Some Vege Protien options
 

Starshine,

I am vegetarian and have done these options that you have suggested. I am in maintainence for a month now and try to add protien in every meal. I have used the following other than what you have listed:

1) Make a green smoothie with spinach,kale and other green you can tolerate and add isolate protien powder. I use the one from Costco, Optimum Nutrition Performance Whey. This has 3 gm of carb and 30 gms of protien. That is half the protien I need in one shot! You can add fruits in the maintainence phase, so i do add frozen banana/blueberries somedays.

2) Morningstar Farms meatless Sausage patties with Mint Chutney for dinner! LOL.. I know not an usual combo but it works if you like your protien spicy with mint/coriander chutney. These have 4 gm net carbs and 10 gm of protien per patty, so I have about three of them for 8 oz of protien. You can get mint chutney in any Indian grocery nearby - either in freezer or otherwise.

3) I also use IP packets or EAS shakes now and then in my meal planning.


Hope that helps! The hardest thing being a vegetarian was eating outside of home where there are very few places with protien from vegetarian source.


Hang in there.. Good Luck!

4)

Thank you for this, vidyab35! :hug: I've been using Optimum Nutrition for my shakes all along, and do plan on using them for the morning smoothies when I get to maintenance at least a few times a week. Thanks for the tip on the sausage with chutney. That's a new one for me, so I'm excited about that.

Nice to know how you're doing your protein in maintenance. I think I'll do it your way, as we Veggies have to make sure we get an adequate amount during the day.

How else do you find maintenance?

hiya!
 

I was about to add a 4th option but hit "post" before that. I also add tofu instead of paneer (cottage cheese) in a few Indian dishes. I don't know if you like Indian, but you can do Palak Paneer (spinach with chese; cheese substitued with tofu), tofu chilli etc. Let me know if you are interested, I can send you my recipes for them.

Maintainence was scary at first, I was not sure if I could do protien well being a vegetarian and all. But is has worked well so farafter a month and half of it at my goal weight of 145. Try to make sure you plan out your protien for each meal, that way there is no surprises and last minute pigging out due to hunger.. LOL. I also exercise 2-3 days a week and that helps a lot. You can do it!


Vidya

I'd love the Indian recipes, vidyab35. Thank you! I like to try new things, and I've not had that much Indian food in my life, so I'm game. :)

Maintenance does scare me due to the way it's set up and how a normal Vegetarian eats, and I'd rather not do fake meats. I'm tired of them, and they weren't a huge part of my Vegetarian diet prior to IP. But it took some work to make Phase 1 work for me too, but it was all worth it.

So glad you're doing so well in maintenance! That's huge. I'm still not sure whenI'll be hitting it, as I keep lowering my goal weight, and I think I have 10 pounds or so left to lose. I'll take 145. :) I've been walking an hour a day since the 3rd week of IP (I walked before IP), and I can't weight to add in yoga and weigh lifting too. Once I lose the fat, I want to build up muscle again.

Do you post at all in the Maintainer's thread? I'd love to see you over there. I asked them for Vegetarian advice a few months ago, and there wasn't too much information there (Infoplease was great with information!).

Thanks again, vidyab35! :hug:

So much great info and inspiration here!

Do any of you use TVP? I was going to replace the meat in my sloppy joes recipe with it, but backed out at the last min and used the Morningstar Crumbles.

When I want some hamburger tasting stuff, I use TVP. Not very often, but I make tacos out of it. I want to try the sloppy joe recipe too.

It's from EatingWell http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/ea...oppy_joes.html
I just replaced the crumbles for the meat...yum-oh!

I am always looking for IP-suitable vegetarian protein sources. These are great ideas!

