Everyone who is vegan has undoubtedly been asked the same litany of questions. There are even videos all over the internet making fun of them. I watch them and laugh along with every other vegan who sees them. It seems to be a rite of passage for all vegans to have to field these questions. For anyone who doesn’t know the questions here are a few of them: Can you eat bread? Where do you get your protein? Don’t you miss meat? The list goes on and on. How to address them can be tricky based on the circumstances. I have a blanket rule for all questions someone asks me: you are free to ask me anything you want, but whether I answer it is my choice and, almost more importantly, once I give you the answer, you will never not know it. When these questions get asked, I find that a good place to start is asking a question back very sincerely, “Do you really want to have this conversation?” Often, the reply will be, “No.” In those cases, you saved yourself a lot of time and frustration.  If the answer is yes, then you can hopefully have a meaningful conversation.

What really underlies most of the questions asked is a lack of knowledge about food. The people who ask the questions are not entirely to blame for this. Much of the blame lies with the food industry. They purposely don’t want people knowing what they are eating. This lack of knowledge is best shown in the question, “can you eat bread?” This is one of my favorite, yet most frustrating, questions and the second most common question I am asked by non-vegans. Asking this just shows that people don’t know what goes into bread. A basic bread only has 5 ingredients: flour, water, yeast, sugar and salt. That is it. There is nothing in there that comes from an animal. When you get into things like brioche, challah, potato rolls, then you start introducing things like eggs and milk, but a basic bread is completely vegan. When I get asked the bread question, I ask the person back, “what is in bread?” More often than not the answer is, “I don’t know.” So, people are eating bread, but have no clue what is in it. I’m sorry, but that is crazy. You need to know what you are eating. To answer the question; it depends on the type of bread.

My other favorite question is the most common one, the one about protein. It truly amazes me how many people suddenly become experts in nutrition when they meet someone who is vegan. Again, it shows a lack of knowledge about what people are eating. I used to answer this question with, “From the same place many of the largest mammals on Earth, gorillas, giraffes, hippopotamuses and elephants, get it.” Unfortunately, this was usually met with a blank stare. This reaction is not surprising. When restaurants make a concerted effort to only label animal flesh as protein, it is no wonder that people think it is the only source of protein available.  Few of us bother to think about where the animals consumed as food get their protein. If we did, we’d would realize they get their protein from plants.  Many take out salad bars only list animal meats in the protein category,  even though you can have a base of kale and add in beans, chickpeas and edamame – all excellent sources of protein. Because of this lack of understanding about protein sources,  now when asked about my intake of protein, I simply ask,  “How much protein do I need?” This has an almost 100% reply of, “I don’t know.”

People generally have very little knowledge about nutrition and food production. So many times the questions asked are not coming from a place of disrespect, but from a genuine lack of understanding. As vegans, we pay more attention to what we eat than most omnivores do. We read labels, we research, we ask questions. We have to.  So, the next time you get asked one of the questions take a moment and try to first figure out if the person is asking out of genuine interest or just being snarky. The snarky ones you can’t do much about. But the ones who want to know are simply uninformed. Don’t get frustrated with them. Remember, before each of us woke up and started our journey towards veganism, we didn’t know either.