Tess Challis Stops Aiming for Perfection and Gets Healthier!

In this inspiring episode of The Glen Merzer Show, nine-time vegan cookbook author Tess Challis opens up about her decades-long journey with veganism—and how letting go of perfection brought her closer to true health and happiness.

“I was trying to be too perfect,” Tess confesses, reflecting on her early struggles with food and the rigid mindset that often sneaks into healthy living.

Tess, who went vegan back in 1991 after discovering the truth about animal rights, shares how her health improved dramatically when she made the switch—and how her relationship with food evolved over time. Now, with her latest book Food Joy, she’s championing a new philosophy: small changes, big joy.

At the heart of her approach is the One Degree principle—a method that encourages gradual, sustainable changes instead of all-or-nothing thinking. As a wellness coach, Tess has seen how this shift helps people ditch guilt and embrace progress, not perfection.

“Food joy is about balancing delicious and nutritious,” she explains. “It’s not about deprivation.”

The conversation also dives into the realities of raising a vegan child, the evolution of vegan options since the ‘90s, and the thriving plant-based scene in Phoenix.

“The vegan movement is huge here,” she says with enthusiasm, noting the growth of community and support for compassionate living.

Throughout the episode, Tess’s warmth and wisdom shine through. Whether you're a seasoned vegan or someone just beginning to explore plant-based eating, her message is simple yet powerful: Let go of the pressure. Lean into joy. Keep evolving.

“I believe in always evolving,” Tess affirms—and it’s this mindset that fuels her work, her cooking, and her coaching.

Tess Challis reminds us that health isn’t a destination—it’s a journey full of flavor, growth, and self-compassion. By ditching dietary dogma and embracing balance, she shows that joy is not only possible on a vegan diet—it’s essential.

🎧 Listen to the full episode of The Glen Merzer Show to hear more from Tess Challis and discover how you can find your own version of Food Joy.

📌 Watch the episode here: Tess Challis Stops Aiming for Perfection and Gets Healthier!

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DISCLAIMER: Please understand that the transcript below was provided by a transcription service. It is undoubtedly full of the errors that invariably take place in voice transcriptions. To understand the interview more completely and accurately, please watch it here: Tess Challis Stops Aiming for Perfection and Gets Healthier!

Here's the transcript:

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Welcome to The Glenn Merzer Show. could find us across all your favorite podcast platforms. You could find us on YouTube. And please remember to subscribe. And you could find us at RealMenEatPlants.com. My guest today, Tess Chalice, is a nine time, she's coming out with her ninth book, a nine time vegan cookbook author, a cooking instructor, speaker.

writer and health coach Tess. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me, Glenn. I really appreciate it. So I know that you do health coaching and you have something called the one degree program, but I don't know what that is. Are you trying to make everyone's temperature go up by one degree? That's exactly what it is.

No, you know, the one degree and it's, it's health, it started out as office health coaching and now it's like a kind of, you know, combination of health and life coaching or whatever, whatever really people need the most. But the one degree approach is a way of helping people to make very small changes. So if you make just like a one degree shift every day, that adds up to so much over time and we can be so hard on ourselves and expect ourselves to go from like,

A to Z overnight. And then we're like, we're not doing enough. And so it's just a way of like just easing in and leaning into all of those positive changes. OK. So basically, if you do one degree a day and you do it for six months, 180 days, you will have turned around to 180 degrees. You're my marketing. Yes, that's exactly that's exactly it. OK. So what is your journey towards veganism? When when did you go vegan?

I'm vegan in 1991. So it's been a minute and you know, it started off, I was in college. So I'm, let's see, how old would I have been? About 20, cause I'm in mid, about 54 now. And I just was learning so much about animal rights and, know, the state of animals. And back then we had the animals film. Now we have earthlings.

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And I just felt like a huge hypocrite. I actually was taking a class in college called the philosophy of animal rights in the environment. And we were we were the professors like, I don't care what you think, but you just have to defend it with logic. And I was like writing all of this. I'm like, I can't defend being a meat eater. I can't I can't defend this. I like it doesn't go with the logic in my mind. So I start off feeling like a hypocrite. And then I just.

started dipping like one degree, I started dipping my toe into like being, you know, vegetarian and then it went into veganism about a year later. It was definitely way harder back then. And then it is now. But the cool thing too is once I went vegan, Glenn, once I finally like did it and I was like, I'm going to just try it. And once I tried it, it was incredible that like how many of my health issues it cleared up. And I hadn't even, that wasn't even an intention, but it was a wonderful aside benefit from doing something from compassion.

