Any advice on swapping out foods for alternative healthy options?

Btw one trick I used early on- and still do sometimes- is to take Greek yogurt and whip it with sugar free pudding and chill. It makes a lovely mousse textured low calorie dessert.

One lady here used to add a can of puréed pumpkin and pie spice, and some sugar free syrup to her vanilla “pudding”. Wonderful. Tastes just like a crustless pumpkin pie without the baking.

Lemon is awesome with a small dollop of canned whipped cream, and chocolate likewise. Tastes like a restaurants style mousse.

hpetty65 wrote: »

Oh my goodness, thank so much, that is great advice. I had no idea it was ok to eat a whole tub of cottage cheese! I'll definitely make a note of all your other suggestions - and love whipping some greek yoghurt into things to bling it up. Got loads of inspiration now 😊

It's OK to eat anything that fits in your calorie goal, if the key objective is managing body weight. But nutrition is important for health, of course. So if health is also a priority (as it should be ), I'd modify that to saying it's OK to eat anything that fits in your calorie goal, and contributes effectively to your nutritional goals.

Let's get one thing out of the way: I hope you know that you don't need to be exact every single day on all of the macros. Pretty close on average over a few days to a week should be just fine. Protein and fats are essential nutrients (in that our body can't manufacture some of their essential components out of anything else). Carbs aren't essential in that sense. For me, that makes me consider protein and fats goals the more important ones to treat as minimums.

I'm ovo-lacto vegetarian, and have been for 50 years now.

If you want to stick with vegetarian protein sources (or mostly those), it should be doable, with a bit of attention, IMO. When I was losing weight (at age 59-60, BTW), so at reduced calories, I was hitting a minimum of 80-90g most days, and sometimes more. Now, on maintenance calories, I shoot for a minimum of 100g, and usually exceed it.

I do eat a lot of dairy foods: Plain nonfat Greek yogurt, cottage cheese, skim milk, other cheeses (calorie-efficient ones in greater amounts, richer ones in smaller amounts). I don't eat a lot of eggs, but do eat some. Year round, when not away from home, I'm sure it averages fewer than a dozen a month, probably lots fewer. (I eat more eggs when traveling because it's harder to get good veggie protein in restaurants otherwise.)

Beyond that, some of my core protein sources that are complete proteins (in essential amino acids, EAAs) are traditional soy foods (tofu, tempeh, occasionally natto, etc.). I know many people don't like the texture of tofu. If that's you, I'd point out that it can be blended into many things unnoticeably to amp up the protein, because it's very neutral tasting.

It's incomplete, but another good source is seitan (it's gluten, so that won't work if you're sensitive). I eat a lot of legumes, including peanut butter. I eat other nuts and seeds regularly in small amounts, but all of those are more a fat source than a protein source. (Fats are the macro I need to pay attention to, or I often wouldn't get enough.)

Quinoa is also a complete protein, though I don't often eat it (not sure why, honestly).

Other sources I like (that are incomplete so need complementing somewhere along the line to get all the necessary EAAs):

* Red lentil pasta (the closest taste/texture to wheat pasta, but nearly double the protein),
* Edamame or black bean pasta in skinny shapes (chewier than wheat pasta, but I like it in pseudo-Asian preparations, such as with stir-fried (or stir-steamed) veg),
* Peanut butter powder (partially defatted), which is good for making peanut sauce to use on veggies, and the chocolate peanut butter powder is tasty mixed with plain yogurt and frozen mixed berries (still frozen, or thawed fully/partly), plus I put it in my oatmeal,
* Nutritional yeast, which I put in my cottage cheese or mix into bean soups or the like.

When I first started trying to get enough protein on reduced calories, what I did was review my diary every few days, looking for foods that had relatively many calories, but little to no protein. I'd then consider whether I could reduce those foods (in portion size or frequency) to make calorie room for other foods I enjoy that had at least a bit more protein. Repeating that process over time, I gradually tweaked my routine eating habits to the point where I was getting adequate protein regularly without having to micromanage it daily.

As @springlering62 said upthread, it's worth even including some smaller protein sources alongside the one or two "big proteins" in each meal. They add up.

One thing that was helpful to me in remodeling my habits was this thread:

https://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 ordered by most protein for fewest calories. Many of the things at the top are meaty/fishy, but you can find plant foods further down the list. Many of those are incomplete (in EAAs), but eating a variety of sources regularly, and relying on traditional complementary combinations (like beans and rice, or beans and corn for example) can mitigate that to some extent.

Like Spring said, I'm also a widow, but I've had a lot of time in that status: I was widowed at 42, in 1998. It's excellent that you're finding your way past some of the immediate (but not so productive) forms of grieving, and finding a new path toward thriving. Please give yourself some time and grace to fully find that new path; I know you'll succeed if you keep working at it when emotional bandwidth allows.

I'm cheering for you to succeed, too: The results are worth the effort, in so many ways.

Apologies for the long ramble! If you have any specific questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

Best wishes!

I love tofu. My husband kicks and screams at the mere sight of the package in the fridge.

Invest a few bucks in a tofu press. It’s well worth it. I also used it to press some homemade paneer and it worked great!

Tempeh.
I'm an omnivore and I still like the taste of tempeh. Its made out of soybeans which are the highest protein bean.