esther

  8. Kinenchen says:

    Thank you for this! I love traveling with Gone Nuts and Vega Shake-n-Go but now I’ve got more options.

  9. Nancy Gentry says:

    Love that Justin’s! :)

  10. evervescence says:

    Great post! I am vegan too and feel much the same about travelling food as well as the restaurant debacle. I’m an introvert so that added unwanted attention I get when trying to order vegan at non-vegan restaurants from friend and/or the staff can be very overwhelming for me. With some planning like you said-calling ahead, checking the menu ahead of time etc. much of that can be avoided.

    I would rather go somewhere everyone myself included can get a delicious meal they can enjoy than settle for something mediocre to make everyone else happy. Eating out is a luxury for me, not something I can do often so when I do, I want it to be great. There aren’t very many vegan-friendly restaurants near me, so my options are quite limited and many of the restaurants here don’t even have vegan options at all. BUT–it never hurts to ask. They often will accommodate you if they know you need or want it. If not pick somewhere else! If they don’t accommodate me, they don’t get my business.

    I’m so very grateful for my wonderful friends that are aware of my lifestyle and that respect it enough to compromise on a place we will all enjoy. YAYE!!! Win/win! If not then I just meet-up with everyone afterwards or another time so I can make my own delicious meal and not have to settle for something yucky. I think eating something yucky while everyone else feasts doesn’t give a good impression of how amazing eating vegan is either. I don’t want them to think that a side of heated up frozen veggies is the only thing I eat. I eat like a queen with better, healthier, tastier food than I ever ate as an omnivore and that is what I want to share with my friends so they can see how fantastic it is to eat vegan, because it is! Eating vegan IS awesome and I never feel I’m lacking in taste or flavor by not eating meat/dairy. I also do not want to support restaurants or businesses that are not vegan-friendly.

    Happy to say many airports do have more vegan options which helps with travelling too.

    So you like Sage’s too huh? Love their nut burgers!~!! Have you ever been to Vertical Diner or Blue Plate? Vertical Diner is all vegan, and Blue Plate is vegan-friendly. Both are fantastic. I’m from Salt Lake City (though I now call NE Florida home) so I know those places well. I miss them! :( Vertical Diner has the traditional diner style foods and are so good they are sure to please the omni’s out there, maybe even your brother?

    • Oh gosh, so true! I’d never go back – – I’m eating a much more interesting and delicious diet now that I’m plant-based. Amazing what opens up, isn’t it? And yes, it’s fun to share with non-vegans just how delicious and inventive vegan cooking can be.
      Just went to Vertical Diner tonight! It’s my guilty pleasure. I haven’t heard of Blue Plate, but I will definitely check it out! I really appreciate your comments. Let me know if you think of any other places I need to go while I’m in SLC. Best to you – -

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