respects you take on more nutrients
than “normal” but don’t get me wrong,
you can still eat a bad vegan diet.
Natural wholefoods, and unprocessed as
possible is always best.
One health fear of switching to
a vegan diet is lack of protein.
What would you say to a client
with this concern?
Where do the animals you eat get their
protein from? Plants.
Protein is made up of amino acids,
and those amino acids are as readily
available in plants as they are in animals
but with varying levels, so if you eat a
diverse diet you’ll eat more than enough
protein along with a large proportion of
other nutrients. Animal sources just have
a denser proportion of amino acids to
other nutrients.
The western world has also gone
protein crazy, no one is ever found to be
protein deficient yet we place so much
importance on it, we just don’t need as
much as we think we do, but we do need
more of the other 24 or more essential
vitamins and minerals for optimal health.
How has learning about the
effects of different foods on the
body altered your mindset?
It’s made a huge difference, everyone
who follows any diet, animal or plant-
based, will all agree on one thing — the
more plants you have in your diet, the
greater the health benefits.
Can you tell us what some of your
favourite meals are? Are there
any foods that you like to include
on a daily basis?
I love to start the day with a smoothie
jam packed with nutrients which may
include some of the following: spinach,
kale, berries, banana, orange, red
peppers, avocado, pumpkin, hemp, chia
seeds, maca, baobab, cacao or plant
protein powder. This ensures I’m packed
to the rafters with nutrients from the off. I
do eat nutritional yeast flakes most days
as it is fortified with vitamin B12, and this
is a potential area of deficiency amongst
vegans, over the long term. Other than
that I ensure I eat a diverse range of
foods each day, usually something that
includes grains, beans, nuts/seeds,
vegetables and different herbs and
spices.
I do love avocado especially mashed
on rye toast, oh and dark chocolate!
What advice would you give to
a plant-based foodie trying to
better their nutrition, lose weight
or build muscle?
Well they are three very different
goals and require three very different
approaches:
Improve Nutrition: eat a diverse range
of foods, don’t eat today what you ate
yesterday, and eat more plants.Lose Weight: eat less energy than you
are expending, try not to combine high
fat, high sugar foods at meal times, and
eat more plants!
Build Muscle: try and aim for
between 1.5-2g of protein per kg of
bodyweight per day, train hard, heavy
and consistently and then rest hard and
consistently, your rest days are when you
build muscle, and eat more plants.