The Vegan Experiment

Welcome to 2011, cyberfollowers! My apologies for a quiet 2010...I think it has been a challenging year for many, but let's turn the page to the fabulous year ahead!

To properly greet the year ahead, I have decided to participate in a little experiment. Specifically, I am eating a Vegan-only diet through the month of January. Yes, I can practically hear your gasps and feel your shudders. I, like most Americans, have been generally horrified at the idea of giving up many foods that I love (one word - cheese!) in exchange for the healthier, plant-based menu that veganism demands. Plus, there is the matter of having to own up to my veganism in restaurants and social settings involving food, inevitably evoking the looks from others that not-so-subtly inform me that veganism is on par with leprosy in their minds. So, why, oh dear god, why would I do this to myself?

Two words - Blue Spirit. No, this is not some new deity that I've created in my mind to worship and build a shrine to in our backyard. Rather, this is the name of a Yoga resort in Costa Rica, where I dragged my boyfriend last month to attend a yoga retreat, hosted by my friends Karen and J.J. I knew to expect a wonderful itinerary from these folks (Kundalini yoga classes, Mixed martial arts, informative classes, and Zip-lining! through the jungle of Costa Rica), but I didn't really anticipate a vegan-oriented menu. I was determined to give it a chance though, in spite of my hatred of quinoa (which I eventually learned to like, once I doused it with some contraband barbecue sauce I snuck into the resort!) As it turned out, the vegan menu was delicious. Then again, when you are working out 5 hours a day, you would probably be grateful if all you had to eat was paper.

Then, the last day, my yoga group went out for a "last night in town" lavish dinner in town. There was cheese, wine, pasta, deserts...did I mention that there was pasta? I thought I would be in heaven. Instead, the sauce of my pasta tasted really salty. The cheese made me feel really bloated. Even the bite of desert I had tasted (grossly) like pure sugar. I know the food was "good," as in I would have loved it if I had been eating it the week before, but after a week of clean vegan eating, I was actually really disappointed.

The next day, I felt terrible. What I mean by this is my body felt icky, the way it does when a person overindulges at Thanksgiving or the morning after having one too many glasses of wine. Plus, I was annoyed - annoyed that the foods that I had loved for so many years could make me feel so bad. It was as though I had been in a bad relationship for years and never even knew it.

It didn't stop with that dinner. When I returned to the U.S., I tried eating one of my either favorite foods -Doritos (I know, you don't have to be vegan to find this admission pretty disgusting.) I had precisely two chips. They both tasted like I was biting into a salt block.

Clearly, my body was telling me something. Thus, I began to think...my body has carried me and tolerated my crazy lifestyle and diet for years (not important how many!) I've decided to give it a break, at least for January. This idea has been catching on (you can read about it on www.spiritvoyage.com ), and I will be sure to give you my honest play by play of how this goes.

The month of January might involve a lot of quinoa, but thankfully we have plenty of barbecue sauce at home.