No Whey! Plant-Based Protein

 

Photo by Jocelyn Morales on Unsplash

 

With the increasing availability of different protein blends, plant-based, high-protein alternatives and vegan protein bars, we are starting to see the formation of a new type of “healthy” lifestyle where a blend of lifting heavy weights and necking copious amounts of protein powder seem to equate to the ideal fitness person. 

But is this stuff actually good for us? And do we really need any of it? And why does there seem to be such a stigma attached to protein intakes for idealistic fitness, especially in a plant-based diet?

Talking to three inspiring and influential women who are running their own plant-based social media platforms, I discuss each of their individual plant-based journeys, the difficulties they have encountered, why they decided to share their stories with others and any experiences they have had with finding ways to get their protein intake whilst following a plant-based diet. 

Protein is an essential part of our diets and is used by our bodies for building muscle, cartilage, bones, skin and so on. It also aids our bodies in maintaining homeostasis and keeping us fuller for longer. But with every social media platform pushing protein supplements as an essential part of a “healthy” lifestyle and promising weight loss or a guaranteed six-pack in two months, it can be difficult to know what protein really is as a food source, how much of it you need and whether these protein supplements really are the key ingredient to a fit and healthy lifestyle. With so much misunderstanding surrounding protein intakes, especially for plant-based diets, based on misleading information constantly pushed on social media, it’s not clearly understood how you can get enough protein in a plant-based diet and where to get it from. 

The British Nutrition foundation states that the Reference Nutrient Intake (RNI) for protein is 0.75g of protein per kg of body weight per day. But what does this actually look like in real food terms? The foundation also states that common sources of protein in a British diet are meat, cheese, eggs, fish, cereals and lentils and pulses. So what does this mean for a plant-based diet? 

 

 

Data for this table sourced from: British Nutrition Food 

 

If you’re wanting to follow a sustainable, plant-based diet, it can be difficult to know where to get your protein from. Plant-based foods that are high in protein include tofu, lentils, beans, seitan and green peas and oats alongside many other whole foods which can be found in your local supermarket or zero-waste shop (see below). But there are also other sources of plant-based protein out there, including protein supplements, meat alternatives and nut butters.  

 

When it comes to fitness, health, veganism and sustainability, it can sometimes feel like these different lifestyle aspects are completely out of sync with one another. This seems to be particularly true in the case of getting sufficient protein from a plant- based diet in a sustainable manner in order to have a healthy lifestyle and achieve fitness goals. 

@emilysvegandiary, @plantbasedpiggie and @graceysfitness are three young and inspiring women who are paving the way for the plant- based movement by providing sustainable food, fitness, beauty and fashion inspo and recommendations on their own social media platforms. Speaking to these 3 women about their plant-based diets, and about whether being sustainable can be complementary to having a healthy lifestyle, the complexities of navigating these issues come to light. Through their own experiences and difficulties with plant-based protein and food and fitness in general, these women have accumulated great recommendations, top tips and advice which they have shared in our discussions. 

When asking these women what their top tips would be for anyone starting out on their own plant-based journey, one of the main messages that was put across by all three women was that there is no expectation for things to happen overnight. Rather, that veganism, and sustainability in general, is something that takes time to work towards and can be progressively implemented. 

@emilysvegandiary

Emily is a student at The University of Liverpool, whilst also running her own Instagram platform and Youtube channel, creating sustainable food, beauty and slow fashion content. Working with brands such as @myvegan and @thecollectiveuk, she provides inspiration, advice and entertainment for her following of 8K people. After already being a veggie previously, she started following a plant-based diet over 5 years ago after watching documentaries on the issues associated with animal exploitation in the meat and dairy industries. With a full plant-based diet being just something to try out and never an initial goal, she ended up finding herself sticking with it over the long term and sees herself being vegan indefinitely. 

“There is a dangerous misconception in the link between veganism and health,” Emily points out, as the word “diet” is used when describing plant-based lifestyles. This can potentially lead to misunderstandings, as vegan food products can be misconstrued as ‘healthy’ alternatives just because of their vegan labelling, when in actual fact there are lots of processed, sugary and unhealthy vegan foods out there, as is the case with dairy meat-based food products. 

Rather than trying to completely change her diet as a vegan, Emily considers her meals in terms of what she would normally eat if she was not a vegan, making the appropriate swaps as and when needed in order to make the meals plant-based. Planning out her meals at the beginning of the week, referring to her own Instagram account and similar ones for inspiration, allows her to buy the right ingredients. When out and about, Emily will also take notes on her phone whenever she comes across an idea for a meal or recipe to try. 