What sort of changes did you have? Well, oh, my goodness, excuse me. I just inhaled a little and have a little like elderberry drink here. Well, was having. So growing up, I was sick constantly. I have a friend who I spoke with several years ago, and she's like, the one thing I remember was that you. She's like, you were always out sick. She's my needs to drink. I think I've.

I've got something in my throat. I'll pause it for minute. you can pause it. OK, I'm dying. All right. So what sort of health changes did you have on the vegan diet? Well, Glenn, growing up, I had so many health problems, I feel like I was just constantly sick. have a friend that I reconnected with a few years ago and she was like, she's like, I feel like every time I wanted to play with you at recess, you were just always out sick. So.

just was always one thing or another, constant headaches. I got strep throat so many times that I became immune to every single antibiotic that they could prescribe for that. And the last time I've ever gotten strep throat was like a couple months before I went vegan. And I just like, never again had it after going vegan. so that was, strep throat is horrible. Like I just remember feeling like it was just the worst thing. It was just so unpleasant and so painful and awful. And so was such a relief not to have that anymore.

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And I remember my skin was very like, remember being, you you're in college, you wanna look good. And I just remember feeling really embarrassed about my skin. Like my acne was really bad. And then again, it was like the dermatologist was like, there's nothing we can do for you. You know, of course diet was never considered as a possible cause. And I remember looking in the mirror, had this, it was so many years ago, it was over 30 years ago, of course.

I remember looking in the bathroom, Mirglen, and just doing like a double take, like, what? Wait, my skin, like it looks so much better. And it had only been like maybe two weeks after going vegan. But my skin just cleared up tremendously. So that was, you know, more of a visual thing. But it was just such a relief to have like that skin issue be gone. Yeah. So you felt like you were living more in alignment with your values, your

Health improved. But what were the challenges to staying vegan at that time? I went vegan around the same time. that's so cool. I didn't know that. So and where were you? Like, where were you? was in Los Angeles. So it's probably a little easier for you because I remember not that it was not a huge accomplishment and like easy, but.

And I was in Michigan and I remember there. remember traveling to California being like, my God, you guys actually have mayonnaise here. What part of Michigan were you in? I went to school in Kalamazoo. OK. WMU college. So the challenges were that I like food and it was just like really hard to find good vegan food. mean, that's what made me start.

Having to learn how to cook was like I want to eat well and I have to do it myself apparently because there's like hardly anything available. So back then I mean we didn't even have butter. I remember going to a restaurant a vegetarian restaurant in Michigan, Seva and I remember being like, I have to eat my bread dry because there was no butter. I think I've eaten there. Is that in Ann Arbor? It is. Yes. That's a great restaurant. I know they're old school and

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But yeah, I remember that was one of the first vegetarian restaurants I went to back in the day. And I remember being, I just have this vague, this vivid memory. No, actually this I find interesting. I have a memory of feeling like I had to eat my bread dry and my friend that I was with who was vegan and he was like this hardcore animal rights guy. He said to me, the vegan police aren't here. You can have butter if you want. And I just remember feeling like that was such an act of kindness. And I think it was people like him that helped me to actually go vegan. Cause I felt like

If I slipped up, wasn't just like, forget the whole thing because I did slip up. I slipped up several times, but I learned something each time. And I was able to then at some point just to keep going and to not go back and keep slipping up. But it took a few months. It took a few months because it was, it was hard to, to not have, we didn't have like the chicken nuggets and the, those transitional foods that can be helpful. Yeah. so,

After you went vegan, did you did you imagine that it would become part of your career? No, no, definitely not. I started cooking and I was like, I actually feel like I'm getting kind of good at this. But it took a while before I actually ever thought about like writing a cookbook or doing coaching or anything like that. OK, now your new your new book coming out now is Food Joy. And.

