PexelsWinter evenings mean just one thing, if we’re being very reductive: hot chocolate, lots of marshmallows and mounds of whipped cream.
Now you can enjoy your festive-film-inspired treats in front of your Netflix on-screen fire, guilt-free thanks to Sainsbury’s, who’ve introduced a vegan range of made-for-sleepover snacks.
Perfect for animal lovers, environmentalists and those on a dairy-free diet, these ultimate hot chocolate ingredients are pretty much guaranteed to excuse you from never leaving the house in the evenings again.
Sainsbury's / FreedomMade by Freedom foods, these cute little marshmallows are no flump, priced at just £2 for a 75g bag.
Adorned by an adorable critter, in the name of stopping damaging mass animal produce, Freedom marshmallows come in traditional pink and white colours.
They are gelatine, egg, and dairy free, as well as being free from artificial flavours and colours.
Sainsbury'sHowever, what would marshmallows be without the whipped cream? One hot, sticky mess, that’s where.
So Sainsbury’s have sorted this too!
Hopla soy whipped cream is a stalwart in their plant-based products, priced at just £2.20, so you can be kind to your pockets and the cows.
Bailey'sNot one to miss a trick, the alcohol industry is getting involved too and Baileys have just launched a dairy free and gluten free version of their famed Irish cream liqueur.
Baileys Almande is – you guessed it – actually made out of almond milk, and it also contains almond essence, cane sugar, purified water and real vanilla.
Who knew plant-based products could taste this delicious? It’s not just the animals you’ll be helping either.
PixabayFor the past two decades, the rate of global food production has increased faster than the rate of global population growth and we’re currently growing enough food to feed 10 billion people.
Yet hunger is caused by poverty and inequality, rather than scarcity and that means 800 million men, women and children are starving on Earth, according to World Hunger.
Dr Marco Springmann, Lead Researcher at the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food, tells UNILAD:
If we would use the feed or the amount of crops we use to feed animals to feed people we could eliminate hunger.
PixabayDr Springmann added:
It’s clear that if everyone had a Western diet, we couldn’t exist and the world would be eaten up.
You can learn more about the meat industry in the UNILAD investigation, ‘Meat The End’.
Full disclosure: As a meat eater myself, the images of animal cruelty are really hard to swallow.
The question of which we value more remains: the luxury of dietary preferences, or the welfare of millions of animals and the potential to end world hunger?
With supermarkets offering tasty deliciousness like vegan marshmallows, how can we resist a kinder palate?
A former emo kid who talks too much about 8Chan meme culture, the Kardashian Klan, and how her smartphone is probably killing her. Francesca is a Cardiff University Journalism Masters grad who has done words for BBC, ELLE, The Debrief, DAZED, an art magazine you’ve never heard of and a feminist zine which never went to print.