High protein, low carb/fat foods for vegetarians and vegans
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plg999
Posts: 14 Member
I'm having a hard time finding vegetarian/vegan foods that are high in protein without also being high in carbs or fats. I'm trying to do a "recomposition" diet, meaning I want to get about 70 g of daily protein on a 1,300-1,400 cal diet, and I'm not seeing a way to do that without relying too much on protein powders. I'm specifically interested in suggestions for breakfasts and snacks - lunch and dinner are much easier in this regard.
Thanks!
Thanks!
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Replies
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Egg whites, Greek yogurt, tempeh, seitan, some premade veggie burgers or veggie ground…..
I do think your goals are unrealistic though.0 -
Check out this thread:
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10247171/carbs-and-fats-are-cheap-heres-a-guide-to-getting-your-proteins-worth-fiber-also
It links to a spreadsheet that lists many, many foods listed in order of protein efficiency - most protein for fewest calories. Yes, you'll have to scroll past the mostly meaty/fishy stuff near the top of the list, but there are plant foods there further down.
I was getting 80s/90s grams of protein when I first started losing weight, as a vegetarian, on 1400-1600 calories plus exercise, without protein powder or fake meat, so I think you should at least be able to get close to 70. I'm ovo-lacto, but I think I could do it purely plant-based, I just wouldn't enjoy my eating as much.
For clarity, I don't think there's anything bad or wrong about protein powder or fake meats, I just don't personally find them tasty/satisfying.
My other suggestion would be to take a look at the totality of what you're eating. Most people (especially omnis) tend to think of protein in terms of "one big protein per meal" ("what's for dinner?" "chicken"). That big protein in each meal is important for vegetarians, too, but on top of that, try to get at least a little protein from nearly everything you're eating. Those little bits add up, through the day.
There are vegetables with more protein than others (see that spreadsheet), even some fruits with a little protein. Some grains have more protein than others. Choose protein-rich snacks. For crunch in a salad, use small amounts of dry-roasted soybeans, or even seeds/nuts within caloric reason (you need some fats, after all). If you eat bread, find types with more rather than less protein. And so forth.
Also, use food amendments/condiments with some protein: Semi-defatted peanut or almond powder, nutritional yeast, miso, etc.
Go through your diary every day or few. Note foods that have relatively little protein for their calorie "cost". Unless they're really important to you for taste, satiation or other aspects of nutrition, reduce or eliminate those foods, replacing the calories with other foods (maybe from the spreadsheet) that you enjoy eating, that have a bit more protein.
Just keep reviewing like that, tweaking what you routinely eat, and I'm betting you can gradually get to the protein level you're targeting.
Side comment: Many vegetarian/vegan protein sources do have some carbs. Unless you're diabetic or insulin resistant, it's not essential to limit carbs for reasons other than calories or nutritional balance. Personally, I wouldn't even try to limit carbs explicitly. (I eat to a protein and fats minimum, plus target a minimum number of veg/fruit servings daily, within calorie goal.)
Some people do vegetarian/vegan keto, but I feel like that just piles complication on top of complication, so if it's optional (as it is for me), why do that? I literally don't care what my carb intake is, personally. I lost from class 1 obese to a healthy weight, with that routine, nearly 7 years ago, 6 of which has been maintaining a healthy weight.
70 grams of pure protein is roughly 280 calories. Yes, some carbs and fat will come with that. As a personal rule of thumb for evaluating foods when shopping, I figure a vegetarian ingredient with 10 or fewer calories (from all sources) per gram of protein is a good source, and any multi-ingredient dish (like a prepared/frozen food or meal, or home-cooked) is decent at 20-30 all-source calories per protein gram. With that rule of thumb - which is just my thing, not in any way official - it seems like you could get to or near 70g, trying to keep most meals closer to the 20-calories-per-gram line, and getting calorie-efficient sides or snacks closer to the 10-calories-per-gram target.
Side question: Recomposition is usually a thing done at weight maintenance calories. Are you quite petite? 1400 calories seems quite low, for an active woman, who's not small/older/sedentary before exercise. If losing weight, protein is still important. Even then, if you got a 1400 calorie goal from MFP, that's supposed to be based on a pre-exercise activity level, with the expectation that you'd eat back exercise calories when you exercise.
It also seems like 70g would be a protein goal for a quite-petite woman too (90-116 pounds or thereabouts?), so maybe I'm just not relating well to that size constraint. (I'm 5'5, about 127 pounds right now, age 66, targeting and usually exceeding a 100g protein goal, and maintenance calories in the low 2000s depending on exercise. I'm admittedly a mysteriously good li'l ol' calorie burner for my demographic, but of course that personal experience is what creates my cognitive biases.)
Wishing you success in reaching your nutritional, body comp, and calorie goals!2 -
Good luck! I eat vegetarian meals often and for a while I was almost entirely plant based and it was too difficult for me to do higher protein. I’m fine with higher carbs. Vegetarian and vegan diets just have more carbs in general.1 -
Side question: Recomposition is usually a thing done at weight maintenance calories. Are you quite petite? 1400 calories seems quite low, for an active woman, who's not small/older/sedentary before exercise. If losing weight, protein is still important. Even then, if you got a 1400 calorie goal from MFP, that's supposed to be based on a pre-exercise activity level, with the expectation that you'd eat back exercise calories when you exercise.
It also seems like 70g would be a protein goal for a quite-petite woman too (90-116 pounds or thereabouts?), so maybe I'm just not relating well to that size constraint. (I'm 5'5, about 127 pounds right now, age 66, targeting and usually exceeding a 100g protein goal, and maintenance calories in the low 2000s depending on exercise. I'm admittedly a mysteriously good li'l ol' calorie burner for my demographic, but of course that personal experience is what creates my cognitive biases.)
I'm 5'6" and currently 132 lbs. I did tell the goal setter thing that I'm trying to lose a few more pounds, so maybe I have some wiggle room to up it a bit, even before exercise bonuses. However, I am quite sedentary most of the day, as I work remotely from my computer and rarely leave the house during COVID/winter.
I'm pretty familiar with getting good protein as I did two pregnancies while almost vegan, but holy moly it's harder when trying to keep the calories down! Like you, I don't like to rely on protein supplements and prefer real food - we already use whole wheat everything and etc. I'm finding very few meals that hit that 20 g protein rule (same rule I've used, too) that don't also make MFP yell at me about fat or carbs.
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Side question: Recomposition is usually a thing done at weight maintenance calories. Are you quite petite? 1400 calories seems quite low, for an active woman, who's not small/older/sedentary before exercise. If losing weight, protein is still important. Even then, if you got a 1400 calorie goal from MFP, that's supposed to be based on a pre-exercise activity level, with the expectation that you'd eat back exercise calories when you exercise.
It also seems like 70g would be a protein goal for a quite-petite woman too (90-116 pounds or thereabouts?), so maybe I'm just not relating well to that size constraint. (I'm 5'5, about 127 pounds right now, age 66, targeting and usually exceeding a 100g protein goal, and maintenance calories in the low 2000s depending on exercise. I'm admittedly a mysteriously good li'l ol' calorie burner for my demographic, but of course that personal experience is what creates my cognitive biases.)
I'm 5'6" and currently 132 lbs. I did tell the goal setter thing that I'm trying to lose a few more pounds, so maybe I have some wiggle room to up it a bit, even before exercise bonuses. However, I am quite sedentary most of the day, as I work remotely from my computer and rarely leave the house during COVID/winter.
I'm pretty familiar with getting good protein as I did two pregnancies while almost vegan, but holy moly it's harder when trying to keep the calories down! Like you, I don't like to rely on protein supplements and prefer real food - we already use whole wheat everything and etc. I'm finding very few meals that hit that 20 g protein rule (same rule I've used, too) that don't also make MFP yell at me about fat or carbs.
Don't worry if MFP nags you about fat or carbs being over, if you're OK on protein and calories.
Have you tried the chickpea and legume (especially red lentil) pastas? They have around twice the protein of whole wheat. The red lentil especially has a similar texture to wheat pasta, neutral flavor. The edamame and black bean pastas have even more protein (up to 24g/serving, usually 190-ish calories), but are chewy. I don't like them as a general sub for wheat pasta, but do like them in pseudo-Asian dishes.
A few ideas:
Edamame fettuccine, with a sauce made by mixing peanut butter powder/rice vinegar/soy sauce (or chile sauce) plus seasonings of choice, with stir-fried calorie-efficient protein-containing veggies (broccoli, say) is going to run around 350 calories, bring about 40g protein. Maybe peanut butter powder doesn't seem like real food to you, but it works for me.
Another thing I like that's quick is a fold-over sandwich on a small Ezekiel tortilla, with mustard, thin-sliced onion, some calorie-efficient cheese (vegetarian, in my case), thin-sliced smoked tofu, heated (microwave is quick), then add raw sauerkraut. Also about 350 calories in my usual quantities, 26g protein.
I've made mac'n'cheese using red lentil pasta, roasted/mashed Winter squash, cauliflower, part-skim ricotta cheese, some apple smoked gouda cheese (came to under half an ounce per serving, but flavorful), white beans, a little egg (4 in the whole 9x13" dish), tiny sprinkle of grated hard cheese on top, flavored with fresh sage. Cut as 18 servings (smaller pieces because it was for a potluck, but it was fairly thick), it came to 199 calories for 13.8g protein.
For me, at home, I'd go simpler, maybe just the pasta, squash, mix in some plain Greek yogurt or ricotta with the squash, little hard cheese on top, maybe some other reasonable cheese, beans if they're handy, soft tofu mixed with the squash or small-cubed firm tofu tossed in if I want extra protein, which should get pretty good numbers, too, for a reasonable serving.
I think most of that could work vegan-ized, too, though the party-recipe mac'n'cheese would need the tofu to sub for all the cheeses, maybe some nutritional yeast for flavor?
Even my routine oatmeal breakfast with coffee/frothed skim milk (x2) on the side comes in at around 16 calories per protein gram, though my portion sizes puts it at a whopping 619 calories (38g protein). (Most people would be satisfied with less, I think, but I'm a volume eater, and have maintenance calories to cover it.) The protein comes mainly from plain Greek yogurt (112g for 66 calories and 12g protein) and 5.5oz of hot skim milk in each cup of coffee (59 calories, 5.9g protein, per each). There's also berries, flax and hemp seed, walnuts, cinnamon and of course oatmeal. I don't see how to veganize that one without a complete overhaul, though.
Another breakfast: Peanut butter on an Ezekiel pita, kefir, skim milk in coffee, is around 366 calories for 21.4g protein, so about 17 calories per protein gram. Also not vegan, though.
Just some examples/thoughts that work for me, maybe not for you, though.
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OK, afterthoughts (sorry, I'm freakin' wordy):
At your size, being (guessing, don't recall if you said) younger than I am, I'm thinking you should be able to lose on more calories than 1300-1400, though I'm not sure, of course.
(As an aside, I'm pretty sedentary myself, outside of intentional exercise, especially in Winter (I'm retired, sedentary hobbies). Sedentary on MFP usually includes something like 3000-5000 steps or equivalent other movement, which many people will get just from household activities. I've been averaging around 3500 steps per day most weeks lately.)
I'm assuming you're lifting (or doing a bodyweight strength program), since recomp is your goal.
You can log that on top of your base MFP calorie goal, if that base goal is sedentary, though they won't add much if accurate. (The MFP exercise database is actually one of the better ways to estimate strength training calories, though it can be pretty whacky for some other things. Heart rate monitor will tend to get it wrong, though IMU some of the better fitness trackers - among the type that know what exercise type you're doing - will now estimate strength training using research-based estimates similar to the MFP method, rather than just using heart rate.)
If you can find time and a form of cardio you enjoy, you can add calories to your eating that way, too. It's a myth that reasonable cardio meaningfully limits muscle gain. Just avoid accumulating too much fatigue (keep the cardio manageable, just a small challenge), do the cardio after lifting if done on the same day, and avoid doing cardio forms (as commonly defined) that truly stress the same muscle groups as your lifting, on a schedule that interrupts your needful recovery of those muscles. (As a rower, I usually avoid leg strength work in season, because I can't recover sensibly from it while rowing or cycling nearly daily, and rowing rather than strength/mass is my priority.)
On top of that, there are lots of ways you can increase your daily life activity, some of which will not take extra time in your day. It's small potatoes, and not anything you can log and eat back, but can have a meaningful impact on your long-term loss rate. There's a thread about that here:
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10610953/neat-improvement-strategies-to-improve-weight-loss/p1
There are lots of ideas from lots of people in that thread. Some won't apply or be realistic for you, but maybe some will.
I'm quite confident, from personal experience, that even a very small calorie deficit will result in gradual loss. I'd let my weight creep up over about 4 years of maintenance, all still in the normal BMI range and same clothing size, but I decided to lose those 10-15 vanity pounds. I just wasn't feeling any enthusiasm for a big calorie deficit.
Normally, in maintenance, I eat most days at about 100-150 or so calories below actual maintenance, and use that as a cushion to indulge occasionally. To lose those few pounds, I just reduced the frequency/magnitude of those indulgences, and the 10-15 pounds crept off again, over a period of a year or a bit more. It was practically painless.
Looking back, calculating my average weight loss rate, it was maybe a pound a month, so about that 100-150 calories daily deficit (and there weren't zero indulgent days during that time, either, just many fewer that were over maintenance calories). As a bonus, I didn't perceive any negative impact on exercise performance (and I do have metrics for my rowing).
Best wishes!1
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