The Vegg Cookbook: Egg-Free Cooking Uncaged!

It’s been just over a year since The Vegg was launched, and this versatile plant-based egg yolk replacer has taken the market by storm. Consumers everywhere — from the US to Switzerland to Australia — are using it to whip up amazing vegan creations including omelets, crepes, hollandaise sauce, quiche and so much more. What makes The Vegg so unique is that it looks, smells, and even tastes like egg yolk – but without all the cruelty, which is good news for hens! Plus, every time you buy The Vegg, 10% of sales are donated to Compassion Over Killing.

The creator of The Vegg, Rocky Shepheard, has received an incredible amount of positive feedback about his product that he asked customers to send in their vegan recipes hoping he could share them with a wider audience — and that’s how he hatched the idea for a cookbook!

The newly-released Vegg Cookbook: Egg-Free Cooking Uncaged  is loaded with over 60 vegan recipes ranging from Scrambled Vegg to Baked Frittata to Peanutbutter Bacon Chocolate Donuts — plus it features a foreward by COK’s Erica Meier. We recently sat down with Rocky to ask him a few questions about how he got started and what’s in store for the future:

Q: What inspired you to create The Vegg?

A: An April Fool’s post inspired me ultimately. I once read a blog about  a vegan fried egg in the UK. It looked so real; I was amazed that this was even possible. After looking into it I found out it was bogus. So, I started thinking about the challenges of doing it myself. A few years later, after learning about molecular gastronomy techniques and engaging in some home-style experimentation, I got lucky with a pretty realistic, simple, yet healthy formulation.

Q: How did you come up with a product that tastes so much like egg yolks?

A: It was a two year process of occasional experimentation. Recreating the experience of eating a particular food is as “simple” as recreating it’s smell, taste, and texture. I had recently given up eggs so I had all three fresh in my mind. We’re getting to a point in food technology where any food can be satisfactorily simulated. This gives me great hope for veganism. We’ll soon be able to eliminate cruelty while offering a food that reproduces the eating experience and at the same time eliminates unhealthy components such as animal proteins and fats.

Q: Where can people buy The Vegg?

A: It’s currently available in many countries around the world and just recently was added to a German company’s “Vantastic Foods” label. You can find an extensive list of locations throughout the US and internationally at TheVegg.com.

Q: Tell us a little about the cookbook – and how we can get a copy!

A: The Vegg Cookbook started out as a Vegg recipe contest with plans to make a cookbook only if we got enough submissions. We ended up with well over 100 recipes and selected the best of those. So it was only possible thanks to the fans, and we’re very thankful to all who entered a recipe. The cookbook is 80 pages in full color with a photo for every recipe. There’s something for everyone in this cookbook. It will be sold on ForAnima.com, Amazon.com, and other online locations. I’m looking forward to any and all reviews.

Q: What’s next for The Vegg?

A: Next for The Vegg? Well, with the help of David Benzaquen’s company, PlantBased Solutions, we’ve undergone head-to-toe re-branding: new logo, website, and packaging. The plan is to make the product more attractive to large US companies like Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, and other grocery chains. So, it’s an exciting time for us and other like-minded companies as we see new plant-based products popping up almost daily. Could we be living in the “golden age” of veganism…I think we just might be.