Hey guys!

I wanted to drop by and share some vegan Costco finds with you:

Alexia Sweet Potato Fries

Mareblu Naturals Variety Trail Mix Crunch Bars (BlueCran Pomegranate, Mango Pomegranate & Strawberry Pomegranate — 18 bars, $11.89 ($0.66/each)

Great bars — 180 calories/each

Falafel Republic $9.89

Delicious falafel balls. Have three for 240 calories, 7g fat

Don Lee Farms Veggie Patties $9.69

I love these vegan veggie burgers. 170 calories each.

Crunchmaster Multigrain Crackers

These crackers are AMAZING! I can’t describe how nutty and crunchy they are! You can have 15 cracker for 140 calories and 5g fat — damn good!

Bob’s Red Mill Quinoa — 64 oz., $9.89

Village Harvest Brown Rice — Frozen. 3.5lb. — $6.99

Bybee Foods Organic Harvest Foursome — $5.89

Sabra Hummus — Original, 16 2-oz singles (140 calories, 12g fat/each) — $6.99

Mary’s Gone Crackers

Additional items to check out:

• Breads and pitas (Some Costco’s carry my favorite pita: Western Bagel Co.’s Alternative Pitas); watch the breads b/c a lot of the brands, including, Milton’s have honey (some vegans don’t eat honey, but I do on occasion); Costco recently started carrying Alpine Valley bread and it is AMAZEBALLS
• Beans (Vegetarian refried, black, garbanzo, kidney)
• Cereals- hot and cold – including Kashi, Coach’s Oats and Nature’s Path
• Chips, crackers (including Kashi Heart to Heart, Sun Chips, Kettle Chips, Stacy’s Pita Chips, Triscuits, Wheat Thins & Food Should Taste Good) and seaweed snacks
• Coffee (Now carrying Starbuck’s Via Ready Pack, Medium Colombian 24-instant pack, $15.99) & tea
• Desserts that are vegan, such as Toffutti ice cream bars
• Milks — such as soy milk, rice milk, and Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Breeze (almond milk!)
• Nut butters including Kirkland-brand organic peanut butter (and some Costco’s even offer Maranatha Almond Butter, though not mine…boo!)
• Olive and vegetable oils; Pam cooking spray
• Pastas, including whole-wheat and udon noodles
• Pasta sauces, tomato sauces, pesto
• Produce – fresh, frozen and dried (notice — organic options are usually only available if frozen, though they do offer refrigerated, sliced & packaged organic apples). They offer two items from the cool brand Village Harvest at my Costco, including the frozen brown rice pictured above, and a whole grain mix with dried cranberries & almonds. They also offer a bucket of dates without preservatives for the cheapest I’ve seen (find ‘em in the granola bar section).
• Snack Bars & Snacks (including 180 Snacks (vegan + gluten-free + kosher),) Clif Bars, Bare Fruit & Everybody’s Nuts Pistachios)
• Shampoo and conditioner! Yep, I’ve recently noticed that Kirkland (Costco’s brand) is offering shampoo and conditioner that is both vegan and paraben-free. Sweet!
• Sweeteners (natural), including maple syrup & agave
• Tofu

If you don’t have a Costco card, you can always find a friend who does! I end up freezing a lot of these goodies since I’m the only one who eats them, but that’s no biggie to me! The thing about Costco, though, is that sometimes you fall in love with an item and next thing you know *poof* they’ve stopped carrying it and never do again! Gah! That happened to me and my beloved Western Bagel Co. Alternative Pitas. I also know that products vary from Costco to Costco as I’ve seen other bloggers get Maranatha Almond Butter (!) at their Costco and all they carry at mine in terms of nut butters are Skippy and Kirkland brands. Lame.

Do you guys buy in bulk or shop at Costco? Ever fall in love with a product and then find your store’s stopped carrying it?! What are you favorite finds?

So anyway, a friend from high school has decided that she’s going to eat vegan for lent (even though she’s not Catholic lol), and has asked my advice on how to make the switch (side note to my readers: dudes, I’m totally flattered! This chick has been vegetarian for 13 years and I’m like new to this whole vegan thing, but confidence is key, right?). So, yea, totally, I’m game to share my tips on making the switch.

First things first! Anytime you’re making a big lifestyle switch (even if just for lent!), figure out what kinda “changer” are you. Are you one of those baby steps, make a flow-chart, break out the Power Point and ladder-step-approach kinda people? Or are you a dive-right-in, give-it-to-me-straight, I-don’t-need-your-baby-steps kinda people? In between? It helps to know ahead of time to ease the switch. If you think of going vegan and gasp, “oh, but think of all of the things I can’t eat!” or one of those, “hmm, what will I eat?” kinda types matters, too. Generally, if you worry about not being able to eat your favorite foods and prefer baby steps, then you will probably benefit from using a lot of vegan substitutes and recipes for your favorite omni foods until you get more adjusted. If you’re not particularly sad about giving up  meat, dairy or cheese, then it’ll certainly be easier for you to dive right into the wondrous ocean of vegan foods. Either way, don’t expect instant gratification (as I had to remind myself in my post here about some reality t.v. chick who expected spiritual enlightenment after 3 hours of not smoking).

In honor of my friend who’s making the switch for lent, I’m going to dedicate my next few (maybe more) posts to debunking myths about vegan eating, profiling some cool vegan bloggers (or hosting guest posts from them), providing the best vegan resources out there for newbie vegans, sharing the best vegan recipes I’ve tried and pretty much learning more as I go along, and sharing with all of you. This is gonna be fun! Knowing some of my friend’s fave foods and concerns, I will definitely be posting on the following things: the best cheese substitutes (are there any? harhar), the best vegan desserts (and ice cream substitutes) and getting enough protein (inc. which protein bars and powders are vegan) aka The Protein Myth.

Since I always think it’s better to refer someone to a product after you’ve tried it yourself, I immediately felt inclined to try a cream-cheese substitute knowing that my friend likes her bagels and cream cheese. I could have saved this for a separate post, but I am too excited to share the results!

So, I went to Whole Paycheck Foods to see what I could find in a cream cheese substitute. I ended up buying some Tofutti Non-Hydrogenated Plain “Better Than Cream Cheese” and some Alvarado St. Sprouted Wheat, Onion & Poppyseed Bagels (all in the name of Blog Research, which I think should also be an extra line on our tax forms under business expenses, no?

I came home, heated up the bagel and lathered some of this “cream cheese” on.
[photo cred]

I sighed as I shoved this mess into my cranky mouth, thinking about how “Blog Research” is a tough job, but some one’s gotta do it…

hmmm…I started to feel less cranky. The texture and taste were not like cream cheese, they WERE CREAM CHEESE! The skies started to get brighter and part as an angel floated down singing some beautiful verses about Tofutti cream cheese (something about how I had been “toFOOLed”). I realized I had died and gone to cream cheese substitute heaven where they, duh, hand out Tofutti cream cheese. Philadelphia Cream Cheese — you don’t have smack on Tofutti!

Friends, please excuse me while I go lather Tofutti fake cream cheese onto everything in my pantry. Again, this is “research,” people. Research.

Hey you — yea, you! Who are your favorite vegan foodie bloggers? What are your fave vegan foods, products and/or recipes? Please share! (Oh and, uh, if you give up stuff for Lent, whatcha gonna give up this year?)

<3,

The Cranky One