The Right Way to Do a Vegan Diet/lifestyle

  • Category: Food
  • January 27, 2019

The popularity of the vegan diet/lifestyle is huge. What was once associated with a select few, is today a lifestyle adapted and practiced by millions of people, including heavyweights like celebrities, for a variety of health, ethical, and environmental reasons. This shows the global demand for a vegan diet/lifestyle is rising, with reports anticipating that plant-based foods will become the food trend and new organic.

Benefits of a vegan diet/lifestyle

Perhaps the driving force for its popularity is the benefits accrued from going vegan, which include:

● Nutritional value
● Purifies our minds and lifts our moods
● Reduces the risk of certain diseases, including heart disease
● Reduces the onset of migraine attacks
● Positive effect on weight loss as a result of fewer calories
● Improves athletic performance
● Better vision and less macular degeneration
● Balances hormones
● Enjoyment of a longer and healthier life

What it means to be vegan

A vegan or plant-based diet/lifestyle is a way of living that attempts to exclude all animal products such as meat, eggs, and dairy products.

There are different types and several variations of the vegan diet/lifestyle.

The focus, however, is on plant-based foods and beverages, eliminating all animal products and byproducts or foods involving animals in their processing mechanism.

So in place of meat, fish, dairy, or poultry, you have fruits, nuts, veggies, beans, and grains on your plate.

A vegan diet doesn’t automatically make it a low-fat or low-carb diet; it just cuts out the meat.

What to eat on a vegan diet/lifestyle

Ideally, a vegan diet/lifestyle involves plant-based foods and beverages so you can eat fruits, veggies, legumes, grains, nuts and seeds, natural sweeteners (no honey), tofu and tempeh, and plant-based oils.

You can substitute honey with maple syrup, or coconut sugar, but in moderation.

Add fermented foods like kimchi, seaweed, miso paste, nutritional yeast, and sauerkraut for vitamin intake.

There are some foods that may be potentially sneaky, coming across as vegan but they’re not. These include sugars, deep fried foods (like onion rings fried in animal fat), roasted salted peanuts,
food/drinks with red coloring, condiments, sauces, dressings, and certain breads, and juices.

Conclusion

With an understanding of what constitutes a balanced vegan diet/lifestyle, plus good planning, you can give your body all the nutrients it needs. A vegan diet offers no less than what a non-vegetarian diet does. All we need is to transform the way we live and eat.