Staying Vegan During Veganuary 2022 and Beyond

Veganuary 2022 is a great way to springboard into a long-term plant-based diet. In 2021, we showed you how to keep January meat, fish, and dairy-free whether you were at home or on your travels. This year, we will help you remain vegan past the end of the first month of the year. Here’s our season-by-season approach to help you stay on your plant-based path from Veganuary 2022 all the way through to December.

1. Winter, When Veganuary Begins

New Year’s Resolutions are easy to make but easier still to break. Perhaps an early holiday will help. This will take you out of your everyday routine. The Canary Islands are popular winter destinations. There is a lagoon in Gran Canaria’s Maspalomas where you can see avian flocks on a long-haul flight from north to south. You will find snowbirds of the human variety on the nearby beaches and within the numerous apartment and hotel complexes. Seeing how dazzling the Canaries are as a winter sun destination, we put together Green Life: The Ultimate Vegan Canary Islands Guide.

The beauty of the Canaries is two-fold. While the easterly, closer-to-Africa islands are more developed, the westerly, nearer-the-old-end-of-the-world isles are more traditional. Developed here means offering international fare that caters for diversity such as veganism. Convention, meanwhile, draws on the everything-grows ethos of the Canaries, where fruit trees and vegetable plots are a common sight. Island-based produce is frequently incorporated into the local diet.

2. Spring(board) Into a Permanent Plant-Based Diet

Unlike the Canary Islands, Spain’s capital Madrid is a city of extremes on the temperature front. While bitterly cold in winter, it’s oppressively hot in summer. Spring is a much better time to visit Iberia’s premier city. There’s a party atmosphere in the streets as the plazas fill up again as al fresco drinking and eating becomes altogether more palatable. Our 21 Things to Do in Madrid Before You Leave contains plenty of suggestions to ensure you stick to your new vegan regime.

So, you can drop by and experience the convenience of Honest Greens, which has a handful of outlets in the Spanish capital. The more exclusive Levél Veggie Bistro, meanwhile, attracts a fashionable clientele to its stylish Ibiza eatery. Alternatively, wander into any old bar and order tapas which typically include patatas bravas. Fried potatoes are accompanied by a piquant sauce and often by alioli, a condiment that usually includes eggs in the supermarket version but which is prepared without huevos when made fresh.

3. Summer, Tis the Season to be Lean and Green

When the sunny days arrive, who wants to heat heavy, hot food? Salads are in. They are as sexy as you make them. So, go drizzle that olive oil over a sumptuous selection of fruit and vegetables. Last June, Chef Denise shared her Favorite Summer Recipes for Cherry Tomatoes with our readers. These include recipes that don’t include any meat, fish, or dairy products along with others that are easily adapted to become vegan. Use your imagination to come up with some plant-based alternatives of Chef Denise’s specials.

Our founder Leesa Truesdell also set up #GlobalFoodieFriends on Twitter. This was a celebration of tummy treats. Regular #FoodieFridays allowed a keen collective to share some of their favourite foodie memories. These included @live4sight’s summer salads. Now that’s a fine advert for DIY cuisine.

4. Autumn, Fall’s Perfect for Nature’s Harvest

The leaves come down, along with windfall fruit. Harvest Festival celebrates nature’s bountiful supply. Veganuary is long gone but there is no need for you to start flagging. As The Top 10 Traveler revealed in an intriguing interview, Green Life: Meet Moshe, the Vegan Travel Expert, there are other initiatives to provide inspiration further down the line. Moshe namechecked the likes of Challenge 22 as fountains of ideas for plant-based goodies.

Another creative resource to draw on is Meatless Monday. Although established in 2003, it has its roots in the actions of US president Woodrow Wilson during the First World War. Appointing Herbert Hoover to head up the US Food Administration, citizens were urged to cut back meat and wheat consumption. So the concept of Meatless Tuesdays and Wheatless Wednesdays was born.

5. Staying Meat, Fish, and Dairy Free 365

As our calendar shows, there’s never a bad time to be a vegan. Seasons come and go, bringing with them different fresh fruit and vegetables. A plant-based diet is certainly a colourful one with natural products mirroring the rainbow in a range of hues. Let’s see if Veganuary 2022 is the starting point of a whole new plant-based you.

To commit to Veganuary 2022 and beyond is to take it to another level, however. It’s as important to be focused on a cruelty-free approach regarding what you put on your body as well as what you put in. Share the same zeal about cosmetics which don’t test on animals like The Body Shop’s range and fair fashion such as DC’s vegan shoes fashioned from algae rather than leather.

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