Please Teese me

I'm looking forward to a dinner of cheeseless homemade pizza tonight. I love the combination of crisp-edged dough base with the rich tomato sauce and fresh and antipasto vegetables. It's so tasty I'm not sure why even omnivores would smother their pizzas in a thick layer of cheese. Why would you want the other flavours to have to compete with all that salty greasiness on top (not to mention, if we're talking about the mass-produced varieties, in the crust)?

Generally speaking, I think it's useful to pursue vegan food without always thinking of veganising other existing foods. I'm wary of too many not-dogs or restaurant dishes of gluten chicken, lest we give the impression that we vegans are secretly hankering after things like schnitzel, but denying ourselves only to save face. Plus, in the case of pre-packaged items, the result is so often something highly processed, with an ingredients list that reads like a chemist's inventory.

And yet. When it comes to, oh, say, cupcakes, I'm all for enjoying vegan versions of things from the days before my veganism. And I'm always happy to bring some vegan sausages to an omni-hosted BBQ — it's so easy for all concerned. Since I began paying more attention to the "vegan blogosphere" I have read such good things about a couple of brands of non-dairy cheese, not to mention the cheese-like things that can be created with nutritional yeast. So I'm thinking I'll find myself some of that there fake cheese in the next few weeks, and see how I enjoy eating "real" pizza again... and some toasted sandwiches, and some nachos, and some lasagne, and...