As you can probably tell from my recipes on this blog, we’re not a strictly vegan household. We enjoy eating all types of food – vegan or otherwise. We also have relatives and friends who are vegan, so it’s not uncommon for me to buy vegan products.
The nice folks over at Lloyd James provided us with a whole bunch of vegan treats to try out. We had so much fun taste-testing everything! Here’s what our “non-vegan” family thought:
Cheeky Monkey: These are like cheese puffs, but with peanut butter. Ayla, my toddler, liked them so much! The rest of us took a little while to warm up to them, but once we did, we couldn’t stop eating them. I think we were expecting them to be sweeter when we first ate them, but they’re really more of a savoury snack. We enjoyed the original ones, but none of us really liked the Chili flavour. I guess it was just a little too “out there” for our family’s taste. I do love that these have no added sugar so they’re a great healthy snack for kids.
Bandar Foods Tomato Ketchup: This was my personal favourite. I put this stuff on everything – fries, sandwiches, pizza, eggs, etc. I actually hoped my kids wouldn’t like this one so there would be more for me, but they really liked it too. It has a beautiful blend of Indian flavour without being too spicy. Perfect for the whole family. I should mention that this is not a completely vegan product – the label indicates there may be traces of eggs and/or milk – so if you are a strict vegan, this is might not be ideal for you. But I loved it!
RawFoodz: I LOVE the salad dressings. They’re taste so fresh and natural, more like homemade. I find they pour better if you let them sit out at room temperature for ten minutes or so, because the oil solidifies in the fridge.
The Zen Budda butter-style spreads are not bad, but probably not something buy myself because I like regular butter a lot more. But if I was vegan, I can see how these would be a great alternative. I tried to sneak the original buttery spread onto the kids’ toast, and Ayla and Cole didn’t seem to notice, but Bennett was not fooled at all. He asked me to get him a new slice of toast with real butter. Oh well. I liked the garlic spread for making garlic toast, I thought it was quite nice.
Wonderfully Raw: The Brussel Bytes did not go over well! None of us like brussel sprouts, so I’m not really surprised that these didn’t taste good to us. I didn’t mind the Snip Chips, which are made with parsnips, but nobody else liked them. I think if you like brussel sprouts and parsnips, then you’d really like these.
The
CocoRoons were really good – so many great flavours! I loved them and so did Ayla. Tony liked the chocolate ones and ate pretty much the whole bag himself. The boys aren’t really fans of coconut so they weren’t as fond of these as the rest of us, but they did eat them and even packed them in their school lunches.
Giveaway!
If you live in the Lower Mainland of BC Canada, here’s your chance to win some of your own vegan snacks to enjoy. Lloyd James is giving away one of each of their products that I’ve reviewed here to one lucky Lower Mainlander. To enter, please use the form below. The contest will run until Sunday, April 12 2015.
Vegan Snacks Giveaway
My kids like to whine, especially when it comes to the food they eat, but that doesn’t stop me from trying to make tasty and healthy meals for them. Follow along as I share family-friendly recipes and reviews from my picky family members, who I lovingly call “The Whine Critics.” 
