Being vegan needn't be expensive!

...And a perfect example of a tasty, healthy, balanced and inexpensive vegan meal is this Venn Pongal, pictured above with a side of Basic Brocolli, both from Dino Sarma's book Alternative Vegan. (He recommended this recipe amongst others himself on his recent blog and podcast on "I'm Broke food"! Worth a listen if you're skint... or even if you're not.)

I think a lot of people have this misconception that a vegan diet is expensive to follow, and this just isn't true. Sure, some ready made vegan products, like the Grassingtons foods which I recently reviewed, can be quite pricey, but I tend to see these things as a treat to splash out on occasionally rather than everyday foods. Obviously if you ate stuff like that every day it would soon add up.

Vegan basic essentials such as legumes and grains are about the cheapest things you can buy! The cheapest way to buy them is dried in a bag- I mean, you can pick up a kilo bag of lentils in most which will make several meals foraround a pound, often less! Even if you buy the more expensive tinned legumes, which are handier if you're in a hurry, you can pick up super-duper bargains like a 15p tin of red kidney beans from most supermarkets' basic ranges, or deals like 3 tins of beans for £1.

I was shopping with my mum last week and she spotted expensive ready made chilli con carne, and I commented that I could make a whole pot of my vegan version myself for round about £1!

Don't let this financial climate put you off going vegan if it's something you've been thinking about- ditching the animal products might even save you a few quid!