The Importance of Variety

Adding variety to your daily meals can save you from falling off any diet. A great way to do this is to have a copy of the vegan food pyramid in your pantry or your fridge anywhere you are most likely to see it while you prepare your food, I put mine at my pantry. Remember that buying in bulk is a great thing and eating fresh produce with little or no cooking is the best way to get the most nutrition out of a plant-based diet. But,  if you are just starting out here is a few tips you can follow to avoid wasting money and glorious food:

1. Buy local. The people who are on a raw vegan / vegan diet outside the country eat locally, what they eat there like berries, oranges, apples grow in their country, we don't have that. We have our own local fruits, latundan, lakatan, dalandan, pakwan, melon, mangoes, pineapples, singkamas, atis, bayabas, duhat are a few of the many fruits available locally. Cheap, easy access and best of all radiation free. We don't need to be pa-sosyal and go buy at grocery stores, the best place to buy our produce is the local market nearest you. Be friends with the small vendors, get to know them, talk to them ask them where they get their produce. If you are lucky enough like me, you'll get to know vendors who grow their own produce, you can even order seasonal fruits from them. They won't pass up a chance to have a regular customer. AND PLEASE DON'T HAGGLE TOO MUCH, these are people grew and sell these produce to have food on their table, do not be a cause for them to have to skimp on their food. 
2. Get to know your local market, know the whole sellers from the retailers, know which kind of produce is native or home grown from those that are mass produced. Lettuce, potatoes brocolli, carrots, bell peppers, ombok, cabbage or all those they call gulay Baguio, usually come from Baguio or the Cagayan Valley. These are best bought from the whole sellers. Okra, eggplant, ampalaya, pechay, tomatoes, kamote, talbos (greens) or all that they call Pam-pakbet can be bought from these small vendors I am telling you about on number 1.
3. Buy unripe fruits. Keep them on the counter near the window, so they will last longer and don't grow molds, inspect them everyday and eat those that are first to ripen and if you cannot consume them all, chop them up and store them in the freezer. Yes I know frozen fruits are dead fruits, but I promise you the longer you go on the vegan/raw vegan diet the less you will have to freeze your produce.
4. Buy just enough greens to last you 2-3 days and as you increase your daily consumption and learn how to store them you can eventually buy in bulk, No one wants to eat wilted green right? but if you have a juicer that is fine, you can juice a lot of them before the wilt.

That's all for now, next time I will share some of my recipes that keep me satisfied, healthy and nourished on a plant-based, eco-friendly diet.