You don’t realize how much meat you eat until you’re forced to go without.

That’s what I did last week — I went without.

In all of my 22 years, food has been my friend. My family’s eating habits, like those of other families from the little suburbia called Puyallup, would make cattle farmers proud. And except for my Mom’s attempt to pass her love of liver and onions onto me, and that once-in-a-blue moon food item I find “a little odd,” I love it all.

However, deciding to go vegan for a week, a full seven days, as a show of journalistic solidarity to the theme of today’s Island Living page ended up being tougher to chew at times than over-cooked steak.

Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t a bad experience. It was just, to jump start myself into a vegan diet without any preparation or knowledge of what I was doing left my plate looking a little high and dry at times.

Every animal product was out. No beef, chicken, eggs, pork, dairy of any kind, animal product or ingredient of any kind. Even for this seafood lover in the height of pink salmon season — fish was out. So, last week I was left with one question. What’s left to eat?

“Learn to love tofu,” was the advice my editor, Matt Johnson, gave me. Other people skeptical of my attempt told me beans, rice, tofu and something called tempeh would become my staples.

Friday before last I went shopping after work as a jump start on the seven days ahead. Off I went with determination to embrace vegan eating and a scribbled shopping list on a grocery store flier in hand. My first trip garnered a random gathering of wild rice, sushi rice, tofu, mixed greens, soy milk and vegetable broth. It wasn’t a good start.

Lucky for the rest of my week’s eating, I stopped by the library before I went shopping again. A mouth watering skim through “Linda McCartney On Tour: Over 200 Meatless Dishes from Around the World,” “The Now and Zen Epicure: Gourmet Vegan Recipes,” and “The Bold Vegetarian Chef: Adventures in Flavor with Soy, Beans, Vegetables, and Grains” gave me a little inspiration for Round 2 of shopping Saturday morning (after a bowl of homemade oatmeal with soy milk).

That trip gave me the supplies to create my soy burgers, vegetable soup, veggie sushi and other meals for the week. I tried to keep in mind while shopping that I wanted to expand my cooking repertoire and try new vegetable dishes, dishes I love in vegan version (like tacos) and explore what some people call “fake foods” — soy and vegetable concoctions that take the place of meat and dairy products.

Overall, the week went well. I didn’t experiment with new dishes as much as I would have liked, because my rushed schedule didn’t always allow it. I learned to tolerate the taunting of my boyfriend, Joe, and our friend, Amanda, who made fun of my soy burger and the rubbery texture of the soy cheese on it.

Finding breads and pasta without eggs or milk can be harder than the average meat-eating person would think. I even thought I’d converted a meat eater when my tofu stir fry looked tempting to Joe. That was until I explained to him what tofu was: At that point, stealing some of it was out of the question.

I did fine, despite the rough spots of my looking perplexed and famished trying to figure out what to eat that fit the vegan bill. And if anything I’m happy I tried it because it made me read labels and gave me a new consciousness of what is actually in what I’m eating (does the average person really know what disodium phosphate or xantham gum are anyway?).

If we ignore the fact that 6.2 days into the vegan experiment I slipped and nibbled on a piece of cheese while fixing Joe’s lunch, I didn’t cheat once.

It was fun. I didn’t starve. It wasn’t as hard as people may think, and I now want to incorporate more strictly veggie dishes into my future meals. But I do have some advice.

Be like every smart person out there and get some help. Whether you’re going to go “veggie” for the rest of your life, a month, a week, or even a day: don’t go in blind. Know that if you go hard core on cutting animal products out of your diet you better know how to get nutritional balance. Go to the American Dietetic Association’s Web site http://www.eatright.org and learn the nutritional qualities and benefits of the different vegetables, grains and soy products out there. The site has all sorts of info including recipes.

Familiarize yourself with the produce section, all of its vibrant colors, sometimes hard to figure out names and tasty possibilities. Have a “veggie” friend take you shopping, cook you their favorite vegetarian cuisine and show you the best places in town to find meatless fare. Thousands of recipe books for vegetarian and vegan lifestyles are out there, so get reading. Study up or else you’ll be stuck with limited choices — if not an empty plate.