Look ma, no meat!

I did it again… but this time instead of eliminating animal products I prioritized fruits and vegetables. What does it mean to eat vegan or vegetarian? Privilege. I can find, purchase, prepare, and consume hearty vegetables and supplement my diet with vitamins. I didn’t eat rice and beans for a week. I spent my time, effort, and money to micromanage my diet for 6 days – two of which were vegan days.

I did not plan to eat ‘vegan’ per se, because my partner wanted to try out the ‘fruit diet’ for a week. Fruits happen to be vegan! I decided that I wanted to balance my diet and prioritize vegetables instead of fruit. Because veggies! Because why not! Because macros and balance!

Here are a few of my takeaways from this round of vegan/vegetarian eating (see my previous challenge here: http://rachelbarnardvegan.blogspot.com/)

• Planning became essential
  • Going out and picking the fruits and vegetables was essential
  • Food prep took quite a bit of time measuring, chopping, etc. Weighing foods takes so much time!
  • I created a spreadsheet with all the veggies, nuts, and fruit I bought with 1oz serving sizes and then puzzled out how to attain a good balance of fat, sugar, carb, and protein from there
  • Basic google research told me that I should be eating around 1,367 calories per day of which 40% would be protein (137g), 30% would be carbohydrates (103g), and 30% would be fats (46g). No mention of sugar… hm. I attempted to cap my sugar intake at 25g (hahaha that didn’t happen. Did you know that fruits have quite a bit of sugar? Did you know that vegetables have carbs?
• Fresh foods take up a lot of space in the fridge (yeah, I know canned and frozen foods exist, but again privilege)
• You can stock certain products to add balance and protein to your diet.
  • Hemp seeds/hearts are high in protein and fat and very low in sugar
  • Chia seeds have no sugar
  • Chlorella is gross and will overpower your smoothie but it is pure protein
  • Flax milk seems to be the highest of the non-dairy milks in protein with very little carbs and no sugar that I could find at our local Safeway. I don’t recommend drinking it plain but it makes a great addition to smoothies and coffee. It even tastes creamy
  • Nutritional yeast is a great protein additive for topping salads, mixing into smoothies, and hiding in a stir fry but it will also start to overpower the flavor of your food and to me it doesn’t taste at all like cheese
  • Coconut milk is a great fat and delicious for making chia pudding
• You can eat a great volume of vegetables without consuming that many calories (not true for all vegetables). Sometimes my salads were too big for my appetite and they were less than 400 calories.
• You don’t need to eat as many nuts as you think… if you eat them intentionally they will satisfy you and I quite like the taste of all the nuts I got (the order of my favorites that I ate would be cashews, walnuts, almonds, pecans)
• When I cut out processed foods and sugars I didn’t experience my daily crazy hungry/bored eating/food fascination that seems to occur daily between 2pm-5pm
• I felt more satisfied and full from my snacks/meals even though I was consuming less calories overall
• My bowel movements changed, becoming less frequent (only once daily) and more dense and very green! The same green as if I’d consumed that black cherry Icee at the movies
• After two days I came to the conclusion that a vegetarian is simply a vegan who eats cheese. Cheese is delicious.
• Did I miss meat? No, I was too busy enjoying delicious fruits and veggies.

Here is my calorie consumption chart for the week (I didn’t weigh my food for Saturday)

Pictured below are a few meals I ate:

Left: Portabello mushroom with cheese and egg on a bed of spinach surrounded by strawberries

Middle: Watermelon salad with feta, tomatoes, cucumbers, and lemon next to lemon sauteed asparagus (can you still call it a saute if you saute in water?)

Right: a picnic we brought to the park -to eat in our car- apples, watermelon, plums, Oreo, feta, mixed nuts, dried and salted beans

More detailed breakdown of consumption for days 1-5:

Day 1:

Day 2:

Day 3:

Day 4:

Day 5: