Fat – The Vegan RD

7 Tips for Sticking With Your New Vegan Diet

Maybe you’ve decided to jump right into a vegan diet or maybe you’re dipping a toe in the water and opting for a gentle transition. Either way, there are lots of things that newbie vegans can do to make their diet feel more practical and sustainable for the long run.

1. Embrace your cooking style.

In their annual click bait story on the “best” diets, US News and World Report suggested that eating vegan means spending lots of time in the kitchen. This is a poorly-informed and limited view of veganism. […]

By Ginny Messina|2017-11-01T17:17:56-04:00January 16th, 2017|Tags: Fat, Nutrition, Omega-3 Fats, vegan transition, Vitamins|13 Comments

Vegan Diets are Dangerous? Here is What the Research Really Says

Doctors at the Cleveland Clinic suggest that vegans should know something about diet planning in order to make sure they are meeting nutrient needs.

Their conclusions were published in the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association. The paper doesn’t say anything that is particularly alarming, and, with a few exceptions, there isn’t much in it that I would take issue with.

But the Cleveland Clinic press-released the findings, giving the media a chance to scaremonger about vegan diets—and you know how much they like to do that.

As is often the […]

By Ginny Messina|2016-03-19T11:49:20-04:00March 19th, 2016|Tags: Calcium, Fat, Health, Iron, Nutrition, Omega-3 Fats, Protein, vitamin B12, Vitamin D|14 Comments

Pinto Beans or Tofurky? How Food Choices and Motivations Affect Vegan Health

When it comes to vegan diets and health, a couple of misconceptions often pop up on blogs and in social media. One is that whole-food plant-based people are healthier than plain old vegans. Related to that is the belief that vegans motivated by ethics choose less healthy diets than those motivated by health.

Is it true? Do ethical vegans care more about animals than their own health? Research—or in some cases, the lack of research—casts some doubt on this.

Obviously, you can be vegan and still eat a pretty junky diet. There […]

By Ginny Messina|2015-03-16T11:23:18-04:00March 16th, 2015|Tags: Ex-vegans, Fat, Health, Soy, veggie meats, vitamin B12|43 Comments

Paleo Advocates Get Vegan Diets (and Saturated Fat) Wrong

Replacing saturated fat with healthy plant fats is still best advice.

Quite a few people have asked me to comment on the blog Authority Nutrition. It’s written by Kris Gunnars, a medical student at the University of Iceland.

First, despite the bold title of his blog, Gunnars is no authority on nutrition. His background is the usual one of the self-proclaimed expert: “I got interested in my own health and started reading books and studies on nutrition.”

The result is that his blog is […]

By Ginny Messina|2014-04-21T11:54:41-04:00April 21st, 2014|Tags: Fat, paleo, saturated fat, vitamin B12|53 Comments

Being Fearlessly Vegan

If you read the comments on this blog, then you know that not everyone in the vegan world is happy with some of the perspectives presented here. The two criticisms I hear most frequently are these: First, that my recommendations, which focus on areas where vegans may fall short, make it seem “too hard” to be healthy on a vegan diet. And second that, because I’m an animal advocate, I care only about making it easy to be vegan—refusing to condemn foods like vegetable oils, nuts and veggie burgers—with little regard for human health.

Obviously, both of these things can’t be […]

By Ginny Messina|2013-03-21T09:55:08-04:00March 21st, 2013|Tags: Fat, nutrients, Vegan activism|38 Comments

Do Some People Need to Eat Meat?

It’s one of the most frequent questions I get from blog readers: How do we respond to people who insist that they require meat in their diets?

I know very well that some vegans struggle with their health, because I hear frequently from those who are looking for help. Most who contact me are animal advocates who are experiencing nutrient deficiencies (diagnosed through blood work) or they simply don’t feel well.

These are not people who are eating junk-food vegan diets. Anyone who gets sick from eating a diet based on potato chips and cookies will usually have a fairly good idea […]

By Ginny Messina|2013-03-02T11:06:01-05:00March 2nd, 2013|Tags: Ex-vegans, Fat, Meat, Protein, Umami, Vegan activism, vegan food guide|165 Comments

Notes from the 6th International Congress on Vegetarian Nutrition

I spent 3 days at the 6^th International Congress on Vegetarian Nutrition this past week in Loma Linda, CA. Held every five years or so, the event is hosted by the School of Public Health of Loma Linda University and is considered the premiere conference on plant-based nutrition. It brings experts and researchers together from all over the world and its proceedings are published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the most prestigious of all nutrition journals. I was honored this year (and a bit terrified, since I felt very much out of my league) to be […]

By Ginny Messina|2013-02-28T15:20:56-05:00February 28th, 2013|Tags: Calcium, Fat, Health, Nuts, Protein|46 Comments

Easy Resolutions for a Healthy Vegan New Year

Happy 2013! There is nothing like a brand new year to inspire health-related resolutions. And while it’s tempting to resolve to make all kinds of big changes, sometimes a few little tweaks here and there are all we vegans really need. Here are ten ideas for vegans—mostly easy ways to fine-tune your diet and lifestyle. One of two of them might help to make your new year a little bit healthier.

1. Give some attention to calcium. It’s simple enough to get enough calcium from plant […]

By Ginny Messina|2013-01-01T09:57:35-05:00January 1st, 2013|Tags: Beans, Calcium, detox diet, Fat, glycemic index, Supplements|29 Comments

Ten Tips for Staying Happy and Healthy on a Vegan Diet

There is a long list of reasons why people fail on a vegan diet and return to the world of cheese sandwiches and fish fillets. They might have developed overt deficiencies or vague symptoms of poor health. Some ex-vegans say that they experienced depression or foggy thinking or fatigue without animal foods. Others struggled with challenging social situations or with cravings for animal foods.

The following ideas for staying happy and healthy on a vegan diet are all things I’ve written about before, but I wanted to condense them into a sort […]

By Ginny Messina|2017-11-01T17:14:47-04:00September 12th, 2012|Tags: Beans, convenience foods, Ex-vegans, Fat, glycemic index, Health, Iron, legumes, Mental health, Nutrition, Omega-3 Fats, Resources, Supplements, Umami, vitamin B12, Vitamin D|77 Comments

Fat in Vegan Diets and Tips for Optimal Nutrition

In case you missed it, Jack had a good post last week about fat in vegan diets.

And if you’re looking to maximize nutrient intake with attention to just a few details, take a look at my post on the 7 Habits of Healthy Vegans on One Green Planet. (This is a very condensed version of a talk I’m giving in Chicago next week. Hope you can be there if you live in the area!)