Hi, it’s Patrick here.
I’m one of the staff writers for HealthGetters and love working here. The mission is to bring you only the latest and most accurate health information possible.
It’s so refreshing when the owner, Justin, let’s you go dig deep for the truth and then he’s not afraid to actually publish it.
Because our other articles on Veganism (here are just 2 for you to view A B) are so well received, people have been asking:
What Do I Eat In A Day As A Vegan?
So, being the resident vegan, I’m going to share with you what I eat in a day as a vegan. This is VERY typical of my daily eating.
As a matter of fact, I don’t vary from this too much at all. I eat basically the same most days.
That may sound boring to a few people, but, it works rather well for me. The reason being is that like most people I find that I eat mostly the same 10 to 12 foods all the time. If you look at your current diet you too may find this to be the case.
I think as humans we do better with consistency in our diets and or times we wake up and go to bed.
So, let’s dive right in.
My Stats
Before we begin I think that it’s fair to tell you that I’m a male who weight trains seriously and weighs 202 pounds at 5 feet 6 ½.
I exercise 6 days per week with 3 of those days being weights and 3 being cardio.
I believe that you should keep your calories relatively high to keep your metabolism high and exercise hard enough to burn off the fat.
I’ve found over and over again that when I restrict my calories too low, I tend to lose as much or even more muscle than fat. That’s DEFINITELY not my goal, so I’ve found I would rather eat a little more and then have to work a little harder to burn off those calories than restrict my diet.
So here goes.
What I Eat In A Day As A Vegan
Upon arising
I have a glass of water and start making my tea.
I’ll typically have 1 cup of green or black tea each day. I make it and let it steep for 30 minutes so that it also cools a bit.
I then also drink Yerba Mate (a tea from South America). I drink that in a traditional (mate) hollowed out gourd and use a traditional straw with filter holes in the bottom called a Bombilla to drink and filter it.
The herb is the Yerba part and the gourd or cup from which you drink it is called the mate (pronounced mah – teh).
Ask anyone who knows me, I don’t go anywhere without my yerba mate, I even travel with it.
I typically drink around 8-10 glasses of water per day over and above any water used in food preparation or making shakes or smoothies etc.
Breakfast
Hers’ my black beans and rolled oats breakfast vegan recipe.
About an hour and a half after I wake up I’ll have breakfast which consists of these things.
1. I put 10 ounces of water into my Vitamix high speed blender.
2. Then I’ll add 2 and 1/2 cups of either cold black beans or cold lentils that I’ve prepared a day or two earlier.
3. I put in stevia and cocoa powder to taste. Usually 10 drops of stevia liquid (yours may vary) and one rounded tablespoon of cocoa.
4. I freshly grind 1 rounded tablespoon of flax seeds and add them in to the shake as well.
4. I put in 5 cubes of ice from a standard ice cube tray.
I then blend it on high until it’s nice and smooth. This generally takes about 1 minute or a little less.
I pour this over 1 cup of raw rolled oats and 2 cut up bananas or 1 cut up apple.
I eat this while also munching on 1oz or raw pumpkin seeds and 1oz or raw walnuts.
The only macro nutrient I count is protein. The protein content varies between the two versions (one with lentils and the other with black beans).
So, depending on whether I use black beans or lentils, this breakfast supplies me around 67 grams of protein for the lentil version and around 59 grams of protein with the black bean version.
The oats and beans/lentils together form a complete protein and complement each other’s amino acid profiles.
The raw walnuts and seeds (pumpkin and flax) add in their amino acid profiles which really help to round out the full amino acid profile so tat I can rest assured that none of the essential aminos are missing or even low.
The fats from the walnuts and seeds helps keep my blood sugar levels stable and help to provide the essential fatty acids my body needs for optimal health.
About 2 Hours Later
I will almost always have a snack about 1 and a ½ to 2 hours later of some citrus foods like oranges, grapefruit or tangerines. I’ll also generally throw in about an ounce of pistachios or mixed raw nuts.
I have not been able to find a source of raw pistachios yet. I’ve been told that they open during the mild roasting they put them through, so getting them raw may not be an option.
I find that these foods in combination don’t affect my blood sugar and actually stabilize it quite well.
I’ll eat either one orange, one grapefruit or 3 tangerines for my citrus serving.
Lunch
My lentils vegetables and rice vegan recipe.
I have lentils and black beans pre-cooked and in the refrigerator at all times.
I also have the vegetables and rice, or barley and yams prepared in advance.
The vegetables are a baked mixture of generally broccoli, onions, celery, mushrooms, red – yellow and orange bell peppers, zucchini and purple cabbage.
