'Vegans still eat well'
Vegan and plant-based can be intimidating, particularly if you grew up eating a traditional diet with meat at most meals.
Yatesha Price didn't grow up embracing vegan cooking. Becoming a mother at 18 started her thinking about healthier eating. She wanted her son to have exposure to foods she didn't have growing up. Then a 40-day challenge had her giving up many things from her diet. During that time, she skipped packaged items and cooked everything from scratch. She realized she felt better when she didn't eat certain foods.
"I realized that a few issues I had went away during that 40 days. That changed my relationship with food,” Price said.
She started cooking plant-based and set out to learn more. One myth is that vegan eating isn't budget friendly.
"It is not more expensive to eat vegan,” Price said. “It is more expensive to eat vegan if you need to stand on substitutes, like meat substitutes, cheese substitutes, egg substitutes. That is where it gets expensive.
"I gave up processed meals. If I wanted something I made it from scratch. I stopped buying pre-packaged. We pay for convenience. You can make a really good meal for four people that is vegan for $10. You can make lentil burgers, a vegetable stir fry. One of the easiest things to make vegan and make it taste good is chili.”
Today, Price cooks plant-based meals four days a week at the pay-whatyou-can Tricklebee Cafe, 4424 W. North Ave. She also does catering and weekly prepared meals for her own business, Nature's Tasty Treats.
“One of my first recipes I came up with was chickpea ‘chicken' nuggets for my son,” Price said. “It was literally chickpeas, seasoned with some quinoa. I would roll them in breadcrumbs, spray them with cooking oil and bake them. He loves them. He's about to be 16 and that's still one of his favorite things for me to make.”
Tylesha King and her husband, Jaleel, opted to go vegan in 2016 when Tylesha was pregnant with their first child. They're now parents of two, and both children are also vegan.
After years of posting photos on social media and introducing family and friends to vegan meals, in June 2020 the couple opened Royally Vegan, currently serving plant-based take-out and curbside meals to-go at 2923 N. 57th St. Orders are placed by phone at (414) 2020231 or royallyveganmke@gmail.com
“People's favorite foods are always the same no matter what. People have misconceptions. Even though we don't eat dairy, cheese, any meat, vegans still eat well,” said Tylesha King.
“The cool thing is that we re-create what people are already eating,” Jaleel added. “People are always requesting soul food. We do the fried mushroom ‘chicken'. It tastes good and they forget it is mushrooms. We do meatballs made with Impossible meat, mac ‘n' cheese with our own homemade vegan cheese.”
Creating comfort foods from their backgrounds was also the goal of partners Jack O'Grady and Chase Roldan opening plant-based food truck Maya Ophelia's in 2018. Filipino bulalo is a recent menu favorite, while seitan asada and queso cheese are always popular. The partners do a monthly pay-whatyou-can meal, too. The truck is located at 818 S. Water St., in the Boone & Crockett lot.
“We decided to do plant-based because both of us have very chronic conditions. I have Crohn's (disease) and my partner is a diabetic. We noticed a lack of accessibility and plant-based when we first started, especially food from our communities,” said Jack O'Grady.
❚ Thoroughly tested and well explained, plant-based menus take over the latest addition to the America's Test Kitchen series of cookbooks, “America's Test Kitchen Plant-Based Cookbook: 500 Inspired, Flexible Recipes for Eating Well Without Meat,” (2020, America's Test Kitchen).
❚ Providing the basics for anyone looking to begin plant-based cooking, “The Everything Easy Vegan Cookbook: 200 Quick and Easy Recipes for a Healthy, Plant-based Diet” (2021, Adams / Simon & Schuster) provides a starting point.
❚ Bryant Terryoffers a guide for exploring vegetables, digging in to share recipes and thought process behind creating dishes for his own family in his most recent cookbook, “Vegetable Kingdom: The Abundant World of Vegan Recipes” (2020, Ten Speed Press). Terry, a James Beard award-winning author and the inaugural chef in residence at San Francisco's Museum of the African Diaspora, has even more inspiring dishes in “Afro-Vegan: Farm-Fresh African, Carribean, and Southern Flavors Remixed” (2014, Ten Speed Press).
❚ For guidance on making staples, check out “The Homemade Vegan Pantry: The Art of Making Your Own Staples” (2015, Ten Speed Press) by Miyoko Schinner. The founder of plant-based cheese and butter company Miyoko's also has a new cookbook coming in May, “The Vegan Meat Cookbook: Meatless Favorites Made with Plants.”