When creating posts for her instagram platform, Emily tries to keep her posts as normal and honest as possible to make them accessible to all her followers. Starting her own plant-based journey by following many visually pleasing and complex instagram accounts, she knows first-hand the benefits of accounts that are an honest and fair account of the lifestyles and diets of real people, rather than the idealised and unattainable diets presented by some accounts. 

As a vegan, you are made more aware of your protein intake, so you are more likely to have sufficient amounts, explains Emily. She then goes on to discuss how protein can be hidden in lots of things that you wouldn’t realise, so there are many different ways that you can add lots of little bits of protein into your meals. 

Giving her recommendations to anyone who is looking to adopt more sustainable habits into their daily lives, Emily suggests using local refill stores and trying to be less wasteful in general. She also advocates focusing on slow fashion as a way to become more sustainable in everyday life. 

Source: @emilysvegandiary 

@plantbasedpiggie

Starting her own plant-based social media platform when first going plant-based after being a veggie since the age of 5, as a way to find inspiration for meals and share what she was eating, Laura has now built up a following of over 13K people due to her creative Instagram posts and guides. “It’s all very much a journey for a lot of people,” Laura explains when discussing going plant-based, “it’s not a decision you make one day and then have implemented all the changes the next day.” With that being said, Laura has never looked back and says that she wished she had done it sooner. 

With both her parents being vegetarian since the eighties, Laura has always felt comfortable in the vegetarian space. However, after becoming more aware of the issues associated with the dairy and egg industries and acknowledging the growing availability of plant-based alternatives, she began researching veganism and, after deciding that it didn’t feel right eating eggs and dairy, made the switch to a plant-based diet. Laura recalls how she initially found the time-consuming nature of checking the labels of food products to ensure that they were vegan to be one of the main struggles of going plant-based. However, she found that this got a lot easier over time. 

Laura explains how it is natural to go through an adjustment period when making alterations to your diet, but acknowledges that she is in the privileged position where being vegan is very much an accessible lifestyle for her. This is both due to having a full time job that provides her with the income to buy vegan meat-alternative products and living in a city that has many vegan options. 

Laura explains how sustainability and veganism can often go hand in hand, but not always. Speaking from her own experience, Laura found herself being more eco-conscious after turning vegan, not just in terms of food, but also in a holistic lifestyle way, describing it as, “a bit of a wake up call.” 

Depending on her energy levels and what she feels like on the day, Laura will keep her meals varied without having to plan them way in advance. Sometimes wanting vegan comfort food, such as cashew mac & cheese, trying out a new recipe, or receiving PR products that she will try to incorporate into a meal, there are lots of different factors that go into her meal choices. Laura has also found that she cooks a lot more since going vegan and will try to use up what she has in, rather than wasting food, using accounts such as @nadinesnutsandbeans for inspiration. 

Before going plant-based, Laura recalls how she didn’t really have to think much about her protein intake, as she was consuming cheese and eggs, which are known to be good sources of protein. After she went vegan, a friend recommended adding the odd protein shake or extra source of protein into her diet, as it doesn’t hurt to do so. While she was previously skeptical about protein baking, Laura is now a brand ambassador for @myvegan and believes that if it tastes good and is good for you, then you might as well add it into your baked goods. 

For finding plant-based foods with a high protein content, Laura recommends using tofu, as it is not as processed as other forms of protein. It can also be very versatile - you can use it to make sweet chilli tofu, scrambled tofu, teriyaki tofu, and tempeh, among other things! Laura also lists some other sources of protein including chia seeds, nuts, beans, nutritional yeast, chickpeas and fake meat alternatives. 

With the amount of options growing and huge businesses beginning to “pave the way” for more sustainable and plant-based diets, Laura can see many more people going vegan in the future. 

 

 

Source: @plantbasedpiggie 

@graceysfitness

 Grace is a vegan fitness and lifestyle vlogger, with a following of over 12k people. Working with brands such as @aybl and @myvitamins, she creates fitness and plant- based content for her instagram social media platform. Whilst working full time for a PR agency, Grace is also currently working in a partnership with @Origym_COE to become a qualified personal trainer alongside running her social media page. 

Following a knee injury four years ago, Grace began to incorporate fitness into her life, as she was determined to get her legs back to where they were before. “If you really set your mind on something, you will find a way to do it,” says Grace as she explains how she went from not really being able to do anything more than walking to weight training and running, with a primary focus on weight lifting. Grace took her physio and recovery very seriously and recalls spending a lot of time going to the gym, and learning about the process of how our bodies actually build muscle. As a result of her determination and hard work, Grace’s knee healed really well and for the past couple of years Grace has mainly focused on weight lifting as a core part of her fitness lifestyle. 

