This isn't a review but I'm curious about other people's experience...there seem to be vegan "substitutes" or "replacements" for almost anything, and I'm slowly starting to try many of them. For any non-newbies, do you find there are food products that you still have a hard time finding good vegan versions of??

CHEESE!

It's the only thing I miss.

Vegan bangers and rashers (available, but only overseas :cry:)

Ditto on the cheese. I was a huge cheese lover and ate it every day. I haven't found a thing that even comes close to the taste of good old cheddar cheese. Or parmesan. Or provolone. Or feta. You get the idea.

Before I went mostly vegan, I even tried an organic cheese but even that was horrible.

They have good butter replacers (Earth Balance - yummy!) but I guess cheese is too hard to duplicate or something.

Cheese, glorious cheese!

I'm not sure if you mean vegan items that do exist, but just not in MY neck of the woods (like Silk Coffee Creamer and vegan whole grain bread with NO whey or other animal products, also vegan tamales and bakery fresh vegan chocolate chip cookies)...

OR: Do you mean items that there is not yet a "good" vegan substitute for... (like cheese, cheese and cheese.) Oh, and I'm sorry, but as someone who grew up on REAL butter, Earth Balance is in NO way, shape or form an 'equal' to butter... it's fairly good as margerine, but it is NOT even remotely close to butter... :brood:

Oh, and I'm sorry, but as someone who grew up on REAL butter, Earth Balance is in NO way, shape or form an 'equal' to butter... it's fairly good as margerine, but it is NOT even remotely close to butter... :brood:lol.... Well yeah, agreed. I suppose I should have said margarine instead of butter. :)

Decent veg*n bacon. The stuff I can get here is the yuck!

vegan nori

I wish I could buy Earth Balance and Silk here in Korea. As it is, I've given up on baking anything that can't be made with oil, and I'll soon be making my own rice milk, as I just discovered that ALL of the commercially-produced soy milk over here contains D3. :spew:

Decent veg*n bacon. The stuff I can get here is the yuck!

Yeah, this. (The same thing as bangers I think.) I want BREAKFAST SAUSAGE!!! ...All the veggie ones have egg-white in them.

I wish I could buy soy boy tofu ravioli and silk creamer in vanilla and hazelnut, but they don't carry those things in Canada.

I want a vegan Twix candy bar, anyone know of anything similar?

I want a vegan Twix candy bar, anyone know of anything similar?
Mmmm...Twix. I haven't had a candy bar since going veg*n. I miss them. :(

vegan nori

nori isn't vegan ?

nori isn't vegan ?

That's news to me too. :p

Other than vegan cheese I've been able to find really good substitutes for just about everything. Since I'm not vegan it's not a big deal (to me). But I know a good vegan cheese would make a lot of people's lives a whole lot better. :)

Is there something specific that you're looking for? If so we can make suggestions. Some of those things aren't widely available though, that's the only bad thing.

Nori is traditionally seasoned with bonito (fish powder). Unseasoned varieties are available. ... They're just a lot harder to find outside of natural food stores.

nori isn't vegan ?
I haven't been able to find a manufacturer who can assure me that their nori isn't grown on mollusk shells. :( And all the web searches I've done on nori cultivation show that it's necessary to start the spores on mollusk shells.

So even though the nori doesn't actually contain animal ingredients, it did require animal products to produce it, so I can't consider it 100% vegan. (just like beer & wine clarified with gelatin, refined sugar filtered with bone char, etc) :cry:

.... i'm sorry but i just don't get it

you eat plants that grow from soil, filled with all kinds of bacteria from decomposed animals and animal feces .... so why can't you eat something that grows on shells ?

.... i'm sorry but i just don't get it

you eat plants that grow from soil, filled with all kinds of bacteria from decomposed animals and animal feces .... so why can't you eat something that grows on shells ?
If the nori grew naturally on the shells, I'd consider it vegan. However, you actually have to obtain mollusk shells (minus the mollusk inside) in order to commercially cultivate the spores. See pictures:

http://www.mbari.org/staff/conn/botany/reds/lisa/cult.htm
http://www.safariseeds.com/Algae/seaweeds-algae.htm <--scroll down to see the strings of shells

One could argue that the shells probably come from commercial seafood processing plants that would be disposing of the shells anyway. But that's what they say about bone char and gelatin too. :(

alright, i get it now :D
thanks for explainging

Mostly everything I want a replacement for, I can find but I try only to only substitute for non-vegan items ocassionally anyway. Something (besides cheese) that I wish could have a vegan substitute is meringue... I miss those yummy little meringue cookies and such... and angel food cake.

I'd love to be able to buy vegan soymilk right here in the very town where I live. Or vegan chocolate. Or vegan personal products (lotions, shampoos, soaps, etc.) Pretty much the only things vegan around here are fruit, vegetables, and grains in their whole, unaltered forms. And while yeah, that is pretty durn good.....it's just not enough. Until things change radically around here (hopefully within the next century) veganessentials and the like had better never go out of business.

Follow Your Heart cheeses, and Vegan Gormet mozzarella. I've heard they're good.

Vegan tuna...gross, I know...but I really miss tuna sandwiches. :(