Vegan MoFo 2019 - Day 1 (ish)

Hi you and happy MoFo!! I'm only a day late, what? It's been 4 years since I last participated in MoFo and I decided that I wanted to do it this year to ease myself back into blogging. haha.

I swear i'm not naked, my top is just strapless because my house is a million degrees today!

I have decided not to follow the daily prompts and to come up with my own themes instead. I also, being realistic, don't think I will manage to blog every day, so I've set 3 themes and my plan is a minimum of 3 posts a week, with the odd bonus post if I get extra time.

It's always difficult picking themes and it's great that the MoFo organisers help you along with that, if you don't want to come up with your own.

But I had the most fun with MoFo when I picked themes such as veganising Jamie Oliver's 15 minute meals (see those posts HERE) or the year I decided at the last minute, my theme would be cockney rhyming slang! (HERE!)

This year's themes are:

- Monday: Veganising....
- Wednesday: What I ate
- Friday: Testing a recipe from a vegan cookbook or blog

I picked the first one because, as mentioned above, one year for MoFo, one of my themes was veganising Jamie's Oliver's 15 minute meals and I loved doing that. So, not wanting to just totally rip myself off and do the same theme again, I decided I would enlist Mr Alien to help me pick some non-vegan recipes to veganise.

The second I picked so I could eek out my holiday food pics. hehe

Lastly, I had the idea a while ago to start a series on the blog, of testing out recipes from other blogs and so if it goes well, this may be the start of it.

I'll be doing a second post today, because it's Friday and I have tested a recipe from a vegan cookbook for you. But for now, i'm gonna tell you a bit about me.

If you've been following me for ages, you know some of this already but if not, hi! I'm Sal. I just turned 40 this year and I live with my lovely husband, Simon, in the south east of England. We don't have any floofy companions (yet!) but our neighbourhood does have a lot of cats, so there's usually one lurking around to pet.

I've been vegan since 1 January 2008 and I started this blog a couple of months later, because at the time I found blogs super helpful for getting ideas of what to eat and how to cook it. There was very limited vegan options in restaurants back then and the only easy to find meat subs were soya mince, granose sos-mix (remember that?) and tofu. Meat subs were really only available if you were lucky, in Holland and Barrett and also in fancy health food stores, in cities way cooler than mine.

So I learned to cook again and I learned to bake. And now there's vegan options in pretty much every chain restaurant and pub on the high street and even the supermarkets have whole coolers dedicated to veg*n food; what a time to be alive :)

I won't ramble on too long about why I don't blog as much anymore but I do miss it and am looking forward to the challenge of regular blogging again, for MoFo.

So, let's do this.

Laters
Sal xXx

I can feel it comin in the air tonight....

MoFo oh MoFo....

If you want to air drum (mandatory) - here you go: YOU'RE WELCOME.

See ya in August MoFos!

Sal
xXx

Poundland / Makeup Gallery Updated Vegan List

Hello everyone.

I know, long time no post and all that. Let's skip over that!

I heard in one of the FB beauty groups today that Poundland's liquid eyeliner is no longer vegan, so I asked them for a new list, as THIS POST is a popular one of mine. I'm sorry to say it's true. So I'm going to put together a post about vegan eyeliners for those of you that like this one but in the meantime, here is the updated list of vegan items from the Poundland Makeup Gallery range:

Vegan

• Intense Lipgloss
• Lip Liner
• Kohl Eyeliner
• Cuticle Care
• Top Coat
• Healthy Nails
• Nail Hardener
• All Coloured Nail Polish
• Ridge Filler 

Vegetarian, not vegan

• Lipstick
• Foundation
• Liquid Eyeliner

  

Not Vegetarian or vegan

• Sheer Lipgloss
• Pressed Powder
• Concealer
• Bronzer
• Blusher
• Eyeshadow
• Eyebrow Pencil 
• Lengthening Mascara
• Volumising Mascara

 

See ya soon
Sal
xXx

BOOTS/NO.7 etc

Hi there, long time no speak, just popping in to post a quick update on Boots.


