Various Vegan Product Reviews

New vegan-friendly products are springing up all the time. Here are an assortment, old and new, that I’ve purchased recently.

It’s always a welcome site to see vegan specialty items at my conventional super market. Bee Free Honee, a sweetener made from apples, has that honey look and honey taste. I mostly used it for marinades but here it is drizzled on some fried banana. Bee Free has the market on vegan honey and you can never have enough sweetening options. 

I was excited when a full-sized package of Upton’s Bar-B-Que Jackfruit was included in a recent Vegan Cuts box. It’s just jackfruit (and barbecue sauce)… no weird, unnatural soy science meat. Just jackfruit! I threw it in the frying pan and sent my spatula to work. 

This was an amazing sammy. Great texture. Why isn’t jackfruit sweeping the vegan nation more thoroughly??

I thought I’d try a different buttery spread. Melt has a line of coconut buttery spreads. This “rich & creamy” version is vegan. Melt is slick, Dr. Oz-approved and has all the right labels. I feel like they are ripe for Big Food purchase. It is definitely creamy and spreads nicely. It’s pleasantly coconut-y… but that isn’t what I always want out of a spreadable fat. It lacks a bit in saltiness, which is what I do want in a spreadable fat.

Impulse purchase! Do you ever just get excited to see the word “vegan” on a box. I do. I have nostalgic junk food pangs that lie dormant. Then a v-bomb on a product wakes them up, like in this case with Tasty Brand‘s Banana Split Sandwich cookies. These have the right stuff. I taste the banana, the chocolate.. it’s a banana split in my mouth! They also have other delicious sounding flavors: Vanilla Cupcake, Chocolate Layer Cake, Peanut Butter Cup, and Strawberry Shortcake.

I started a Vegan Cuts Beauty Box subscription, which I am very excited about.  I plead typical “girl” when it comes to lotions and potions, creams and salves. This first box was a delight. I’ll get back to you on any products I grow to love. 

Then there’s hair. I bought this R+Co prep spray from Soon Beauty Lab after a great visit. R+Co has a full line of vegetarian & cruelty-free hair stuff. My spray specifically says “vegan” so there may be animal-derived by-products in the line somewhere… unless, like some restaurants, they choose to not advertise their veganity on their website. I will look into more as I am interested in trying other products. So the anti-shampoo Wen is vegan. I thought I’d give it a try. I like it, though I wasn’t rinsing thoroughly at first and was have build up. Now I only shampoo my hair once a week or so. Damn, I sound like an informercial. 

Briogeo is another hair care line I’ve recently discovered. Most of their shampoos are vegan and clearly labeled, though they are not all-vegan. I break my Wen up with a Briogeo shampoo.

Forget cheese; the toughest challenge for me as a vegan is a warm winter coat. So pardon me while I write about… clothes. Much to my excitement, Ll Bean has a Fleece Peacoat. The classic style is one I had written off due to the wool thing. It’s a great coat besides the extra small being enormous on me. I subbed out the buttons with these bad boys. As far as warmth, my Boden Duffle is a little worse for wear. I was in the market for a more flattering warm weather coat. Thankfully I found Calvin Klein’s Asymmetrical Quilted Puffer on a whim–no feathers, no wool, warmth to -10° fahrenheit. And flattering.