Quorn soya products

[Essie]

I have been vegan for about 3 months. I bought a lot of vegan cookbooks and when i tried some of the recipes usin tofu i hated them! The only tufu brand i have access to is cauldron... Having said that I'm pretty sure that it's my own fault that I'm not cooking it properly otherwise it wouldnt be so popular!!

Anyways, in the same section of my supermarket there are some cauldron products, of course none of them are vegan, but have some egg or milk in them.

My point is I cant seem to be able to cook vegan products like soy mince or tofu, or i havent found the right ones for me. Sometimes I find myself staring at them and having this internal fight thinking.... but they are still vegetarian!!!

Please dont beat me up as Im coming with my best intentions, I just need some advice from people who may have gone through the same thing or have some brilliant ideas. I am totally commited to being vegan and i hate all these doubts.

thank you xx

[Val]

Do you get Yves products in the UK? http://www.yvesveggie.com/

90% of their stuff is vegan, they have a "gourmet" line that uses dairy and eggs though.

I don't think we get Cauldron brand over here, but I find there are huge differences between different brands of tofu. My favourites are Pete's extra firm tofu (this one seems to be hard to find...a lot of places carry the schezuan or Italian ones, but there's only one place I know of that sporadically carries just the regular one) and La Soyarie (a local company).

Is the tofu you're getting silken or regular? Some silken tofu brands say things like "great for stir-frys" but they're lying. I think it's absolutely disgusting. Silken tofu is great for making desserts or spreads, but it makes me gag to have it in a meal.

Don't fret though, to be honest I use tofu maybe once or twice a week. It's great, but not a staple in my diet. Just make sure to cook with beans, lentils, or nuts. Those are all great protein sources. Meat substitutes (including tofu) are not a necessity, there's so many great vegetable ingredients to work with on their own.

My staple meals are soups (particularly lentil) and stir-frys. Curries as well.

[Essie]

Sorry it's cauldron tufu, the rest of the products i was refering to are quorn. My main problem getting other products is that I only have a Morrisons nearby, and a Tesco a bit further away, and 2 (rather tiny) health shops in town.

To be honest with you the reason I'm being so boring about it is because I want to have the most variety in my diet that I posibly can, not only for nutrients but also for flavour and choice. The fact that I'm useless in the kitchen is certainly not helping. I cant wait to get more clued up so that quorn with all its milk and eggs doesnt tempt me anymore.

Oh well, I'll stop whining now.

[Poison Ivy]

The cauldron tofu is the only one I can get hold of too and it is not terribly nice cooked straight out of the packet. It is much better if you freeze it first then defrost it and squeeze all the water out of it as it becomes much firmer in texture. Have you looked in the Tofu (http://www.veganforum.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=75) thread, there are some good recipes in there!:)

[Mr Flibble]

Not sure about in Stratford, but in Leamington there's a good vegetarian co-operative shop from whom we get our organic vegetable deliveries. They've always got lots of good tofu and stuff. We've usually got taifun basil tofu, taifun smoked almond and sesame tofu and clearspot plan/smoked in the fridge from there, then cauldron firm and mori-nu silken from supermarkets. We've ordered from goodnessdirect a couple of times, but the packaging they have to use for chilled/frozen is disturbingly wasteful.

As for cooking plain tofu right (as in tasty) there's lots of threads on this board including the one poison ivy refers to. Book wise this one (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Authentic-Chinese-Cuisine-Contemporary-Kitchen/dp/157067101X) is the best I've seen for info on preparing tofu.

[Ruby Rose]

Yeah, I'm with you about the yuckness of Cauldron tofu - just tastes like plastic to me, and not even tasty plastic! We've got a good health food shop here in Salisbury, but where we lived before was - like where you are - a bit of a tofu-free zone. The good thing about tofu is that the packaged stuff lasts for aaages, and the fresh stuff freezes well, and is even better after it's been frozen.

We tend to buy Mori-nu in bulk from the student shop at Southampton University - where it's about 40p a pack cheaper than other places. We tend to do a bit of a diversion whenever we drive through Southampton and stock up on 10 boxes or more.

Like Mr Flibble, we use a lot of clear spot tofu - it's the best fresh one we've found - again we buy in bulk when we see it: six or more at once then stick them in the freezer. Taifun is nice - it already has the flavour in it - but it's a bit pricey for us.

If you really are stuck with the dreaded Cauldron, only go for the beech smoked or the marinated chunks - Morrisons stock both, so keep your eyes open - and give the plain stuff a wide berth.

We don't often eat tofu more than once or twice a week, and we tend to use it more as an ingredient with other stuff than as a feature!

Don't beat yourself up about feeling pushed towards Quorn - perhaps you might invest in Vegonomicon or some other great cook books that steer away from the fake meat stuff. If you're shopping and cooking for recipies that don't need fakey stuff, you probably won't want it anyway.

[Essie]

Thank you very much all of you for your support, I was really expecting a right telling off for my psychological lack of commintment!
Might be worth a trip to Leamington to see what goes on around there.
Thanks a lot again, Merry Christmas!!