Vegans don’t eat any animal products. That means no meat, dairy, eggs, or honey, but also a surprisingly long list of hidden ingredients tucked into everyday foods like bread, candy, wine, and white sugar. The obvious exclusions are straightforward, but the less obvious ones are where most people get tripped up.
Meat, Poultry, Fish, and Seafood
All animal flesh is off the table. This includes beef, pork, lamb, veal, chicken, turkey, duck, and game meats like venison or bison. Seafood is excluded too: fish, prawns, crab, lobster, mussels, oysters, scallops, and clams. There’s no gray area here for veganism the way there is for some pescatarian or flexitarian diets. If it came from an animal, it’s excluded.
Dairy Products and Their Derivatives
Milk, cheese, butter, yogurt, cream, and ice cream are all non-vegan. But dairy also hides in processed foods under names most people wouldn’t recognize. The Cleveland Clinic flags these milk-derived ingredients commonly found on labels: casein, caseinates, whey, lactalbumin, lactoglobulin, lactose, curds, dry milk solids, and nonfat dry milk. These show up in everything from protein bars to salad dressings to chips.
If a product contains any of these, the FDA requires the label to include a “Contains: milk” statement. That’s the fastest way to check rather than scanning every ingredient individually.
Eggs and Egg-Based Ingredients
Whole eggs are obvious, but egg derivatives appear in baked goods, pasta, mayonnaise, some sauces, and many processed foods. Albumin (the protein in egg whites) is used as a binding or clarifying agent in foods you wouldn’t expect, including some wines. As with dairy, look for a “Contains: egg” statement on the label.
Honey and Other Insect Products
Honey is produced by bees, so vegans avoid it along with beeswax, royal jelly, and bee pollen. These appear in some cereals, granola bars, lip balms, and cosmetics. Common vegan alternatives include maple syrup, agave nectar, and date syrup.
Gelatin
Gelatin is made by boiling animal bones, skin, and connective tissue. It gives gummy candies, marshmallows, and Jell-O their texture, but it also shows up in frosted cereals, yogurts, gel capsule supplements, and some frosting. Plant-based alternatives like agar (from seaweed) and pectin (from fruit) serve the same purpose, and many brands now use them instead.
Red Dye From Insects
Carmine, also listed as cochineal extract or E120, is a red pigment made from crushed cochineal insects. The FDA requires it to be labeled by its common name, so you’ll see “carmine” or “cochineal extract” in the ingredients. It’s used in red and pink foods like certain yogurts, candies, juices, and cosmetics. Look for products colored with beet juice or paprika extract instead.
White Sugar and Bone Char
This one surprises most people. A significant portion of refined cane sugar in the U.S. is filtered through bone char, which is charred cattle bones used to give sugar its white color. Brown sugar, confectioner’s sugar, and any product made from that same refined sugar are affected too.
The tricky part: supermarket store-brand sugar is sourced from multiple refineries, making it impossible to know whether bone char was involved. Beet sugar is always bone-char free. Turbinado sugar, raw sugar, and evaporated cane juice also skip the process. If a bag of sugar says “organic” or “100% beet sugar,” it wasn’t filtered with bone char.
Bread and Baked Goods
Many commercial breads contain dairy or eggs, but there’s another hidden ingredient to watch for: L-cysteine, a dough conditioner used to improve texture in mass-produced bread and bagels. It’s traditionally extracted from duck and goose feathers, human hair, or swine bristles by boiling them in acid. A plant-based version made through fermentation exists, but labels rarely specify the source. Artisan and organic breads are less likely to contain it.
Wine, Beer, and Other Alcohol
Many wines and some beers are filtered using animal-derived fining agents that never appear on the label. Isinglass, made from fish bladders, is commonly used to clarify white wines, rosés, ciders, and light reds. It’s especially favored by Pinot Noir winemakers for its gentle effect on aroma. Gelatin and egg whites serve the same purpose in other wines.
Because alcohol labels aren’t required to list processing aids, there’s no way to tell from the bottle. Apps like Barnivore maintain databases of vegan-verified wines and beers, which is the most reliable way to check.
Vitamins and Fortified Foods
Vitamin D3, added to many cereals, plant milks, and supplements, is typically derived from lanolin, a waxy substance found in sheep’s wool. A vegan version sourced from lichen exists and is becoming more common. Lichen-derived D3 actually has higher bioavailability, with absorption rates three to four times greater than the animal-sourced version. Check supplement labels for “vegan D3” or “lichen-sourced” to be sure.
Omega-3 supplements are another common issue. Most fish oil capsules are obviously non-vegan, but even the gel capsules themselves are often made from gelatin. Algae-based omega-3 supplements are the vegan alternative, since fish get their omega-3s from algae in the first place.
Natural Flavors and Hidden Additives
The FDA defines “natural flavors” as chemical compounds extracted from plants, animals, or their products. That definition is broad enough to include flavors derived from meat, dairy, or seafood, and manufacturers aren’t required to specify which. A “natural flavor” in a bag of chips could come from a plant or from an animal, and the label won’t tell you. Contacting the manufacturer directly or looking for a “certified vegan” logo are the most reliable workarounds.
Confectioner’s glaze (also called shellac) is another one. It’s a resin secreted by lac insects and used to give a shiny coating to candies, pharmaceutical pills, and some fresh fruit. You’ll find it listed as “confectioner’s glaze,” “resinous glaze,” or simply “shellac.”
Reading Labels Effectively
The “Contains” statement required by the FDA is your best shortcut for catching dairy and eggs. It must list all major allergens, including milk, eggs, and fish, even when they appear under obscure ingredient names. A “may contain” or “produced in a facility that processes” warning is different. That’s a voluntary, precautionary label about potential cross-contamination during manufacturing, not an actual ingredient. Most vegans don’t consider cross-contamination a concern for ethical purposes, though people with severe allergies do.
For everything the allergen label doesn’t catch, like bone char in sugar, L-cysteine in bread, or isinglass in wine, a “certified vegan” logo from organizations like Vegan Action or the Vegan Society is the most reliable signal. Short of that, ingredient lists and manufacturer websites are your next best tools.