It has some pages to read in the beginning and then it has recipes. I've read those pages and it seems to be about the idea that you've overcome being a restrictive vegan, that you're trying not to put too many rules and regulations on your diet, but just trying to eat healthy food. Is that a fair summation? Yeah. mean, for me, food joy is also just where

delicious meets nutritious. And that's been always like such a big part of what I love to do with food is to make those things that are just so good for our bodies taste really good so that you're not like, okay, I have to eat this. You're like, ooh, I get to eat this. And yeah, I think that there's so many different aspects of food joy. And what you said about restriction is, know, cause I went through, I went through like some fairly

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heavily eating disordered periods, like when I was in my 20s, I actually was an obese vegan. I was quite overweight to the point where I was in my 20s and felt winded after walking up a staircase of stairs. So what were you doing wrong in your diet that you became obese at that time? I was trying to be too perfect. was I was telling myself, OK, I need to follow this.

this very, very strict plan that allowed, know, it was just it was very, restrictive. No, no fat whatsoever and all that kind of thing. And I felt like for me, my mentality was like all or nothing. So I felt like if I wasn't doing that 100 percent, then I was failing. So like every day I would just binge eat. So I was just binge eating like vegan junk food every day. Oh, so you were. Let me try to understand this. You were trying to be perfect. Yes. And then when you would fail,

You would say the heck with it and you would eat all the wrong foods. Yes. And a lot of people do that. It's very common. Yeah, it's very common. People feel like they. So for you, the solution was not to try to be perfect. Eventually, and this is a no weight endorsement of Weight Watchers, but eventually I started doing like Weight Watchers and what I learned back then, and that was like late 90s.

What I learned was, okay, I can actually have a little chocolate. It's not the end of the world, or I can go have some French fries once in a while, but you just can't eat them every day, all day. Like you can have this or that, but the fundamental part of my diet, I actually started eating vegetables again as a vegan because of that, because like vegetables were free and I started eating more beans. I was like, oh wow, beans are great for weight loss. Okay. And so it just, kind of taught me about the value of food and like the things we should be emphasizing eating more of and that the treats that are

the treats are okay, but they just aren't something that you should just be eating all of the time. So it was really like learning about balance. And then I was like, okay, so it taught me a lot. And then I was just like, I'm not going in any more of these meetings. So I just kind of did my own version of it because I didn't want to learn about how to make seven up and cool whip cake. But, you know, I really learned a lot about balance. And so it helped me at that point to like know that I didn't have to be perfect.

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succeed. Okay. So once you did that, once you loosened up a little bit psychologically about your diet, ironically, you started eating healthier then, right? Yes. Yeah. So in other words, you're telling yourself, I don't have to be perfect. And that actually makes you eat better.

Way better. my God. I went from eating like Chinese takeout with everything fried and then like vegan chocolate cake and like loads of white bread and like just feeling like crap every day. I went from that to mostly eating a whole food plant-based diet and with a few treats, which is pretty much how I eat. Right. So like, yeah, mostly whole food plant-based and then just, but just like not having that restrictive, like all or nothing mindset. All right.

And so for how many years now have you been on this healthier path? Well, gosh, over 25 years, I guess. Wow. OK. Yeah. And it continues to get healthier. I've I've kind of weaned off, you know, like so, for example, the new book Food Joy has a lot different recipes than my first book. You know, now my chocolate chip cookies I'm using.

you know, oat flour and instead of the oil, I'm using almond butter and they're so delicious. Like they are so, so good. They taste as good or to me better than the book I wrote, you know, 10 or 15 years ago. But, you know, they're just, they're so much healthier. So I've still like even over the, over time, I've still continued to like, I can, you know, I can still make all of these adjustments and eat healthier. And I think the healthier we are and the healthier we eat, the like,

healthier we crave and it's it's easier to do it. Yeah. I think when you just when you eat with a sense that one of the purposes of eating is nutrition. yeah. It kind of makes the know, the fried food just not look worth eating. Right. And I'm lucky.

