About Marie
As you’ve probably guessed already my name is Marie and at the time and day of writing this very blog post I’m 23 years young, living in Vienna with Mr. handsome, Michael. But in order for you to get to know me better let’s start at the beginning.
From an early age on I loved food, I loved eating and I loved tasting new things and I loved helping in the kitchen. As a toddler I dunked my bread with spreadable sausage into my chocolate milk and my pizza into soda, and loved it. I also never liked having to eat the food that was supposed for children, like for example in restaurants I always wanted to order stuff from the big menu not from the kids menu, because all the food sounded way better and more exciting than pasta with tomato sauce or fries.
At school excursion every other kid would bring a sandwich for lunch, I brought all the ingredients for a Cesar salad: salad, dressing, roast chicken and a fork. Let that melt in your mouth: a fork. I brought A FORK to a school excursion in the woods.
Admittedly I ate quite a fair share of meat as a kid. My absolute favourites were lamb chops, roasted deer and duck, again not really your normal kids favourite.
Around the age of 13-14 I decided to no longer eat meat. I don’t recall the exact motives why I became vegetarian but I remember I didn’t really like the taste of meat anymore, cared for animals a lot and I also suspect it was that typical teenage urge of rebellion. Anyways during high school I stayed at a boarding school as my hometown was way too far away to go back and forth every day for school. The concept of vegetarianism however was still quite foreign for them so my meals mostly consisted of sides (rice, potatoes, fries and bread), soggy salad, mozzarella or some other cheese. Food wise it wasn’t the best time really and I always tried to make the best of it when I was at home on the weekends, eating full meals and baking all kinds of cakes, cookies and muffins.
I recall the first time my mum, who has been vegetarian for as long as I can remember, experimented with veganism (that was when I was around 14-15... a difficult age). I remember her bringing home one of the first vegan cheese substitutes and I also remember trying it and thinking that my mum must have lost her mind because this ‘cheese’ tasted absolutely disgraceful, and that I would never be as crazy and go vegan, ever. Well, little did I know.
During my year abroad in England I had the opportunity to taste many new cuisines I had never had the opportunity to try yet, like Indian and Caribbean for example. And I loved it! I’m not going to lie to you though, I also ate a lot of trash: McDonalds, PizzaHut, PizzaExpress, and the list goes on. But even in England my pattern continued, I loved trying new food and so money was mainly spent on food. Another thing that also happened during my year abroad: I discovered my love for photography. I take my camera with me wherever I go ever since.
In my last year of school I met Michael, and we fell in love preeetttayy hard.
2 years later we moved to Vienna together to live and study there. I was used to living away from home because of boarding school so it wasn’t my first time not living at home like it was for Michael. However having our own household to manage was a completely new experience for me too. I took us some weeks to settle in and also to manage the food and cooking situation. There still was meat and animal produce on the table pretty much every day though.
The decisive turning point for us, however clichéd that may sound, was a documentary. I remember watching the documentary (don’t remember anymore which one it was but it could have been “Fork over knives” or “Cowspiracy”) and realising how poorly animals were treated, not only the ones that are slaughtered for their meat but also the ones that are held for their milk and eggs. Michael at first didn’t want to watch but in the end was as shocked as I was.
At that point we decided: no more meat and no more animal produce. Of course switching didn’t happen from one day to another but gradually. We informed ourselves about a whole food plant based diet, read books, papers, guide books and learned about all the things you got to pay attention to. In the beginning it was pretty overwhelming but over time it became easier and more natural to us, and we learned an insane amount of new stuff too. I remember my mum being very understanding and supporting. But all in all my whole family never made a huge deal about us going vegan, which was great because there were enough people making it hard for us already (I think everyone that has gone vegan knows what I mean, all the comments etc. can be quite challenging on ones nerves sometimes).
Anyways, I always loved cooking thanks to my dad who is a chef himself and taught me most of the things I know about cooking. I was stoked to learn about to many new ingredients and spices to try since going vegan. We experimented a lot and got more and more adventurous with our food creations. That’s when I started to dig up my old camera and take pictures of our food.
One day Michael said we shouldn’t let the pictures go to waste and use them instead by creating an IG account and sharing our vegan food journey with the world. At first I was reluctant but then I thought why not, let’s do this. And here we are now, almost 2,5 years later with a considerable amount of followers and our very own blog, which you’re currently reading. We’re very happy and very grateful for each and every single one of you following along our journey and supporting us, it means an awful lot to us and to be honest it still feels very surreal.
What are your goals and dreams for the future?
I hope that someday we’re able to make a living from our blog and IG so we’re free to travel the world and live wherever we want to. I honestly would hate it to be tied down somewhere seeing and doing the same things for ever and ever. I believe everyone should live their dreams and passions and not be afraid to do so. I hope to travel, to live in different countries, meet new people, that’s my dream. But most importantly I want to be happy.
What is your favorite dish?
That’s a hard question. I guess it really depends... One day I’d say hands down my grandma’s potato salad, spätzle and sauce, the other I’d probably say something like stir fry noodles with tofu. Or sushi, sushi is awesome too. Oh, or Pizza. Then there is Curry with Naan, soooo good. Or Tacos ughhhh so delicious. And Tteok bokki of course, how could I forget one of the best dishes there is. Also bread, sandwiches, burgers, Döner...No I simply can’t decide, sorry there’s too much good food to just choose one.
What does a perfect day look like for you?
Waking up sunshine on my face, going for a walk, having a humongous bowl of porridge and listening to good music or a podcast. I love to cook up a storm for friends and family so that would definitely also be on the perfect day list. I guess just cooking in general makes me very happy, so as long as I can do that, it’s a good day.
Hi, we’re Marie and Michael, two foodies living and studying in Vienna!
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