Hey y'all, just in the posting mood today! I was writing another post and thought about my love for good vegan alternatives. I am not personally vegan, but as someone who takes great pride and pleasure as a cook serving other people food, I want to serve my vegan comrades as best as I can, so I try to taste test a lot of vegan stuff. I'm not a carnist who believes that the vegan option can never taste as good, I just have a lot of allergies so I have to be cautious about eating things that aren't meat. However I've tasted and heard from vegans, certain things like cheese simply aren't as good as the non-vegan counter part. I feel like we hear about this stuff way too much though, as there are so many interesting flavors vegans use that carnists don't.
My personal pick for this topic is coconut aminos. Soy sauce is a great way to add umami flavor into almost anything you're making, so I was disheartened at first when I heard that soy sauce wasn't vegan. But one of my vegan friends got me a bottle of coconut aminos to try, and it blew my mind. The extra sweetness in it makes so many things you'd use soy sauce for way better. Teriyaki sauce should always be made with coconut aminos, fried rice gets a slight sweetness that really lends well to the veggies in it, it's so fucking good.
While I'm not a vegan or vegetarian, personally NotMilk is what came to mind- it genuinely tastes so incredibly like milk, I was shocked- yet it also has that subtle pineapple flavor (part of what they used to imitate milk, I guess) making it even better. I don't tend to consider other plant-based milks a replacement but rather their own separate drinks- but NotMilk really hit the spot.
Other than that, while it's subjective... I've tried Chinese mock duck and other mock meats (generally gluten and tofu based) prepared in ways that were really tasty and could more than replace certain kinds of dishes.