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It's like, have a mixed blessing here because I can't even eat fried food anymore. It gives me the worst stomach ache. And this has been going on for like, I'd say five years or so. And my body just all of a sudden was like, girl, no, you cannot eat this anymore. Like I will make you so unhappy and miserable. So I can have maybe a bite. Like if my daughter's make, you know, we're out somewhere and she's got like a vegan chicken thing or whatever, some little fried thing, you know, and obviously vegan.

Maybe you can have a bite. But if I eat much of it, I will be I will feel so crappy. So, yeah. And your taste buds change. Like the taste of it isn't even appealing. I don't even care that I'm not eating. Yeah. Now, you mentioned your daughter. You raised your daughter as a vegan, right? She. Yep. And she turned 22 this week and she's been vegan since birth. Obviously, in pregnancy, all of that. Yep. And she's been thriving for 22 years.

Absolutely. And she's human, know, she's, she, she got pneumonia this year, but she snapped back. mean, she's, she's fine. I mean, she's, you know, generally stays very healthy. She's human. She got COVID in 2021. She, you know, she got, she didn't feel great for a week or two, and then she was fine. You know, she's just, it's so much different than when I was growing up and I was just always sick all the time. Cause she's generally just thriving and eating really well. And

very healthy and yeah, and we don't even try that hard. It's like not that hard to raise a human being on plants. Like I didn't even take prenatals. I know that's controversial, but I didn't even take prenatals while I was pregnant because plants are amazing. Now, tell us about the challenges of raising a vegan daughter, because I'm sure when she was a girl, she would go to parties and you would have to.

perhaps concern yourself with what are they going to be serving at the party and how do you explain to a little girl, we don't eat that, that comes from an animal. So how did you meet that challenge?

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Well, Glenn, I, you know, again, and this is probably controversial, but I didn't, I didn't enforce that. I was, kind of tried to let her have some autonomy. And I said, you know, if you go to party and you want to eat cake, you can have it. And there were a couple of times she went to birthday parties and had their cake. So there were a couple of times when she would do that. Then she got to a point where she just decided on her own and she was fairly young still. Like, I just don't want to ever eat that anymore. And we would just send her with a treat or we'd make treats for them.

But she generally, you know, it's very simple for a child. You just say, here's why we're vegan. It's animals don't want to be eaten. We don't need to, you know, their milk is for their babies like my milk was for you. Their milk was for their babies. And they they don't we don't want to hurt animals. I mean, it's so simple. You just tell them the most simple of facts and they're like, yeah, of course. Like they get it like so easily. So did your daughter as a little girl?

I wonder why other people weren't like you. You know, why do other people eat cows? Right. Dickens, did she ask that question? That's a question. I can't. It's been so long. I don't know. I don't remember. But what I will say that reminds me of something funny is that she would have she had one friend in particular who would taunt her with me and just wave it in her face and all of that.

And she would tell me about that and like, so rude. That girl is now vegan. Good for her. She always let girl that girl. She's like a daughter to me. She was she was always, you know, she's always at her house. And, know, you just I'm a believer you feed people really good food. And that's such a good way to convert people that, you know, now she's vegan. And I think she has a she has another friend that went vegan that just leaves her little girls that were like daughters to me that I would just feed and give them good food.

And then they came around, even the ones that were like a little, you know, not very nice about it sometimes. So you just never know what someone you know, someone can really change. And what about other members of your family, your husband? He yeah, he when we met, he was my one of my prerequisites was that would only be with someone vegan friendly. I was like, OK, I'm not going to be like it's OK if they're not vegan.

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they just had to be vegan friendly and really respectful. And he was from the beginning. On our first date, he was like, let's go somewhere with, you know, that has a vegan menu. And then he ate or he's like, let's order all the vegan stuff. And we just ate, he ate all vegan with me almost all the time. But then I was very like, I was a little bit, you know, okay, we're gonna have just plant these little seeds. Of course, feeding him great vegan food the whole time.

but then I would like, let's watch this documentary and let's watch that documentary. And then I had this hunch several years ago. I don't know how long it's been. I want to say maybe four years ago or five years ago, something like that. I was like, how would you feel about watching Earthlings? I'll watch it with you. And I had never once been like, had never seen Earthlings. I don't want to watch it. I was like, I can't watch horrible stuff like that. But I was like, I will watch. I'll take one for the team. And so.

