Cheese & Dairy

I hit the Irish Jackpot last week I won Gaby’s Give Away for Kerrygold products.

It was St. Paddy’s Day last week, and I guess I had the luck of the Irish on my side because there was:

Cheese galore

Butter

And an amazing cookbook. It’s a beautiful, hardcover, book with great photos and recipes inside.

I was seriously blown away by the generosity of Kerrygold’s “prize pack”.  They overnight, refrigerated shipped everything to me in California.  I have won a fair number of give aways over the past couple years blogging and have hosted at least 75 give aways for my readers on my own site, and this give away was definitely top shelf.

Thanks, Gaby and Kerrygold!

With all that cheese, I think I can make some Vegan Fajitas with Sweet Ginger Lime Dipping Sauce.  Obviously they won’t be vegan if I add cheese with dairy, but you could always add vegan cheeze, too.

These fajitas use mushrooms.  But feel free to use tofu.  I just recently had ‘shroom cravings so am all about them lately.

From my last post about my rainy day coffee meetup with Amber, and cookies vs. cookie dough, it seems most of you love your cookie dough.  If we all love cookie dough so much, why do we even bother baking the cookies? Because lots of you said you do enjoy the baked cookies, too.  Not just dough.

Questions:

1. Do you like cheese?

I loved cheese before I stopped eating it about 7-8 years ago.  I used to eat any and all types of cheese.

I’m pretty sure Triscuits + Cheese + Wine was dinner at least twice a week in my early 20s.  And honestly, those were great “dinners” and memories.

2. If you don’t like or eat cheese, why not?

For most of my life, I have eaten a largely plant-based diet.  Vegetarian, vegan, or pescatarian.  I dislike labels and since we are all on our own journey, and life ebbs, flows, evolves, and changes, we ought to be present and aware of what will work for us as life and our needs and desires change.

Growing up, even as a small child, I never liked or ate red meat or pork.  I ate very limited amounts of poultry and did enjoy fish.  However, I have food allergies, including anaphalactic reactions to shellfish that came on out of no where when I was 24.

Around that time I also felt like dairy was also a culprit and I eliminated dairy, including cheese, from my diet.

However, in recent years, it seems that dairy in trace/smaller amounts such as in butterscotch chips or in white chocolate in desserts or in cream in coffee, I don’t seem to have any issues or reactions.  I haven’t tried eating cheese though.

No issues with the butterscotch chips in No Bake GF Peanut Butter Marshmallow Bars with Chocolate Frosting

And no issues with the white chocolate in the No Bake White Chocolate & Mango Cookie Dough Bites

Maybe in small amounts, my body is ok with dairy?

3. If you’re dairy free or vegan, do you miss cheese?  Do you miss dairy?  Would you miss dairy if you were to give it up?

Many people say they could never go vegan because they’d miss dairy, cheese, yogurt, and such.  I’ve said before I really don’t miss cheese or dairy (aside from the traces that I have in recipes).  Until I open my refrigerator and see all the cheese I just won.

Or walk around my neighborhood and see people drinking wine and eating cheese.  I guess perhaps I miss the memories.

I know we don’t “need” dairy.  I did a post on it.  Dairy FAQ’s, Calcium, Myths, Recipes.  But I do think I “need” white chocolate in my life.

I love nutritional yeast for all it’s cheezy vegan-ness.  I have a nooch recipes post with about 15 cheezy recipe ideas but let’s face it, cheeze is not cheese.

Do you eat cheese?  Or dairy?  Would you miss it if you didn’t eat it?