Vegan Vox Reviews...Out of This World - Leeds

I recently travelled to Leeds for a wedding, and whilst I was there I stumbled upon this gem of a food store, right in the centre of the city, opposite the Corn Exchange. 

Out of the World, has a huge selection of goods on offer - mainly organic, ethically traded, whole foods and produce. They are not entirely vegan but more than half of the stock is vegan-friendly and includes a huge range of nuts, seeds, pulses, fruit, vegetables, crisps, chocolates, drinks, vegan cheeses, mock meats, ready meals, snacks and so much more. They have a lovely range of cruelty-free cosmetics and toiletries, cleaning products and non-food items too. 

One of the things which I enjoyed was the hot/cold food counter selling Sos-Rolls, sandwiches, cakes, muffins, pasties etc - loads of vegan choices.

A Sun-Dried Tomato Sos-Roll

The drinks range is huge, from organic fairly traded teas and coffees to wines, beers, juices and soft drinks.

The prices are average for this type of store and the range is better than many other independent heath food shops I have visited.

Here are some of the goodies I purchased:

Equinox Kombucha

Whole Earth Cola

Tyrrell's Sweet Chilli & Red Pepper Crisps

Organic Rooibos Caffeine-Free Tea

If you are ever in the Leeds area, it is definitely worth paying a visit to Out of This World. I will be returning.

Where are your favourite vegan-friendly food shops? Let me know in the comments below.

Big Vegan Love,

VVx

Vegan Vox Reviews...Lush

I was lucky enough to receive this gorgeous Lush gift set for my birthday from a family member. I see Lush as a real treat, lovely fresh products, the majority of which are vegan and they label all of their vegan products in store and on the packaging, so it is easy when shopping. The products smell great and leave my skin feeling fab. The sugar scrub is a great exfoliator, the lemon soap bar is so refreshing, the olive shower gel is super moisturising and the smiley face massage bar is lovely at the end of a tiring day.

I like buying gifts for people from Lush, as it is a nice way to introduce non-vegans to cruelty-free beauty and bath products. I always end up with a little treat for myself at the same time :-). There are Lush stores all over the UK, click here to find your nearest shop. They also offer online ordering and gift wrapped boxes. They have great ethics and values and you can read about those here.

Where do you like to buy your vegan friendly bath and beauty products? Share in the comments below.

Big Vegan Love,

VVx

The Ordinary Vegan - Naked Rescue Haircare

A few months ago I purchased Superdrug's vegan haircare range and whilst it is okay, it didn't leave my dry, very curly, very long hair feeling great. So I ventured down the high street in search of a vegan friendly haircare range which was more natural and hopefully better suited to my haircare needs without breaking the bank. I found it! Naked Rescue is a range of haircare products sold in Boots.

I found out more about the company on their website and found out that they are free from harmful chemicals, ethically sourced, have environmentally friendly packaging and don't test on animals.

So onto the products themselves. They have a range of bath, beauty and hair products. I have only tried the shampoo and conditioner so far, but they have left my hair feeling soft, shiny, feeling manageable and smelling good. I definitely want to try out more of the range now. All of the products are vegetarian and have not been tested on animals. The majority of the products are vegan. There are a few items which are not vegan friendly due to honey or beeswax but these are listed on the website and clearly labelled on the bottles. Naked also have a gluten-free range and a range for children and expectant mothers.

The items can be purchased online through their website and in Boots stores. They deliver overseas for those of you reading this outside of the UK.

What are your favourite vegan haircare brands? Leave me a comment below and share them with us all. Make sure you come back tomorrow for a brand new Vegan Recipe of the Week.

Big Vegan Love,

VVx

From the company website:

The Naked story began when a mum of two was looking for affordable products to use on her children who had very sensitive skin. Scanning the list of ingredients she was not happy with what she read, considering all the other messages she was reading were about ‘nasties’ and ‘baddies’ in food and drink. At that point no one was questioning ingredients in branded toiletries so she decided to do something about it.

So Naked was born with a clear and simple concept – a brand that is safe, natural and free from harmful chemicals but is priced for everyday use. It can be used by women, men, babies, children and even the odd pampered pooch! We use the best natural ingredients with specific actions and real benefits, which still smell and feels like a special treat. But we don’t take ourselves too seriously despite our strict criteria!

From the beginning, we wanted Naked to use only ethically sourced ingredients and we pride ourselves on using the best environmentally friendly packaging available, currently 50% PCR (Post Consumer Recycled) in all our bottles. We are also proud to support initiatives like the Oxfam Shinyanga project which brings clean water to children in Tanzania, something we take for granted every time we jump into the shower.

Naked is not expensive and exclusive, yet it’s still desirable, ethical and environmentally friendly, but manages to look cool (and hopefully it will make you smile)! Above we want to give you fabulous products which feel and smell good despite what we leave out of the ingredient list..... We believe this is goodness in a bottle!

Vegan Vox Reviews...Unicorn Grocery, Manchester.

Unicorn Grocery Workers' Co-operative, Manchester.

Hello vegan friends. Over the last two weeks on 'Vegan Vox Reviews', I have reviewed places which I visited on my day trip to Manchester including my review of V Revolution. Last week, I briefly mentioned Unicorn Grocery, but I wanted to save the photos and main details for this post.

Unicorn Grocery (what a fab name BTW!) was the last place we visited on our trip to Manchester as it is a few miles out of the city centre in Chorlton. It deserves a post of its own as it was so amazing.

