Since the name of this blog is La Vie Dairy Free, it only seems fitting that my first blog post is all about my favourite dairy alternatives. Having been dairy-free for around four years now, it’s safe to say I’ve trialled and tested my fair share of dairy substitutes – so if you want to know which ones have made it onto my ultimate favourites list, keep on reading below…
Milk
I thought I’d start with the most obvious product for a dairy-free favourites list – milk. The dairy-free milk market has boomed in the last few years, so knowing which one to choose can be a bit tricky. There’s not just soya and almond milk out there anymore – no-no, you’ve now also got oat, rice, coconut, hazelnut, cashew, hemp and even pea!?! There’s not enough room in this post to compare all these different types of milk (there’ll be a blog post on this coming soon…) but I can tell you that my firm favourite is oat milk. It has a mild, sweet taste to it, is packed with fibre and heats better than most other dairy-free milks, making it perfect for your daily cuppa. My go-to at the moment is Alpro Oat Original, although I’m yet to try the cult classic Oatly which could definitely see things change…
Cost? 1 litre of Fresh Alpro Oat Original is currently on offer for only 80p at Tesco’s!
Yogurt
Luckily, the dairy-free yogurt market is a bit easier to navigate than the milk one (pea yogurt is yet to exist as far as I’m aware). Dairy-free yogurt is usually just made with either soya or coconut (although there are a few almond-based options out there too). Coconut yogurt is definitely the creamier of the two, but it’s also pretty pricey and a bit too rich for me on a daily basis, so I tend to go for soya-based options. Whilst many supermarkets now make their own-brand soya yogurt, I usually stick to Alpro; they source their soya beans sustainably (yay!) and offer a pretty impressive range of flavours. My go-to is their Plain Unsweetened soya yogurt, which goes perfectly with fruit and muesli in the morning and is a great option if you want to avoid the high levels of sugar often hidden in yogurt. Alpro’s Plain with Oats soya yogurt is also a good choice if you’re looking to boost your fibre intake or just like a bit of added texture to your yogurt.
Cost? Tesco’s are doing Alpro’s Plain Unsweetened Soya Yogurt for £1 until 1st October (they seem to have offers on lots of Alpro products at the moment) but Waitrose and Asda are also doing 2 for £2 which works out as the same.
Cheese
Dairy-free cheese is a bit of an opinion divider – some love it, lots absolutely hate it. I have to admit, when I first cut milk products out of my diet, dairy-free cheese was the one thing my taste buds just couldn’t adapt to. The vast majority of the ones I tried were rubbery, bland and were pretty foul-smelling (I still remember my Mum yelling ‘What’s died in ‘ere?!’ after catching a whiff of Violife mozzarella in our fridge). After having tested a fair few now, the one I always come back to is Sheese’s grated mozzarella. The texture isn’t at all rubbery, it melts well (rare for vegan cheese) and its flavour resembles ‘real’ mozzarella more closely than any of the other dairy-free alternatives I’ve tried. Yes, if you were blindfolded you’d probably be able to tell it’s not dairy mozzarella, but in my opinion, Sheese is the closest you’re gonna get to the real-deal.
Cost? Couldn’t find any offers on at the moment but Sainsbury’s and Waitrose both do it for £2.50.
Butter
Butter probably seems like quite a boring category, but coming from a French family where basically everything is cooked drenched in butter, finding a good dairy-free butter was very important to me. I’ve tried countless ones over the years, each one unfortunately as insipid-looking and bland-tasting as the next, lacking that richness and creaminess that makes dairy butter so deliciously good. I’d practically given up hope of ever finding a good vegan substitute and was mourning the loss of Anchor, Président and all the other butters I so enjoyed in my dairy-days until I stumbled upon Flora Buttery 100% Plant Goodness (purely by chance may I add – Sainsbury’s had run out of Vitalite). What a happy accident that turned out to be. Six months later and I have not once looked back, my craving for good creamy butter has been satiated and with each bite I am still in wonder as to how Flora have managed to create something that tastes so close to the real things. If you want further proof to this claim, even my French grandmother cooks with it now, and we all know how much the French love their butter.
Cost: Tesco’s are really coming up trumps here – they’re doing the 1kg tub for £2.50 until 1st October – that’s over £1 less than at Asda!
Dessert
Seeing as desserts are obviously the best category, I just had to choose two options. My first favourite is Pudology’s Millionaires’ Pud, inspired – as the name suggests – by millionaire shortbread, a treat that’s normally an absolute no-go zone for those who can’t/don’t eat dairy. But thanks to Pudology, we can now enjoy this treat again (hurrah), and without having to compromise on taste. The pud’s top layer of chocolate is creamy and sumptuously silky, the caramel filling underneath is sweet and sticky, and the biscuit base is deliciously buttery (cue the Greg Wallace buttery-biscuit-base song). My second favourite is the Coconut Collaborative Little Choc Pots – silky smooth, super-chocolatey and oh-so creamy. They’re quite small but don’t be deceived by their size, each tiny pot is seriously indulgent and packs a whole lot of flavour.
Cost? It seems you can only buy the Millionaires’ Puds from Sainsbury’s and Ocado, the latter of which offers the cheaper price of £2.39 compared to Sainsbury’s at £3. The Choc Pots are stocked by a lot more supermarkets: Ocado, Waitrose, Tesco, Morrisons, Coop and Sainsbury’s. Surprisingly, they’re cheapest at Waitrose who’ve got them on offer for a mere £1.66 until 8th October – all the more reason to give them a go!
Ice-cream
I’d have a lot more fun choosing options for this category if I wasn’t allergic to tree nuts🙃. Unfortunately, a lot of dairy-free ice-creams are made with cashews, almonds or hazelnuts – all of which make me look like I’ve had some seriously botched lip-fillers. My favourite is Swedish Glace’s Soy Vanilla ice-cream. Yes, I know – vanilla’s the boring flavour – but this ice-cream is so creamy that it’s even been mistaken for dairy-ice cream by my dairy-eating friends. And that makes up for a bit of a plain flavour in my opinion. Lots of people rave about Halo Top’s nut-free vegan ice-creams, but unfortunately at a pricey £5 a tub I’m gonna have to wait until there’s an offer on before I give them a go!
Cost? Ocado, Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, Waitrose, Coop and Iceland ALL do it for the price of £2.50.
So there you have it – my favourite dairy alternatives! I hope this helps any of you struggling to know which dairy-free products to opt for and if you guys have any more suggestions/recommendations, please drop a comment below!
La Vie Dairy Free 