❚ Recipes from chefs and people involved in the sustainability and plant-based food movement are set off with statistics, facts and explanations behind choosing vegan meals in “Eat for the Planet Cookbook: 75 Recipes from Leaders of the Plant-based Movement” (2019, Abrams) by Nil Zacharias and Gene Stone.
❚ Lauren Toyota, known for her YouTube channel “hot for food”, has a new cookbook coming soon, “hot for food all day: easy recipes to level up your vegan meals” (March 2021, Random House).
“There wasn't any vegan Filipino food. Finding vegan Mexican food was not easy. We had to create most of it from scratch, including our own meat substitutes and cheese substitutes.”
Creating staples from scratch is part of the fun, and plant-based recipes don't have to be intimidating or difficult.
“I don't think you need any special tools or skills. It is not like I converted my kitchen when I became vegan,” said Courtney.
Soak, blend and add flavors
Cashews are a staple staple ingredient for Montelbano, and a favorite to teach people about because they are easy to use and budget-friendly.
“If you're making your own cheeses, desserts or beverages, raw cashews are your best friend,” she said. “You can find them at your local grocer, and literally all you have to do is soak them, use a blender and add flavors. Then you have a great cheese sauce, soup or dessert.”
For Angela Moragne, plant-based eating changed her health, but she's not a strident all-or-nothing type of eater. Moragne, owner of That Salsa Lady and Hood Ranch, started Dabblin' Vegan because
Personal chef Lauren Montelbano says this recipe is an easy vegan cashew cheese. It goes well with fresh vegetables, crackers and bread and can be used on sandwiches, wraps, and pizzas.
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon salt
dash pepper
1/4 cup water
1/3 cup dill
1/3 cup minced basil
1/4 cup chives
Add cashews, nutritional yeast, olive oil, lemon juice, garlic powder, salt and pepper to the blender and blend until smooth and spreadable. Add water if needed to achieve a super smooth consistency. Blend, scrape and blend again until it's creamy.
Add finely chopped herbs and mix together well. Garnish with fresh herbs to serve.
she found an increasing interest in people wanting to learn plant-based recipes at her cooking demonstrations.
“It has been over 15 years since I changed,” she said. “I had ulcerative colitis and it was very debilitating. I lost like 40 pounds, and changing my eating helped my ulcerative colitis. There is something here. I enjoy vegan food. Ninety percent of what I do is vegan, but I'm never going to be a vegan. Dabblin' Vegan makes it more accessible.”
“I tell people if you eat a salad, for that meal you're vegan,” said Moragne, who will be at the Milwaukee Winter Farmers Market with the Dabblin' Vegan and That Salsa Lady. The winter market runs through March 27. “It encourages eating more vegetables.”
Nationally, plant-based meal services have grown along with people's interest in eating vegan.
California-based Veestro plantbased meal delivery service was founded in 2012 by brother and sister duo Mark Fachler and Monica Klausner. Their childhood in Costa Rica inspired
Prepare rice or quinoa to serve with this recipe, which comes from the newly published “The Spicy Plant-Based Cookbook: More than 200 Fiery Snacks, DIps and Main Dishes for the Plant-Based Lifestyle” ($16.99, 2021 Adams Media / an imprint of Simon & Schuster).
1 (15 ounce) can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon curry powder
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
1⁄3 teaspoon red pepper flakes
2 cups spinach, stems trimmed
In a large pot over medium-high heat, add oil and saute onion and tomatoes until onion is soft, about 5 minutes.
Reduce heat to medium-low and add remaining ingredients except spinach, stirring well to combine. Allow to simmer uncovered on low heat, stirring occasionally until mixture has thickened, about 8 to 12 minutes.
Add spinach and allow to cook just until spinach is wilted, about 1 to 2 minutes. Remove from heat. Soup will thicken as it cools.
their approach to sustainable plantbased meals. Their kits are now available nationwide, and they've seen an expansion of interest this year in particular.
"We see the biggest numbers in the places you would expect, urban areas including California, New York and New Jersey, Philadelphia, also Texas, Florida,” said Monica Klausner. “The exciting thing is that in the past couple of years we've seen growth in a lot of small markets where plant-based food is harder to find.”