Cravings are a normal part of life. Understanding our appetites, knowing where they come from, and accepting them can be helpful. Then it's only a question of what we're going to do about it.
If you're participating in Veganuary, you may experience meat cravings, but that doesn't mean you have to consume meat. Below are our top tips to satisfy your cravings for meat on a plant-based diet.
Understanding Your Cravings
Those feelings of not being able to live without meat may be partly physical, but habit and routine do a lot of the work too. Either way, the intensity usually fades over the first few weeks.
However, not all cravings are physical. Sure, there's the flavour of meat that we miss, but it's more complicated than that. Memories, associations, customs, and emotions are all linked to food and eating. Every dish you miss may be evoking a memory: time spent with family or friends, comfort foods that communicated love, and activities that were enjoyable and a part of your life. So, when we have food cravings, it's possible that we're also craving the people, places, and events that those foods were a part of.
Fake Your Meats
There is a multitude of fake meats on the market, and the quality of the products is improving all the time, with excellent taste and texture. We have a whole blog dedicated to the best fake meats for Veganuary.
However, you can get that meaty flavour without buying any brand-name meat substitutes by using tofu, tempeh, textured vegetable protein, or seitan instead. When you want to recreate a beloved meaty dish, consider what texture you need to replicate.
Choose seitan if you want your fake meat to have the texture of beef and be able to be sliced with a fork and knife. Seitan can be prepared in a variety of ways to mimic the firmness of a steak, the softness of a pot roast, or the chewiness of ribs. Seitan can also be used to mimic the texture of pork.
Tofu will help you make all of your favourite chicken meals, whether you cut it into cubes for crispy Chinese fare or slice it into cutlets to bread and fry.
Depending on whether you prefer the firmness of scallops or the flakiness of "fish" fillets, tofu and tempeh work well in recreating fish dishes. Tempeh is a great ground beef substitute for Sloppy Joes, meatloaves, and Shepherd's pies.
Satisfying Your Craving With Vegetables
There are a variety of veggies with meaty flavours and textures. Mushrooms, particularly Portobellos, are excellent for meaty recipes such as stews, burgers, and stroganoff.
Although jackfruit is a fruit, its flavour is more savoury than sweet, making it an excellent addition to BBQ sandwiches, stews, and other meaty dishes.
Lentils, beans, eggplant, and even nuts are examples of vegetables that can replace meat and satisfy your cravings.
Choose Your Seasonings
Seasoning is the main component that makes meat taste so wonderful, second only to texture. After all, no one eats plain meat without seasoning it, so why should vegetables be any different?
The same spice blends that you would use on meat can be utilised on veggies. Although poultry seasoning is advertised for use with chicken and turkey, it's often vegan. There is no steak in steak seasoning; there is no genuine poultry in poultry seasoning. These are simply herb and spice blends that we've grown to associate with meat.
To manufacture your own "poultry" seasoning, combine sage, thyme, marjoram, rosemary, celery seed, allspice, and black pepper. To make your own seitan steak spice rub, combine chile powder, paprika, oregano, cumin, coriander, mustard powder, brown sugar, salt, and pepper.
Vegan-ify Your Broths
Chefs use chicken broth for everything since it has extra flavour, so let's develop a vegan broth with that same extra flavour. Vegan "chicken" or "beef" broth or bouillon cubes can be purchased, or you can prepare your own broth.
Simply season veggie broth with "poultry" seasoning to make vegan "chicken" soup. To make a thick, meaty "beef" broth, combine tamari, soy sauce, liquid aminos or vegan Worcestershire sauce, red wine or red wine vinegar, and black pepper in veggie broth.
For spectacular results, use your fragrant "meaty" broths in soups, sauces, gravies, or anywhere else you'd use broth or water in a recipe.
Get Your Nutrients
Cravings are a poor guide to what your body is short of. It's a tempting idea, but it's mostly folklore, and you can crave a bacon sandwich while being perfectly well fed.
What does change when you stop eating meat and fish is what turns up on your plate. Two things are easy to lose without noticing.
Omega-3 is the one people miss. Oily fish is the richest everyday source of EPA and DHA, the two omega-3s your body puts to work directly, and no plant food contains them at all. Flaxseed, chia and walnuts give you ALA instead, and your body converts only a small amount of it onwards. If fish is the thing you've given up, that's the actual gap. Algae is the only plant source that supplies EPA and DHA ready-made, which stops being surprising once you know it's where the fish get theirs. There's more in our guide to how vegans and vegetarians get enough omega-3, and ours is vegan omega-3 DHA and EPA from algae.
B12 is the other. It's made by bacteria rather than by plants or animals, which is why animal foods carry it and plants don't. Fortified foods or a supplement are the only reliable vegan sources. Our post on the signs of a B12 deficiency covers what a shortfall looks like and how long it takes to show up.
Iron is the third to keep an eye on. The iron in plants is absorbed less readily than the iron in meat, and eating something with vitamin C alongside it helps.
It is possible to satisfy your appetite for meaty food, as well as your meat-loving friends and family, without having to cook or consume meat. It's all about the taste and texture, and with these tips, you'll be able to prepare rich, meaty, and delicious plant-based dishes for Veganuary.
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