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If you wish to be a low carbohydrate vegetarian, the first thing
required is to get over the idea, very wide spread, especially
among moral vegetarians, that the body requires very little protein.
Improved health and energy level when protein intake is increased
is virtually universal. You also need to ignore the widely touted
idea that grains and beans are the "natural" diet of
humankind, because they have been the principle diet of the majority
of humankind since the Agricultural Revolution. Remember that
agriculture was invented approximately 10,000 years ago -- and
that by the best estimates of science, humankind has a 2 million
year history. That's a very long time during which human beings
lived and thrived on a diet that contained very little in the
way of grains and beans, but did indeed include meat and other
animal-derived foods.
None of which means you can't be a low carbohydrate vegetarian,
and be quite healthy! After all, the concept of "natural"
when it comes to humans is pretty meaningless. We didn't evolve
with central heating, either, but I, for one, don't care to give
it up! All it means is that you won't be constructing your vegetarian
diet around grains and beans.
So what will you be eating? Well, first of all, all the stuff
that non-vegetarian low carb dieters eat that isn't meat! That
would mean, of course, plenty of low carb vegetables, nuts, seeds,
low sugar fruits, healthy fats like olive oil, mayonnaise, and
butter, along with foods that contain healthy fat -- things like
avocados and olives. If you're a lacto-ovo vegetarian, you'll
also be eating eggs and cheese. (If you're a vegan, you should
know that most soy cheeses are indeed low carb.)
The big food group that omnivorous low carbers tend to neglect,
but that the vegetarian low carber will likely be consuming in
abundance, is soy foods -- tofu, tempeh, okara, soy based veggie
burgers, and soy based meat substitutes -- sausage, fake cold
cuts, ground beef substitutes and the like. You'll need to be
even more vigilant about reading labels than the omnivores, who
can generally assume that all fresh meat, poultry, and fish have
about the same carb count -- zero -- and the same protein content
-- 7g per ounce, cooked. Pay attention to not only carbohydrate
content and fiber content, but also protein content, and look
for products that have 5 or fewer grams of usable carbohydrate
per serving, (subtract the grams of fiber from the total grams
of carbohydrate to get the usable carb count), and choose those
with the most protein for the least carbohydrate.
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Another low carb, high protein soy food that many of you may
not know about is textured vegetable protein, or TVP. Even if
you haven't heard of it, you may well have had it, since it's
often used to make processed foods seem like they have more meat
in them than they do. I suspect it's also the basis for a fair
number of the vegetarian meat substitutes on the market. TVP is
a soy product, made by Archer Daniels Midland, the ultra-huge
agricultural company. It comes dry, in granules or in chunks.
There are also some seitan (wheat gluten) products that are low
enough in carbohydrate to qualify as "low carb", but
keep in mind that wheat gluten is A) not a complete protein and
B) one of the foods most likely to cause unpleasant reactions.
Choose it less often than the soy products, and eat it in combination
with other vegetarian protein foods.
So there you have the basics of a vegetarian low carb diet: Plenty
of low carb vegetables, nuts and seeds, eggs and cheese, soy products,
a bit of low sugar fruit, and unprocessed natural fats. A nutritious
diet, and a healthy one. Just be aware that as a vegetarian, you'll
be getting more carbs with your protein than your meat-eating
low carb compatriots, and adjust the carb content of the rest
of your diet downward accordingly.
Any concerns, here? Well, just a couple. First of all, most vegetarian
meat substitutes cost considerably more per gram of protein than
inexpensive meat or poultry would. Especially if you're a vegan,
a low carb vegetarian diet could get pretty pricey. Too, vegetarian
meat substitutes are virtually all processed -- even tofu is a
processed food, to some degree. It's unclear to me what, exactly,
the impact of this might be, but I thought I should point it out.
(On the other hand, to be entirely fair, ground beef has to be
considered at least slightly processed, too. After all, our ancestors
didn't just eat the muscle meats, they ate virtually the whole
animal.)
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