As of today, I'm officially removing Boots/No7/SEVENTEEN/Botanics etc from my list of brands I'm happy to buy from. I've seen numerous comments on facebook from former employees saying they have seen correspondence referring to use of animal tested ingredients. Also today I've seen a response from Boots to someone saying outright that some of their suppliers 'may' have to test ingredients or components on animals.


They're straight up too shady and 'grey' for me to trust them and so I can no longer be confident they're cruelty free. So they're now a no-no for me.


I'll be back properly real soon - I have some epic eats to share with you from my recent trip to San Diego and Las Vegas! It's gonna be a good one!


Have an ace weekend. It's raining here after a month of a heatwave YAY - I'm off to dance in it!


Sal x

Alien on Toast is 10!

So this Monday just gone, my blog turned 10. TEN!! I can't believe I have been blogging for a decade, where did that time go?

Back then I had only been vegan a couple of months, was living in a little flat, on my own, in my late 20s, finding my feet with veganism. I found it frustrating to eat out as NOWHERE really understood vegan!

Skip forward 10 years, I'm a newlywed (technically still? I dunno), about to move house again hopefully in the next few months with my awesome husband. Still vegan YAY but in a world where it is SO much easier to be vegan.

New products being released all the time, almost all chain restaurants and even pubs (which were always the most difficult) releasing vegan menus.

My blog has changed a lot over the years. It started off with this POST! Most of my posts back then were just pic spam of what I'd eaten recently. Usually terrible photos taken with flash!

I can't say my photography has improved that much, but the pic spam has gone, as now we have Instagram, that's really replaced those kinds of posts.

I blog about food and beauty now and I have a youtube channel, something I never thought I'd wanna do back then.

I guess all this waffle is really to say THANK YOU! To whoever is reading this. Whether you've been with me since 2008 or since today, I appreciate every single one of you that clicks on a blog post or watches a video.

And because I love you so much, I'm doing a giveaway. Maybe more than 1, stay tuned. I haven't exactly figured out what will be in it yet, but I've started putting it together. So watch this space or follow me on Twitter / Instagram or Youtube if you want to know about it when it's ready.

Sending you all love and cake! Hey maybe I need to make a blog birthday cake?

Sal xXx

MUA Vegan Options

Just popping in to say YAY! Cruelty free drugstore brand MUA finally have a page showing their vegan options!

Just go to their website and click on the vegan tab HERE.

Now if only I wasn't on a no-buy cuz this palette looks pretty!!

Laterz

Sal xXx

I'm broke but I'm happy...

OK I'm not broke but I do spend WAY too much money on makeup.

I had a clear-out at Christmas and had literally a black sack full of stuff. Some was too old and crap to be donated but there was a giant carrier bag full of donatable stuff, which I gave to some very happy teenage girls (our friends' daughters). The pic above is one of about 4 from the clear-out I had 2 years ago!

Even after said clear-out, I have more makeup than one human ever needs. Now that I'm married ... nope, nope can't do it. Can't pretend that getting married made me a grown up!

OK so now I have other priorities, like saving for a new place to live, I can no longer spend all my disposable income on makeup. So I'm putting myself on a no-buy.

Also I binge-watched all of Kimberley Clark's anti-hauls and it really did hammer home how I'm guilty of buying stuff just for the sake of having it, even if it ends up just sitting in a drawer! I really recommend these videos, even if only for entertainment value. Kimberley is smart and hilarious!

Obviously as someone who likes making youtube videos* this is a bit of a problem, as I won't have a tonne of new stuff to review for you, so the content will have to change a bit to use up stuff I already have.

So I'm allowing myself to buy essentials such as deodorant and toothpaste of course. And things like concealer when they run out, I'll replace (and mascara as that should be replaced every few months). But I'm really not going to need a new foundation, eyeshadows or lip products for some time! I'm also not cancelling my Vegan Kind box for now.

So is anyone else on a no buy?

Sal xXx

*youtube have just demonitised my channel for not having enough subscribers. They're doing this to all small youtubers (less than 1000 subscribers) so I'm not alone and it's not like I'm going to miss the 20p I'll probably make from the ads haha. But it is a slap in the face! So anyway, if you feel like it, please subscribe to my channel because youtube being dicks aside, I love doing it and am planning to continue and also to get more regular with my posting schedule.