I'm like, we're in La Jolla on a vacation sitting in the like in the main room. The ocean is going and we're like watching Earthlings. I'm just like, let me just say there is nothing better on a romantic vacation in La Jolla than watching Earthlings. That's it's just a classic. Yeah, it was so romantic. We had our kombucha and our glasses.

And we just, yeah, so I'm like, will he notice if I'm like closing my eyes for half of this, which I did, because I'm like, I can't watch this. But it's it is a good thing if you are willing and open to really just have it in your brain. So anyway, so we watched it. as I had hoped, he's like, that's it. I will say we did watch. I felt like they didn't cover dairy enough. So after that, I found this YouTube video called Dairy is Scary.

It's a five minute video. It is a masterpiece. That woman created a masterpiece. Dairy is scary. Five minutes. She covers everything. So we watch Earthlings and then we watch that. And then he was like, I'm done. He's like, I'm never eating this stuff again. And he never did. Good for him. Yeah. He never has. He's, know, one time he made a mistake and ate something, but never like that was just, he thought he was at a vegan place and it was vegetarian. And he was like, these eggs tastes really like eggs. It was in Austin. It was at Bolden Creek.

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And he's like, and then the friend he was with was like, their eggs. So he's like, OK. Now, what about the extended family? What happens in your family for Thanksgiving with relatives? Well, we live far from like most of our relatives, so we generally just always a good solution. I know. Not the worst. We generally invite people over and we just do Thanksgiving like a vegan Thanksgiving.

One time in the last recent, like within the last decade, I think only once have we gone somewhere where they've had turkey. And I was just like, I don't want to do this again. didn't like it. Not that I can't be around someone who's eating meat, but it was just it was very different to just have the big turkey and all of that. And it wasn't my favorite. OK, so you have the new book coming out called Food Joy. Is is that the your

major initiative now is trying to get this book out. Yeah, yeah. You know, I feel so lucky that you and then you so nice of you to have me on your podcast and and then Victoria Moran, who wrote the forward. my God. The forward she wrote it. It me in tears. It was so beautiful. She's a lovely woman. she's lovely. I just love her to bits. She's she offered to have me on her podcast as well. So that's on the radar as well. And and then just

however else, but yeah, I would love, you know, it's funny Glenn, because when I first was thinking about writing the book, I was like, I just want to write a book so that I don't have to go to my scrap paper. I'm done writing cookbooks, but I will just do a little book. Cause I, you know, I'm tired of like, what does this recipe and finding my scrap paper? I want to just have my book for myself. But then the more I started writing it and the more beautiful the book started to become. Now I'm like, I want as many people to have this book because I just feel like it's such a

I feel like we put so much joy into it and I just love the recipes so much and I'm like really excited to share them. So I do hope people will get it and enjoy it. Do you have a copy to hold up? I wish I did. it's almost ready. But I think by the time this airs, it'll probably be ready. It's a lovely book, a lot of beautiful photography. Who did the photography?

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Hannah Kaminsky is an angel. She's a genius. She is a genius. Yes. And I'm to tell her that, she's going to love to hear that because she is a very humble genius, but she is a genius and she did the design. She did all the photos and it is is a work of art. And I am so grateful that she and she's just lovely, delightful to work with. Highly recommend her. She even did my husband's website for his business. Like, she's amazing. She she is. I have met her along the way and she's remarkable.

yes, she is. I love that. And so is there a launch date for the book?

Not, not really. You know, the first five books I wrote, I self-published. The last three I did, I had a publisher. And this one, just was like, I want to do it my way. I just want to have this be a fun, joyful project. Hannah's doing all the hard stuff. I'm just going to create recipes and write and what I love to do. And so it's kind of just whenever, whenever it's ready. I don't have a publisher with a launch date like I used, like I have. So I believe it'll be ready around

the third week of April of like, so probably when this airs, it should be available. Well, the book is called Food Joy. And I'm sure when it's available, if you go to testchalice.com, right, that's your website, T-E-S-S-C-H-A-L-L-I-S.com, there will be a way there. You'll have a link there to purchase the book.

