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Just did this week’s weigh-in– pleased to report that I’m down just over 1/2 pound this week. Actually, I was on track to do better than that, but I had a day off from the diet on Easter Sunday. Ham, pie, cake, scalloped potatoes, chocolate— all the things I’m not supposed to be eating. But we’re back on the stick today, and I’m glad to see that one day off didn’t cause me to entirely lose my progress from the past week.

Onwards and downwards!

I’m a big fan of the backyard BBQ. So is my wife, since BBQ night is the night that I’m primarily in charge of the cooking for once. I rule the charcoal grill like a modern day Colossus. (At least at my own house I do).

The weather has been starting to crack a bit towards spring, so on Monday I fired up the trusty old grill for the first time since last fall. Only this time, we weren’t going to be charring animal flesh. No sir. It was all about non-sentient vegetables and fungus, baby.

After pulling the cover off the grill and getting a fire going (sorry, no gas grills for me, I’m a purist and only like to use real, non-briquet, charcoal), I tossed on some asparagus lightly coated in olive oil and fresh-ground black pepper. After that, I added some portabella caps. And then finally, some Gardenburger BBQ Riblets, which appear to be some sort of soy concoction pressed to resemble actual ribs. In effect, these kind of reminded me of McDonald’s ‘McRib’ sandwich. Perhaps you may have been one of 7 or 8 people who got to sample one.

So how did my vegan feast turn out? Pretty decent, actually. I’m always a fan of grilled asparagus, so that was a hit. Grilled portabella burgers were ok (we added a slice of soy cheese, which is kind of iffy– not a taste I’ve acquired quite yet). Surprisingly, the Gardenburger riblets were really tasty, and rather convincing as ribs (notwithstanding the lack of bone). We’ll be trying them out again.

So it turns out you can grill without meat. Not quite the same, but makes for a tasty meal nonetheless.

One effect of the vegan diet which I’ve been noticing is that I’ve been getting really hungry at mealtimes (which I guess shouldn’t be too surprising), and I’ve been packing away food in larger volumes than I have in the past. Typically, I would often fill up relatively quickly when eating dinner. But after eliminating the meat, I’ve been taking in second helpings more often… and even then, not walking away from the table feeling stuffed or bloated. In fact, I typically have the munchies within an hour or two.

The good news, as I see it, is that I’m not denying myself food when I get hungry. I’ll have a snack, it’s just that it’s a meatless- and animal-product-less snack. Also, trying to keep out the simple refined sugars. I’m not on any no-carb kick. I will have rice, pasta and potatoes, although we try to lean towards brown rice, whole wheat pasta and sweet potatoes.

The effect so far has been pretty positive. Let’s see if it keeps up in the week ahead…

If you start to explain your vegan diet to people, the big question which always seems to come up first is WHY? There are a few different reasons why people might choose to try going vegan. On a case-by-case basis, maybe one, several or all may apply.

1. You want to lose weight. Cutting out animal proteins is a great way to cut weight without having to starve yourself. (Combine this with elimination or minimization of simple sugar consumption for maximum effect). As stated previously, this is the primary driver for my vegan experiment. 
2. You believe factory farming is hazardous to your health. Animals are filled with drugs in order to keep them happy and maximize their yield on factory farms. You might come to the conclusion you don’t want to ingest all of that crap every time you eat. This is a secondary driver for me. I figure that, worst case scenario, it can’t do any harm to eliminate all of the extra chemicals and second-hand drugs from my diet.
3. Animals are people too. This is basically the Peta-type argument, which goes that even if it weren’t bad for you to eat meat, it would still be the wrong thing to do. Personally, I don’t buy this one (although I think that animals should be treated humanely and with respect).
4. You’re kind of crazy and you need a cause to be militant about. We all know people like that. You kind of suspect the whole reason they get into something is so that they can act superior and preach to you about it.

Any other reasons I missed?

