by Tashko Mihaylov
Cutting off dairy products and cheese in particular can be one of the hardest things when becoming a vegan. “I might be able to stop eating meat but I cannot give up cheese” is quite a common phrase. A few years ago cheese was almost impossible to replace but these days the variety of vegan cheese keeps growing — you can find versions of Greek feta, halloumi, cheddar, cheese spreads even blue and goat cheese alternatives.
Dominika Piasecka, a spokesperson for The Vegan Society, says that vegan cheese comes with health benefits compared to animal products like meat, dairy and eggs that are full of saturated fat and cholesterol. The animals used in their production are often pumped full of antibiotics and growth factors, so vegan alternatives to these products are better for the animals, your health and the planet. According to Compassion in World Farming, cows are modified to produce 10 times more milk as they would produce naturally.
But even so, most people still find difference in the taste that makes it harder to make the change. The Vegan Society strongly encourage customers to wait for a couple of weeks since eating their last slice of dairy-based cheese (as your taste buds will have the ability to adapt) and then try different vegan cheeses as it can be a really great and versatile product once you find your favourite.
The perfect vegan cheese ingredient can be different depending to your preference. Coconut oil-based cheeses tend to fall apart and taste very different to the real thing, which cashew and other nut-based cheeses are much closer to dairy-based cheese.
“Taste is very individual, but companies like Follow Your Heart and VioLife make good products, and most vegan cream cheese is very delicious. The secret to making solid vegan cheese taste good is melting it well – you won’t be able to tell the difference,” says Piasecka.
London is home of some of the most imaginative plant-based food makers and if you think you will miss the good old cheeseboards when you switch to vegan cheese, the first ever plant-based cheesemonger shop in the UK La Fauxmagerie is based in Brixton. The founders, Charlotte Stevens who is lactose intolerant and her sister Rachel who was just beginning her vegan journey started looking for plant-based alternatives. This led to them sampling a lot of oil-based cheeses that are more widely available, but they weren't satisfied from a flavour perspective.
Stevens sisters began attending markets and vegan festivals and found some great artisanal cheeses, but found it difficult to source these as they are often only available from market stalls or individual websites.
“We wondered why there didn't seem to be a shop dedicated to providing high quality vegan cheese options, and eventually decided to take it upon ourselves to make these products more readily available to the public,” says Rachel Stevens. According to Stevens, many people in the world are dairy intolerant and many are learning the benefits of a plant-based diet, so as awareness increases her and her sister can only imagine that more and more people will seek out alternatives to dairy in future.
According to Just Eat, the demand for meat-free food increased by 987% in 2017 and Tesco says that veganism was the biggest trend of 2018.
