General/ Veganism

Top Tips To Get You Through Veganuary 2020

If you’re new to veganism – or have always been curious, but never made the jump – the international campaign known as Veganuary may be the perfect transition period to attempt it.

According to their blog, “Veganuary set out to create a movement that would appeal to non-vegans throughout the world.”

With more people starting the new year with new trends, new objectives, and newfound motivation, you surely won’t be alone diving into a plant-based prerogative.

With so many questions surrounding newly-vegan navigation, we’d like to share with you some tips and resources for how you can best prepare for the month (or year) ahead of you.

Register on Veganuary.com

By doing so, you can take advantage of the free resources provided to help you understand how to tackle this process from the get-go.

Don’t be scared of the kitchen

There are plenty of resources on the web to get you comfortable whipping up easy meals for you and your family. Try typing in “Vegan Recipes” in Google or in YouTube, or hashtagging it on Instagram. A great website to start with? The feedfeed vegan.

Look around your city for participating local restaurants

A handful of U.S. Cities are focused on bringing Veganuary into local restaurants. Perhaps the largest brand promoting Veganuary is Vegans, Baby (founder: Diana Edelman), going on their third year featuring restaurants during the month of January. Vegans, Baby (based out of Vegas, baby) is further partnering with Portland Vegans and Vegan in San Diego to bring restaurants in multiple cities to the Veganuary surface.

Another city with honed Veganuary focus this year is Denver. With plenty of vegan food options to boast outside of January, Denverites can always support one of the local vegan watering holes (think Watercourse Foods, VegNews-nominated food truck WongWay Veg, or knock out a grocery haul from Nooch Vegan Market). For January, those in Denver could also partake in Veganuary-featured restaurants, propelled by Veganuary’s partner, The Humane League (special thanks to Denver-based Vegan Advocacy Lead: Carlee Kreisel). Restaurants specifically partnering with The Humane League in the mile high city include: Tacos Tequila Whiskey, Himchuli Indian & Nepali Cuisine, and Coohills French Restaurant.

Head here for an insider interview kicking off #VeganuaryDenver at Coohills with ultramarathoner, author, and long-time vegan Scott Jurek of The Game Changers.

Know of restaurants in your community who are participating? Be sure to let us know in the comments below!

Utilize this time to try new plant-based fast food options

You’re probably aware of the Impossible Whopper at Burger King, Beyond Meatball Marinara Sub at participating Subways, Beyond Burgers at Carl’s Jr. and Sheetz, or others. With the vegan trend sure to continue growing in 2020, keep your eyes peeled for other chains breaking the mold and offering a variety of vegan items.

Let HappyCow be your guide to finding vegan options around the world

You can search HappyCow online or on our app for vegan, vegetarian, and veg-options around the globe. This is handy any time, of course, but whether you’re traveling or just new to veganism and don’t know what’s in your general area, this is a great go-to. Try out our handy Search Map to get started in any city.

Here are just a few other ways HappyCow can be of assistance:

We share mouth-watering restaurant food daily, on Instagram. (Are you following us?)
Here’s our worldwide worldwide calendar of vegan events.
There are also thousands more articles right here on HappyCow.net sharing tips for health, travel, cooking, and more.

Foreign travel? No problem!

Need a little extra help with a vegan translation while traveling? Try these V-Cards! You can print them out and keep them in your purse, wallet, or pocket. Translations that are included: “I AM VEGAN / Plant foods only please! NO MEAT / NO EGG / NO DAIRY” and many more detailed phrases from Afrikaans to Zulu. (The equivalent iPhone app is also available!)

Join the HappyCow community

Don’t feel like you have a vegan community to rely on for support? Don’t worry – you’ve got an entire virtual community at your back! Our free online community of 300,000+ people is connected across the globe. Ask for advice on our forum, find people in your city to meet-up with, write reviews of your favorite restaurants, create personalized restaurant lists for sharing or for travel planning, and receive notifications in your city when new restaurants open! As a bonus, we also offer a free email subscription, with insider tips and updates. Click here to get inside.

Start following vegan-related food and lifestyle blogs

There are layers upon layers of recipe websites and blogs to be found, but these folks will give you their 100% vegan approach in the kitchen and beyond. Some household names in the blogger community include:

Jasmine Briones and “Conscious Chris” of Sweet Simple Vegan
Kate Flowers, co-creator of Freedom Food Life
Valerie Libutti of Vegan Travel Eats
Caitlin Shoemaker of From My Bowl
Janelle Stone of NuttiNelli

And for those of you who want to know where and what to eat around the world through the eyes of someone firsthand, here are a few Instagram accounts and blogs dedicated specifically to traveling vegan:

Lastly, be patient with yourself.

Veganism can be an extreme jump for some just starting out with little to no support system. Make sure to lean on your vegan friends, find a supportive vegan community, utilize free resources and search engines online; if you fumble here and there, just remember to be gentle with yourself. Like any other process, it takes time. The point of Veganuary isn’t to be a perfect vegan, the point is to strive for the best choices you can make for yourself, the environment, and the animals – however and whenever you can.

Are there any tips you’d add? Spread the love and share this with your Veganuary friends and family!

Happy Veganuary 2020!

All opinions expressed are those of the author.

Featured image credit: Anna Pelzer / Unsplash