This past week has been somewhat challenging on the diet. I had a several day business trip to Orlando for a convention. Going away from my home environment where I have stocks of acceptable foods (and a wife to take care of me) makes it a lot harder to stay vegan. Especially in a tourist town like Orlando which is full of chains.

How’d I do? Pretty well, really. I didn’t keep totally vegan, but I did keep to mainly choosing shrimp and salmon dishes. Actually, I had a really good salad with salmon at one place. I have to admit, I did splurge and blow the diet one night– BBQ ribs at Tony Roma’s. But that was a planned excess. Actually, it’s the first time I’ve had red meat since starting the diet in late January. That’s pretty impressive for someone who never went a day in his life without red meat.

One surprise– I flew home out of Orlando Sanford airport, which is pretty small. I needed to eat dinner at the airport, and all they had was one dinky little place for food. I thought all was lost and I’d either be eating nothing, or having to go for a hamburger. Surprise– they had a veggie burger on the menu, which turned out to be pretty decent. So I was able to stay on course.

When I got back, I was sure that I would’ve gained a bit of weight, especially since I had to slack off my exercise program while on the trip. But another surprise– I actually lost a bit of weight. My next official weigh-in on Monday is going to be a good one. This vegan thing is definitely a great path to weight loss (and it doesn’t even require a whole lot of portion control).

I’m heading off for a few day business trip this weekend, so I’m about to confront (for the 2nd time) the challenge of keeping it legal on the road — ie., how do you keep vegan when you’re away from home, trying to eat in restaurants and snack shops?

I had a brief brush with this about 2 weeks just after I had adopted the new diet. I did ok (although I do admit to cracking under pressure and having some clam chowder– I was up in New England for the first time, after all, so how do you turn down the local specialty?). One pleasant surprise - we ate at a ‘Legal Seafood’ one night, and I ordered their vegetarian stir-fry. I figured it might be lame, so I got it with shrimp. It turns out, I needn’t have ordered the shrimp, the dish was excellent, very tasty. In fact, it was a much better looking dish than the big cut of tuna which my colleague ordered.

 This time, I’m off to Orlando, Florida, the land of chain restaurants. I’ll try to report back on what I found to eat, and how ‘legal’ I was able to stay!

You can blame it all on this guy (see pic). There I was, on January 25, 2008, minding my own business and reading the morning paper with my breakfast. Then I came across an article with an intruiging title, “The 247-lb. Vegan“. This article was about Tony Gonzalez, a star football player with the Kansas City Chiefs who, for personal health reasons, decided to adopt a vegan diet.

Now, let me step back to tell you:

• I love meat. Love it, love it, love it.
• I also enjoy working out- weightlifting, running, cycling.
• I’ve known vegans before. The adjective which comes to mind is ’scrawny’. Not exactly the image I seek out for myself.

But here was this article about a guy performing at the highest levels in a professional sport which demands speed, strength, and overall manliness, and doing it on a vegan diet. Hmmm, now that’s interesting.

But what really got my attention was the bit about how he rapidly dropped 10 pounds after starting the diet. Now, that was a problem for Tony, given his profession. But for me, seeking a way to drop extra pounds which have piled on… hey, this sounds intriguing.

So later that night, as I was stuffing in a meat-laden meal at a local Mexican restaurant with my wife, I broached the subject: “Now honey, don’t laugh at me for suggesting this…” (uttered with a mouth full of beef burrito), “but I think I want to try out a vegan diet.” The beginning of Lent was imminent, and having grown up Catholic, it always has seemed natural to deprive myself of something I like during Lent. So why not meat, the most important thing in my world? And if I can lose pounds, avoid chemicals and save the world while doing it, so much the better.

My wife didn’t laugh at me (which is why I love her). Rather, the next day, she came back from the supermarket with all kinds of (gulp) non-meat-oriented foods. Uh oh, it’s on now. The commitment - 60 days of veganism. Well, kinda veganism, since it’s not like I’m religious about it. That means I get to cheat if I’m stuck without something decent to eat.

Let’s see what happens!