Good Food road-test: a vegan diet

• Pete Evans' cauliflower tabbouleh
• Dan Lepard's apricot lemon cakes
• Isa Chandra Moskowitz's blackbean burgers

The premise: A plant-based diet, so no animal products whatsoever, including honey.

The results: It was cupcakes that did it. Plant-based and delicious, they convinced me going vegan for a few weeks would be a great way to re-examine what I ate and why, with some new cooking (and eating) experiences along the way. The aim: 22 days, as per the celeb eating challenge du jour tackled by the likes of Beyonce, Jennifer Lopez and Jay-Z. I ended up doing it for a month, tacking on another week and a bit to make up for a bumpy start. ''Vegan turbulence'' is how some bloggers describe the digestive transition. Mine was a bumpy ride: urgent dashes to the loo, heartburn, sharp stomach pains, all culminating in a lightheaded mis-step, when I tumbled out of a bus on one particularly bad morning. To be honest, its effect took me by surprise, given I eat vegetarian about five days a week, but I guess I did have a rather bad cheese habit.

Once I made it through the transition though, it was smooth sailing. The eating-in side of veganism, I loved. I experimented with tempeh (not a fan), tried to perfect ''nut cheeze'' (it's nicer than it sounds) and sprinkled an abundance of nutritional yeast on dishes as a B12 source. I enjoyed exploring new parts of my cookbook collection, in particular Pete Evans' Healthy Every Day and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's River Cottage Veg. Blogs and forums were a great help, especially when I was feeling unwell, and also as a supermarket guide. Thank goodness for smartphones, as I was having to Google so many food labels before being able to plonk something in my trolley.

Eating out in Sydney's inner west was fantastic: pizza, pad Thai and kibbeh, all vegan, all delicious. Further afield, it was a little more challenging, requiring many questions and clarifications. In one case, a restaurant went through the motions with me, agreed to exclude a few ingredients, only to serve me up the oyster-sauce laden dish as written on the menu. It certainly increased my empathy and respect for the vegan community.

The pros: Eating cruelty-free. Plus vegetables, legumes and tofu are delicious.

The cons: Reading food labels. Variety when eating out. No more cheese (was actually easier than I thought).

Dish discovery: Sadhana Kitchen's raw, vegan neopolitan cheezecake. I'm still dreaming about it.

Dish disaster: Vegan ''chorizo'' burrito.

Top three pantry staples: Tofu, vegetables, nuts.

How hard is it to eat out? It requires many questions (even once the dish arrives) and in many places a resulting scarcity of options. But there are some great vegan restaurants out there too.

Did it work? I was more mindful of what I was putting into my mouth, both emotionally and practically. As a result, I lost four kilograms, felt lighter and healthier and that had a really positive impact on my mood. I also cut my caffeine intake, which meant I slept much better. It made me realise how much of a treat that skim flat white and a milky cup of tea really are.

What will you keep? Understanding where our food comes from and how it gets to our plates has always been important to me. I have definitely reduced the amount of animal products I consume, but am not quite ready to make the full transition to veganism. After this challenge, however, I can definitely see it being part of my future.