Seriously, this shop alone could make me consider moving to Manchetser, along with all of their other wonderful vegan friendly places, of course!

The shop is huge for a health food/whole food store, it is the size of a small supermarket. They have rows and rows of fresh organic fruit and veg as you walk in, but the best thing about this shop is everything is vegan! That's right, no label checking for me, it was like being able to walk around a supermarket and put anything I like in the trolley! This is a novelty indeed for a vegan but when the shop is full of such an amazing array of produce, it actually makes it even better.

There was a porch entrance area with plants and garden items and then as you enter the store, you are overwhelmed by lots of fresh fruit and veg, all organic, all colourful and smelling delicious and at reasonable prices too. Once you are past the fruit and veg section there are fridges full of tahini, hummus, salsas, sauces, dips, cheeses, and a whole host of other refrigerated goodies, followed by freezers with pies, vegan ice creams, cheesecakes, meat substitutes and ready meals. There is an organic bakery in store too with an array of fresh bread and cakes.

There are shelves full of canned goods, jars of preserves, oils, vinegars, wines and beers, pastas, rices, pulses, nuts, beans, savoury and sweet snack foods, toiletries and skin care products, a deli counter with olives, salads, pies, pasties, sandwiches and rolls, vitamins, cleaning products, companion animal foods and even a free apple cart for children to take a free apple whilst shopping! 

There are recycling points, compost bins, reusable bags for sale and so much more. There is a recipe stand with take-away leaflets of recipes for you to make at home after buying the ingredients you need in the shop. 

There were lots of friendly staff on hand to help with any queries and to fill the stock up on the shelves. You literally could do your entire weekly shop in here without needing to visit one of the big supermarkets! Please open one near me!!

Anyway, we had a good hour-long browse around the store and these were my purchases, although I would have liked to have bought much more!

Unicorn grocery can be found at: 

Unicorn Grocery

89 Albany Road
Chorlton
Manchester 
M21 0BN

Their opening hours are:

Monday	Closed all Day
Tuesday	9:30 - 7:00
Wednesday	9:30 - 7:00
Thursday	9:30 - 7:00
Friday	9:30 - 7:00
Saturday	9:00 - 6:00
Sunday	11:00 - 5:00

You can find them online at: http://www.unicorn-grocery.co.uk/index.php

If you are ever in the North West of England, please pop in to Unicorn and show them some vegan love. The world would be a better place if we had one of these shops in every town.

Big Vegan Love,

VVx

The Ordinary Vegan - Superdrug

This week's The Ordinary Vegan is a chain of shops rather than one product. This week I am choosing to highlight Superdrug. Since becoming vegan, it has been harder for me to find cosmetics, skincare and toiletries than food. There are specialist stores and organic online products available but many are expensive and you have to do your research. A few weeks ago, I went into Superdrug and saw this notice:

This got me thinking about whether many of their products were vegan as well as not tested on animals. Well, it turns out that not just do they have many vegan products, but they label them as vegan too. 

So I needed a few toiletries this week and popped back in, it's really easy as all of their own brand products which are vegan say so on the packaging and all of their own brand products are not tested on animals and are BUAV approved. I bought some hand wash, shaving gel, skincare oil, moisturiser and foot spray. All vegan, all not tested on animals and no animal ingredients. 

I also browsed around the shop and found they had vegan shampoo and conditioner, cleansers, toners, body creams, baby powder and baby wash, and much more. As Superdrug has branches in most high streets and towns, as well as shopping centres and an online store, I think they more than qualify for The Ordinary Vegan this week. They also sell vegan Original Source products which I featured here. It would be great if one day all of their products were vegan as I don't believe any beauty products need animal ingredients, by-products or animal testing but they have made a positive start and if we vegans go and buy these products they will only make more, which can only be a positive step in the right direction.

Come back later this week for a yummy Vegan Recipe of the Week and a Vegan Vox Reviews...

Big Vegan Love,

VVx

Vegan Recipe of the Week - Raw Almond Cookie Bites and Pt.2 UK Vegan Food Swap

This week's Vegan Recipe of the Week is not one of mine. This recipe was sent to me in my August UK Vegan Food Swap parcel by the lovely Chrissie, who is a raw wholefood vegan. She sent me all of the ingredients and a hand written recipe along with a raw snack bar, vanilla chai tea, some gorgeous vegan soaps and a tea towel. This was all packaged up in a nice glittery box chosen by her daughter, and a lovely note card. I felt very spoiled. I was looking forward to making the cookie bites as I have never made a raw dessert recipe before.

So here is the recipe:

Ingredients:

1/2 cup of unsoaked almonds

1/4 cup of unsoaked walnuts

pinch of salt

1/3 cup unsoaked pitted dates

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

1/4 cup dried cherries

1/4 almond ground almonds or almond flour

     

Method:

Put the almonds, walnuts and salt into a food processor with the s-blade and process until coarsely chopped. 

Add the dates and almond extract and continue to pulse until the mixture begins to stick together. Don't over-process.

Add the cherries and pulse again briefly then transfer to a bowl.

Roll 1 tbsp of the mixture in your hands to form a ball and roll in the ground almonds before placing on a plate. Repeat until you have used all of the mixture.

Put the plate in the fridge for at least an hour until chilled and set.

Eat and enjoy!

These Raw Almond Cookie Bites keep well in the fridge for up to a week and are delicious. So thanks to Chrissie for the recipe. I can't wait until next month's food swap! You can read about the box I sent out in Pt.1 of this blog post here.

Big Vegan Love,

VVx