Speaking about her plant-based diet, Grace discusses how she was a pescatarian for a couple of years, before deciding to go without eggs and fish and become fully vegan. When explaining why she made this decision, Grace says: “I don’t think eating meat is necessarily bad for you, but in terms of the environment it’s really the only choice if you want to eat sustainably.” Grace then goes on to disclose how, no matter how hard you try to find sustainable, locally sourced meat sources, you are still supporting the demand for meat so it all filters in. 

Considering the link between veganism and fitness, and whether it is easy to be healthy when following a plant-based diet, Grace points out that it very much depends on the person. It is very easy to be a vegan and not be healthy, as there is a lot of vegan junk food out there, which can be a trap that a lot of people fall into resulting in them becoming malnourished. From her own experience, Grace finds it easier to make healthy choices as she makes most of her own meals, and will try to incorporate lots of veggies into most of her dishes.

As part of her weight lifting, Grace has a coach that will see her through her building and cutting phases. As a vegan, Grace’s coach won’t set her macro goals any lower than the other girls they train just because she is on a plant-based diet. Even before going vegan, protein was always something that Grace considered when deciding what to cook as at any point in life when she was in a building phase. Because she wanted to build muscle, adding more protein into her diet was a “no brainer.” Grace finds that she is not thinking about it any differently now compared to when she was eating meat, but rather just finding different ways to get her intake in. 

Aiming to incorporate a protein element into every meal, Grace describes how you can get plant-based protein from sources that you might not normally think of, such as swapping out your normal white grains in things such as rice and bread for wholemeal grains, which have a naturally higher protein content. Alongside this, there are also other potential swaps that you can make to bump up the protein content of your meal, such as having lentil or spinach pasta rather than normal pasta. 

Alongside protein intake, another element that Grace factors in when deciding what to cook is price. However, Grace is an advocate of the idea that you can very much follow a vegan diet for the same price or cheaper than when eating meat. 

As with Laura (@plantbasedpiggie), Grace acknowledges that she comes from a privileged lifestyle where she has freely been able to choose to adopt a vegan diet without being restricted income-wise or accessibility-wise in terms of having access to decent supermarkets. From this point of view, Grace discusses how she is aware that this particular type of lifestyle is affordable for herself but this may not be the case for other individuals or families. However, this is where education and guidance can come in, says Grace. 

Cooking a lot of her own meals from scratch, which Grace believes is more necessary and has a bigger part to play when on a vegan diet, she is able to make her meals cheaper. Choosing her ingredients based on what she can cook from home, Grace will opt for more simple ingredients that are easily accessible and will work with most meals, including lots of different veggies. 

Giving her recommendations to anyone who might be starting out on their own fitness journey, she says “the biggest thing is finding your motive, if it comes down to wanting to feel good, getting endorphins and feeling healthy, this will be much longer lasting than wanting to look a certain way or lose weight.” 

“We are told we have to shrink ourselves, and that our only fitness foals are that we have to be smaller,” Grace explains, “but that’s not going to work.” For Grace, the biggest thing is that you have to find what you want and try to fit into those goals, rather than trying to convince yourself that you are actually enjoying the hours you do slogging away doing cardio at the gym. It’s all about being truly honest with yourself about what you actually enjoy doing. 

“Fitness and health is something that should add to your life, not take away from it,” says Grace. “You have to really own why you are doing something and be really driven by it,” she adds. What it ultimately comes down to is wanting to feel good. 

Looking into the future, Grace hopes that her lifestyle will become more and more sustainable, as there is always more that you can do. Her goal is to keep on going to gradually have a more sustainable lifestyle by finding other ways to live more sustainably as she goes on. 

 

 

Source: @graceyfitness 

Speaking to these women, it is apparent that some of the ideas around plant-based protein, sustainability, fitness and health that are perpetuated by social media and the fitness industry may be based on misconceptions. Whilst sustainability is a main priority for many vegans, this should not mean that they have to compromise on their fitness, health and protein goals. Taking the advice given by these women, it is clear that plant-based protein is an accessible food type, even when on a limited budget. 

By being creative, cooking a lot of your own food and finding inspiration from accounts such as the ones run by these women, protein can be incorporated into a plant-based diet without compromising on your ethics. 

Thank you to Emily, Laura and Grace for contributing their time, knowledge and experience to this article. 

 

 

Author: Ellie

 

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