Here are a few of our fave little known, or 'accidentally' vegan things you can find in the stores that might have passed you by.
Week 8 is coming
You know when you are waiting for a bus for ages and then all of a sudden four of them come at once? Well, we have some good news for you. We are soon about to enjoy a windfall of new vegan products released to stores here in Norway. Not just any old products either... really amazing and highly anticipated ones. Read on to find out more about what they are, and when and where you can get them.
Your first three weeks as a vegan
Thinking of trying out veganism? We know that it might seem like a massive scary change at first, but it gets easy really fast, and in fact by the time you get to your third week as a vegan you will probably find that the lifestyle feels mostly effortless to continue. It's a bit difficult to know how exactly to start with going vegan so we thought we would write a guide to help make those first few weeks of trying out veganism in Norway so much easier. At the end of the three weeks you might not know all the little tips and things that someone who has been vegan for many years does but you will definitely be over the hardest part and know more than enough to stay vegan if that's what you want.
Don't forget the B12
Vitamin B12 is required for the proper function and development of the brain, nerves, blood cells, and many other parts of the body. The only natural places it can be found in good enough quantities are foods such as meat, fish, and dairy products, that's why vegans and vegetarians must take it as a supplement.
B12 helps your body in so many ways so please put some time aside in your morning routine to down your pill with your morning coffee, orange juice and toast.
Vegan Sneakers from Nike
I was saddened to read on a website called Vegan Kicks that they didn't class Nike as a vegan brand any more as they no longer specified on their website which trainers did not use animal glue any more (they used to have a specific list online of which trainers did.
I gave up on my Nike dreams and have found happiness in my Asics Gel Lyte trainers. Asics are widely known not to use animal products in their glue so their synthetic trainers were a good choice for me, as they look quite cool.
However, I'll always hold a torch for Nike. I didn't give up and kept badgering them and doing research. Last night I found a great group of German vegan sneaker enthusiasts called Vegan Sneaker Connection. They're a great group of people who are doing lots of research into the big sneaker brands to see which products are vegan. I was surprised to read that they were adamant that synthetic trainers from Nike were vegan.
Excitedly I asked them if they would share the email they had from Nike which confirmed that the glue used on the trainers did not include animal products. They copied the text from the email and sent me two screenshots which prove it is from Nike and that it is from November 2015.
IKEA goes vegan
We in Vegan Oslo, together with several others from NOAH - for dyrs rettigheter, Norsk vegansamfunn, Veggispreik and more, were lucky to get invited this Friday to taste the new “grønnsaksboller” (vegetable balls) IKEA are launching.
IKEA is betting big - with their 800 million customers each year they expect to sell a 100 million tons of these new vegetable balls a year, which is a third of what they currently sell of the world famous IKEA meatballs.
The new focus on these vegetable balls are the result of an interest in the environment and animal welfare. They want to get more people to eat sustainable and cruelty free food, with the largest focus on sustainability. WWF reports (1) that if we continue to eat like we do today, we’re going to need 3 earths to feed the world's population by 2050.