Yeah. And and check on Amazon for a book called Food Joy or look up the name test Chalice. How do you could I ask what area of the country you live in now? Of course, yeah, we're in Arizona. We're in Phoenix. In Phoenix. So do you find in Phoenix that the vegan movement is growing?

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It's pretty huge. Yeah. I'm in the, I'm in a Facebook group called happy Phoenix vegans. And we have like 8,000 and that's just in that little group. So it's huge here. I wish we had better restaurants. There's they're all, everybody wants the vegan junk food. So all the restaurants are junk food. Unfortunately, everyone wants the comfort food. I know when we go to California, there's all, you know, there's lots of great healthy vegan restaurants. Unfortunately here we, we don't have that.

But there is a big vegan movement here, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. My friend Silas Rao lives in Phoenix. I don't know if you know Silas. I don't think so. Yeah. You have to go to my YouTube channel and see my interviews with Silas. I will, for sure. Yeah. You have a great... I love your channel. Thank you.

Do you feel that your vegan diet is still evolving or do you think you're pretty much where you want to be? I'm a big believer in always evolving. Although I will say like that to my husband, he's like, how much healthier can we eat? Because we go, you know, of the best things about Phoenix are the farmers markets. They are phenomenal. We have such wonderful local organic growers here. And so, you know, we shop, we get, you know, really fresh local organic produce and

eat really healthy. you know, there's there's always room for improvement. Not a lot. I mean, we eat really well. Yeah, but you can always you can always tweak things, you know, and there's other areas of health you can always do, you know, more healthy things, exercise more, meditate, all of that good stuff. As you know, often when people go vegan at first, they worry about protein. I was

When I went vegetarian at 17, I didn't go vegan initially because I had an obese aunt and uncle who made me worry about my protein. shouldn't say they made me worry, but they caused me to worry. Yeah, totally. So do you concern yourself with protein at all or do you have favorite high protein foods like legumes or tofu?

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That's a great question, Glenn. And I know protein is all the rage right now of like, everything has to be high in protein. I will say when I first went vegan, I read Dr. McDougall's book and it helped me so much because it was like, it helped me to get rid of that fear of like, you're not gonna get enough protein or calcium. And so I think I mentioned before that I didn't do prenatals with my daughter. And I wanna mention this, cause I think this is really great. I did not do prenatals.

I was gonna do them and then I was like, you know what? Let's just check every two weeks because they're gonna check all my levels. And every two weeks, all my levels were really high. And there was one point, I think like six months in where my iron level was at the low end of normal. So it was still in the normal range, but it had dropped. And the midwives were like, my gosh, you need to start taking iron. And what I did instead was I started eating more legumes, iron protein and iron and greens.

And I came back two weeks later and they were like, my God, what supplements are you on? I was like, just ate better. Just cleaned up my diet, stopped eating as many chips, started eating more beans and greens. And so I've carried that through. I do eat a B12 nutritional yeast, but other than that, I don't really supplement. think that plants are truly amazing and they're so sufficient. And I don't really worry about protein, but I know there's that whole thing about like, as you're aging, you should be eating more protein. So I do try to eat.

beans every day. try to, you know, I love tofu and tempeh and beans and lentils. So I do try to include those at like lunch and dinner, but I don't do any. Like, I don't count anything necessarily. And I don't worry about all of the like complementing proteins because that's all been like debunked. Yeah. I never really concerned myself with protein, but I did read Brenda Davis's book about a year ago, Plant Powered Protein.

where she makes that point that as you get older, maybe you should pay a little attention to it. So now I probably eat more tempeh than I used to for that reason. Totally. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I'm right there with you, Glenn. That's exactly like, yeah, I'm like paying more attention. I'm not really feeling like I don't need it, but I'm like, you know, wanting to just keep that muscle mass. It doesn't hurt to just eat. And they're great foods anyway. They're you're high in fiber and all of the good things. All right.

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Well, I wish you great luck with food joy. hope everybody goes out there and gets a copy when it comes out, which may be when this around when this interview airs in a few. Yeah. Will you come back another time maybe and do a food demo for us? yeah, that sounds really great. Be happy to. Yeah. All right, Tess. Well, it's been nice speaking with you and getting to know you. You too,

I really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Take care. Thanks.