Vegan Pointers

[SQu]

My 20 year old daughter is home for a few days and announced her new veganism for ethical reasons. I am reading on the forum and have got that eating mostly potatoes, spinach and mushrooms + their cooking liquid could perhaps provide enough protein and calcium. She’s prepared to use eggshell too.


But I now only have a day or two to get whatever info and supplements would be most helpful. I’m compiling long term ideas for when she is in her own place with a kitchen but also short term ideas as she is eating in dining hall till December. So some easy snack ideas without cooking needed that she could do in her room would be helpful.


She eats 6 pieces of fruit a day, uses coconut oil instead of margarine on bread, likes coffee.

She has a history of high estrogen (menstrual difficulties, improved recently) and depression (controlled reasonably on tyrosine theanine magnesium and pregnenolone). Chesty when ill. She smokes. Drinks I think about once a week. Insomnia (clearly running on adrenalin) so you can imagine how concerned I am that her nutrition stays high. She is 164cm, approx 54kgs so not much fat storage which is good re pufa storage and estrogen production. But not much margin for too much weight loss for example. She is a student. Gets time outdoors. Walks 3-4km a day.


Help from experienced long term vegans would be very much appreciated.

 

[SQu]

She has hypothyroid symptoms and I am hypothyroid. I used to think she was not an ideal candidate for veganism considering her history of estrogen symptoms. But she was vegetarian from January till August and I think the lowering of cysteine and methionine has already helped her lower some previous symptoms like some hair loss, and lessen menstrual symptoms. Her skin has improved. So I'm open to the possibility that peaty veganism could work.

 

[Ritchie]

Strip it back to the basics of Peat philosophy and work from the ground up. If you take this foundational approach being vegan and following Peat should be fairly easy. Firstly, avoid PUFA's. A mistake that many Vegans make is they eat way to many PUFAs (mainly because they think they are good for them and so seek them out). Avoiding them should actually be fairly easy when only eating plant based foods (i.e. no vegetable oils except coconut or maybe a little olive oil, no avocados, avoid eating lots of nuts/seeds etc) My personal opinion is a few activated nuts here and there in their whole form (i.e. almonds/brazil/macadamia) isn't going to hurt even though they have some PUFA (not as much as eggs, animal fat, chicken, fish, butter, whole milk, etc) and they provide some good nutrition along with vitamin e, and some sprouted seeds are ok also, again as long as not overdone.. Next, the obvious focus of a Peat inspired diet is high energy in the form of carbohydrates (i.e. glucose/sugar). So lots of fruits, fruit juices, dry fruit such as dates and apricots, maple syrup, sugars, potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice, some grains (oats/rye/buckwheat/sprouted seem ok and I remember reading Peat saying as much) coconut sugar, date syrup, whole coconuts, coca-cola (if real sugar), dark chocolate, coconut ice cream etc.... Throw in some leafy greens such as spinach and kale and other veggies such as peas/broccoli/root vegetables/tubers/mushrooms etc (all well cooked). Carrot salads. Coconut milk is great as an alternative to cows milk with coffee or in smoothies.. Peat has spoken of Potato juice being very nutritious and beneficial and contains a fantastic quality protein, so you could juice up a few litres every now and then, and keep it in the fridge. You could throw in a protein powder like pea protein isolate, potato protein or rice protein as a supplement with smoothies etc (all have a very peat friendly amino acid profile with very low tryptophan and methionine, and you can get sprouted versions which make digestion very easy).. Oysters are a grey area ethically, as they don't move, don't have a central nervous system or brain and for all intensive purposes don't seem to be capable of experiencing pain and/or sentient consciousness. Half a dozen oysters eaten fresh and raw once a fortnight should be plenty to supply any lacking B12. If she doesn't want to eat oysters she could just supplement b12 now and then.. Check out this thread: Peat's Surprising Response To My Email. A "Ray Peat Vegan" Is Possible .. and if you search "vegan" there are a few other threads on the forum..

 

[Constatine]

Vegans tend to grossly undereat. Make sure she gets some calorie dense food in there.

 

[SQu]

Thank you #oneZero for such a detailed reply. I'm reading that thread.
Yes I'm already seeing how much she has to eat to feel satisfied. She's been adding a lot of coconut oil to help in that way.