I also had these pages bookmarked, great stuff here:
Vegetarian [including some of the packets that don't seem like they would be vegetarian, but are (chicken soup, chili, spaghetti bolognese, etc.) and vice-versa. See Post #10]
Vegetarian's Guide

I just bought these again - glad to be reminded of these! Just wanted to note that the ones I purchased from Trader Joe's (Morningstar Farms "Original Sausage Patties"; 38 g each), the net carbs is only 2g each (3g total - 1 g fiber). That means that three of them = 240 calories; 6 g net carbs/9 g fat/30 g protein. I don't know if this amount of fat is considered to be too high for IP... 34%... actually that seems higher than the recommended amount of less than 30%?

ALSO, yes, the recipe for an IP-friendly version of Palak Paneer(Tofu) would be great! I have done this in the past with prepared Indian packets but the fat was always crazy high.

Next week I think I'm going to try to make some "wheat meat". Anyone attempted this? Thoughts? Suggestions?

I'm glad you are making it as a vegetarian!
How many g of protein are you trying to get at each meal and snack? I'm over doing it I think...Kate

bump

I've discovered two versions of tofu that I love (not usually a word I'd apply to tofu): shirataki "noodles", 40 calories per decent-sized serving, 0 fat 0 carbs. They are in a lot of grocery stores these days. Also yuba, tofu in thin sheets, that make great wraps. In SF bay area, they are made by HodoSoy. They may be available in Asian specialty stores, too.

My husband & I love Sunrise Soya Foods (based in Vancouver, BC) 1800-661-BEAN or www.sunrise-soya.com They sell certified organic (non-GMO'd) soy which is much healthier for you than the manufactured fake meats or GMO soy products commonly sold. Our favorite is the Extra Firm Herb. Lots of flavour on its own and firm enough so we get that meaty chewiness. I can eat half a 350 g pack and get only 2 net carbs but 26 g protein. Yes it is 260 calories for that portion, but let's face it - unless you are using high fat dairy as your protein choice your meals probably aren't too high in calories. I also use Vega protein powder in the Tropical Tango flavour and Genuine Health Vegan Proteins+ in double chocolate for my morning smoothies - they are very low in calories and average about 20-25 g of protein in a serving and around 6 or 7 carbs. Maybe this will help with some ideas, but I also miss lentils, beans, and fresh non-roasted nuts & seeds. Oh well - I'm on Phase 2 Alternate right now so I'm very cautiously adding in a bit of beans & quinoa. :broc:

Vegetarian getting mixed messages from coach on protein- help!
 

Hi! I'm a lacto-ovo vegetarian on the IP diet, and it's going great. I've just finished phase 1 and am moving into phase 2. The problem is finding vegetarian proteins that are appropriate for my 8 oz protein meals (on phase 1 it was just dinner, but in phase 2 it's now both dinner and lunch).

Up until now, I've been having Trader Joe's high protein extra-firm tofu almost every night for dinner on this diet (seasoned with soy sauce and spices). However, as I mentioned above, in phase 2, I need to provide my own protein for lunch as well, and I need some alternate ideas. Nutritionally, my lunch/dinner should look like this:

Cal: approx. 100
Fat: <5 g
Carbs: <5 g
Protein: > 20g

There are not a lot of vegetarian proteins on the market that meet this nutritional criteria, especially if you want to avoid soy protein isolate.

I should mention that I don't like the taste of eggs (although I do not technically exclude them from my diet in general)- but recommendations such as scrambled eggs, hardboiled eggs, sunny side up eggs- these won't really work for me- I find them too unappetizing. However, I don't mind eating foods with eggs cooked into them.

Thank you in advance for any suggestions!

I wish I had an answer for you, I want to be vegetarian really bad but I too dont know of good sources besides tofu and eggs on this diet which would get old! Ive been watching a lot of documentaries about food culture and I am really having trouble with the guilt of eating animals, I would really like to live a non animal product life.

I plan to do this after IP if I cant figure out alternatives that meet IP criteria. In the meantime I am going above and beyond to buy meat that comes from farms that are ethical and treat their animals well, but in the end I know its still really bothers me that they are killed. "Sigh." :(