I put it all into a glass Pyrex pan and bake at 350 for an hour with water only, no oil, while covered.
I then keep this veggie mix in the refrigerator and portion it out each day.
So, If I had black beans for breakfast, I’ll do lentils for lunch or vice versa. I find that doing lentils all the time, even though they are a little higher in protein just gets old and my body likes the variety quite a bit better.
1. Put 2 and ½ cups of lentils or black beans into a bowl.
2. I next add about 2 cups of the veggie mix described above.
3. Next comes ½ cup of brown rice.
4. Then ½ cup of boiled yam pieces.
I stir it up, microwave it for 3 minutes until hot add seasonings, Siracha sauce, ketchup, barbeque sauce, yellow mustard or whatever I’m feeling like that day.
Then to top it off I have ½ of an avocado sliced over the top and then I dig in and enjoy.
This meal provides about 57 grams of protein with the lentil version which is the one I eat most often.
About An Hour Or Two Later
About an hour or two later I’ll start drinking my yerba mate. My first mate of the day will be 2 rounded tablespoons and fill the gourd or cup with hot water. Once that has been consumed, I’ll add one more tablespoon to refresh it and have another. Just sipping them all day long.
If I’m hungry I’ll have another piece of citrus. But on most days, it will be just the mate tea.
Dinner
Dinner can be varied, and I like it that way. No sense in being too boring all the time.
However, having consistency for breakfast, snacks and lunch gives me the mental freedom to excel at work. I don’t have to think about a lot of outside nonsense, it free’s up my mind to concentrate on the important issues.
I’ll give you my favorite dinner and you can give that a whirl. I’m sure you’ll like it too.
1. I have 2 scoops of a protein powder that I make for myself that has a vastly superior amino acid profile and supplies 24 grams of protein per scoop which is 48 grams total.
I’ve been in the nutrition business for many years, so I make my own. You can use the one you like the most.
Mine is simply brown rice protein mixed with soy protein and hemp protein. When you combine them in the right ratios you get a really superior protein that has nearly the same NUPS (Net Utilizable Protein Score) as whey protein.
It’s truly only off by just a tad. Then, because it’s not from animal sources and doesn’t cause as much inflammation, it’s actually a better overall protein.
2. I then have as much fruit as I want. I’ll generally have 2 apples, an orange, a cup of papaya, a cup of pineapple and a banana.
There might be 5 grams of protein in all that fruit, but I round it down to 4 grams.
So, the total of all that is 52 grams of protein.
That’s What I Eat In A Day As A Vegan
My total protein for the day is 176 grams.
For a 200-pound person who trains quite hard that’s not bad.
Yes, I eat that much fruit, and no I don’t get fat from it at all.
Getting fat from eating fruit is caloric dependent.
Sure, if you eat more calories than you use over a long period of time you’re going to get fat, period end of report.
However, if you consume a few more calories than your BMR requires but work your butt off in the gym to burn these off you will actually build muscle whilst losing fat, which is the holy grail of dieting.
Why Do I Eat This Amount Of Protein As A Vegan?
I know, there are a few people out there who will attempt to say I eat too much protein and there are those out there that will say I’m not eating enough.
I’ve experimented with my body and this amount, plus or minus a couple of grams is what produces the best results for me.
Yes, you can get enough protein to survive from nearly any whole food plant based vegan diet.
However, if you want to look and be super fit, you’re going to need more protein that just the bare minimum to survive.
I’ve found that for both men and women who want to be rather athletic all the way up to being amazing need around .8 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight unless your bodyfat level is over 25%.
If you’re over that, then you can reduce the protein a bit because you’re not feeding as much muscle per pound of body weight as someone under that level.
This also translates out to about 2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight when you’re under 25% body fat.
Sure, you can eat less, but not if you want to really look athletic or be a bodybuilder.
NOTICE I didn’t just say bodybuilder, I said athletic up to bodybuilder.
Ladies, there is no reason to freak out.
You’re NOT going to look like a bodybuilder no matter how much protein you eat unless you put in years of gut busting training and dieting.
So, don’t worry about that in the slightest.
But, by eating enough protein you will over time become much leaner and more toned than if you didn’t.
Ok, there you have it.
That’s what I eat in a day as a vegan.
Of course, you can vary this or eat anything you like.
This is just an example of what I eat.
Have a great day!
Sources
2. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0899900713004413
3. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2019.00919/full
4. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0899900704001005 5. https://journals.physiology.org/doi/abs/10.1152/jappl.1992.73.5.1986