Harriet has been vegan for roughly around 5 years and made the decision when she first started University. Harriet’s always been a huge foodie so decided to channel that into an Instagram account called harriets_plantbased_eats where she posts photos of vegan food she’s eaten mostly in London but also other parts of the UK, and abroad to highlight that you can easily find delicious vegan food anywhere!
Meatless Movement recently had a chat with her to discuss her journey to becoming a vegan, the challenges she’s faced along the way and her top favourite vegan food spots in London.
Tell us more about yourself, please
My name is Harriet I am 24 years old and am working in Social Media for an Architectural company. I was born in Southampton and have moved around a lot within the UK as my Dad was in the army. I now currently live in East London.
I’ve been vegan now for about 5 years, I went pescatarian initially as I watched a few documentaries on factory farming and the treatment of animals but wasn’t educated on the treatment of fish so continued to eat that. I’ve never enjoyed dairy products so it was easy for me to swap those products.
When I went to University I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on fish so I ended up cutting everything out and going completely vegan, however whenever I came home I would eat fish if my parents cooked it and at that time veganism wasn’t too popular so it was difficult finding alternatives and I wasn’t very clued up on what to eat.
I then got really into fitness and weight training and over the years became a lot more aware of what foods I need to nourish my body with, so decided to commit fully to a vegan diet for mainly health purposes. I then started to become more aware of the environmental impacts of consuming animal products and also the way they are treated that I knew I could never go back to eating them.
Now that I am living in London it’s so easy to be a vegan here as there’s so many restaurants you can eat at and the supermarkets have really pushed for more vegan alternatives which is great!
Any interesting stories during this period?
I think when I first went vegan and friends/family found out there were a lot of initial questions and concerns on me becoming extremely unhealthy and malnourished, which I guess was understandable at the beginning due to the lack of information on a vegan diet. It’s interesting when people find out your vegan they automatically turn into some “nutritionist” and tell you all the things that will become wrong with you etc when they have no idea about the insane health benefits you get from consuming an all plant diet compared to those that eat animal and dairy products.
What are some challenges faced in finding vegan/vegetarian food? or eating out with friends, etc. How do you overcome these?
I think when I first went vegan it was difficult as it wasn’t a “trend” so not many restaurants had options to choose from. There wasn’t a really high demand for products as well so finding food alternatives was tricky. I never had a problem with going out with friends as they all knew my diet so when booking somewhere they would always try find a place that would accommodate for me. Sometimes it would be tricky if I was going abroad as you don’t know how accommodating other countries were to your diet.
How do you feel about being a vegan/vegetarian?
I really enjoy it! I feel healthy and happy and have seen so much progress in terms of my body and fitness goals. I am such a foodie so living in London has been amazing for me to be able to try all this insane vegan food that I really don’t feel like I’m missing out at all. I have loved documenting my journey through my Instagram page as well, being able to connect with other likeminded vegans and some really popular vegan influencers which has been cool. Also being able to show people that vegan food doesn’t have to be boring or you can’t eat much there’s literally so much food you can enjoy that you probably didn’t even think was vegan! There’s a video on my Instagram page showing ‘accidentally vegan products in Tesco’ and the amount of people that were shocked to all these snacks and food that a vegan could eat was really fun to produce. I like to think that I’m educating people on how easy it is to be a vegan now and how it’s not crazy restrictive.
How would you tell someone who’s not yet vegan/vegetarian to try meatless food?
I would start off by suggesting easy swaps. Swapping your dairy milk to a plant milk alternative, even just swapping the milk you put in your coffee is a start. Maybe showing them how to make one of their favourite meals plant based, if they like spaghetti bolognaise asking them to use plant mince instead of beef mince and see how they like it? You can’t ask someone to change their diet overnight and be negative about what they’re currently consuming, I think the best approach is to educate them on why you don’t choose to eat those things and then take them to a vegan restaurant or cooking a plant based meal with them just so they know they can make the swap and that it’s not actually that challenging or restrictive eating a meal which has no meat or dairy products in it.
Recommend some good places or food
London has so many amazing vegan restaurants that it’s so hard choosing favourites but I will put some suggestions of places I think people should go to if they’re living in London or maybe just visiting:
- Doughnuttime – Best vegan doughnuts ever, they’re absolutely huge!
- David Hassel-Biscoff Doughnut
- Rudy’s Vegan Diner – Unreal ‘dirty’ vegan food, think burgers, milkshakes the lot it is insane!
- Rudy’s Rueben
- Unity Diner – Earthling Ed’s (famous vegan activist, educator, public speaker, author) restaurant. Lots of options here to choose from and the food is phenomenal.
- Surf n Turf Hotdog
- Club Mexicana – Probably the best vegan Mexican food you’ll eat! Tacos, burritos, loaded nachos they have everything!
- ‘Fully Loaded’ nachos
- Mildred’s – a great place to go for your first vegan meal, they have an extensive brunch menu and their lunch/dinner menu has so many different options ranging from curries to burgers to salads to tacos they do everything!
- ‘Blueberry Hotcakes’
To someone who’s just beginning to go meatless, what is your advice?
I think the main misconception is not being able to eat anything, becoming unhealthy, malnourished etc. I think when someone talks like this to me the best way is to just explain that you actually do get pretty much most your daily vitamins and minerals from a plant based diet.. you have to supplement a few but as long as you’re acknowledging this then you’re literally fine. I also tell them to check out my vegan page as it shows all the foods that are available to us to eat. Recommend various podcasts, books, documentaries just so they can educate themselves on the benefits of a vegan diet and why I’ve chosen to do it.
Just take it day by day and don’t get caught up in being a “perfect vegan”. Even just introducing one meat free day a week is a great start! Just build on it, educate yourself and have fun with it!
Harriet 🌱
Eating my way around London’s vegan spots and some other places along the way! 🧁🌮🍕🍔🥞
📍East London
@trainn.app ambassador🏋🏼♀️
all images courtesy of Harriet