What am I doing here?

Let's get one thing out in the open ... I LOVE CHEESE!! Whenever something good comes out of something bad like mold then I have to respect that. I am not just a cheese light weight either. I've run the gauntlet from mild gouda to stinky roquefort and everywhere in between. Most of my favorite foods involve cheese and I am a long time food lover who doesn't mess around when it comes to meal time.

So why a blog about trying vegan eating? Well sometimes you have to step back and look at the bigger picture. Due to some health issues that have been exacerbated recently I have to stop and think what I can do to try to get better. I have been told in the past that I am intolerant to whey protein (found in all dairy), but it was easy to overlook a diagnosis from a homeopathic doctor as more of a suggestion. The nice hippie doctor man wants me to stop eating dairy, how sweet of him. But there have also been some pretty darn credible studies that link a dairy and meat heavy diets to the exact sorts of issues I am running into. I decided what have I got to lose if I try this out for a little while.  If I don't get better, then you bet your sweet ass I'll go running back to the loving arms of cheese. But for now, I feel strongly that this is the right thing to do to get back on track. 

Sure now you know my sad Oprah worthy story about health issues. But I didn't really answer your whole question.  You'll have to forgive me I have a tendency to go off on tangents sometimes. Rather than fight it, just go with me on these short out of the way journeys and just trust that I will eventually get you back to the path we were on.

Side journey #1: There is nothing worse than a condescending well anyone, but especially a condescending vegan!!

Hipster Barista here kind of sums up how it feels living in Seattle sometimes. I am finding that my timing is quite bad, because right now there is a bout of stylish veganism going around. I mean admit it, everyone tries a fad out at least once in there lives. Often we just want to see what all of the fuss is about. But in this case I don't respect the reasons behind this particular fad and I don't want to give the impression that this has anything to do with my decision. I even considered doing this whole thing in secret, because I know some of my friends would have a field day with the born again vegan hipster jokes.

But then I thought to myself, what could be worse than feeling like I was doing something wrong because I had to do it in hiding.  It also occurred to me that there could be some other folks out there who were also dragged kicking and screaming into a plant based, whole grain diet and they just want to feel like they aren't alone too.

So getting back on topic as promised ... I am blogging about this experience to be able to look back on how this went and also in the hopes that someone will relate to what I'm going through and maybe even want to swap recipes.

Also I want to be 100% clear that while I am going strictly dairy free, I am going to bend a bit here and there on the meat issue. I already eat a meat lite diet, but the big thing here is the veggie centric shift I am going to have to make. In the end even if I do eat meat it will never comprise more than 10% of my diet.  What can I say, one of my favorite things is tuna sashimi and I am not prepared to give that up just yet.

I am sure there will be some good food moments and some "I'd rather be dead than eat that again" moments. Whatever happens thanks for reading!