After about a whole year of actively experimenting with various diets, I came up with my own which for the first time in a long time made me satisfied with what I put on my plate and health-wise thrive.

I felt the need to share my diet habits in order to help others find a balanced regime, and not to have to go through the struggle I went through. Nobody was there to teach me what I know now, all of this was hours and hours spent with researching nutrition, cooking methods, and a lot of tests and trials before I came up with something that works.

So here's what I eat on a daily basis nowadays...

I start my morning with some oats in soy milk, eye balled, not to much, but not too little either with a topping consisting one apple, one banana, some cinnamon, a pinch of ginger, some sunflower seeds and raw cacao nibs.

This is usually followed by a strong cup of plain black tea, I buy the tea in bulk and in it's whole form and then powder it so I can use it in the coffee machine. One serving can produce multiple cups in case that caffeine kick just wasn't enough, but the first one is always the strongest. Still, don't throw it away after just one wash, the second or even third cup of the same material can also be quite potent.

Moving on to lunch... I have several variations, and I'm going to share them all.

Most often I eat grilled potatoes (diced, with skin) and onions on a non-stick pan with a basis of paprika powder, salt, pepper, garlic powder, chili peppers and parsley. The way I prepare that base is put all the ingredients in a cup and mix it with water and stir. When frying, the liquid evaporates but the potatoes and onions soak up the "marinade". No oil!

Now for the meat substitute, I use grilled tofu. After I grill it, I usually also mix it with some tomato and beetroot powder along with salt, pepper, garlic powder all with some water mixed with a bit of lemon juice to create some sort of "sauce" which the tofu soaks up after it's grilled pretty well just to give it a bit more taste.

On the side I will usually have a plain (but cooked) cruciferous vegetable, it varies from day to day but it is usually spinach or some cabbage, not going too fancy with this but hey it works.

*Use ceramic cookware people, that stainless steel, aluminium or whatever you might be using might be toxic in the long run.

Next to that I usually add a legume, sometimes it's peas, sometimes green beans, also not going too fancy but works just fine.

And last but not least, champignon dip which I make with sliced champignons (duh), diced onions, soy milk, turmeric, salt, pepper, and garlic powder. I might add some powdered oats that I powder in my blender to give it a bit more thickness and it doesn't alter the taste so much.

The other variation is to have some rice, glass noodles or chickpeas instead of the potatoes which are usually cooked plain and than a sauce is added on top of it, usually the tomato/beetroot one because it's awesome, but you can experiment with whatever pleases your taste buds more.

In the place of tofu I as a variation would fry some lentil burgers which contain lentil powder, a tablespoon of powdered oats, a tablespoon of powdered sunflower seeds (I powder them all in a blender), the filling consists of some onion, carrot, a bit of celery root and zucchini or eggplant all blended up. The dry mixture is combined with the "wet" mixture and mixed until it gets a dough-like texture. Than I spice it up with salt, pepper, garlic powder, chili peppers, and parsley. Shape 'em up, and fry them on both sides till they're done.

The sides stay pretty much the same, still some legumes, a cruciferous vegetable and oh so loved champignone dip

And last but not least...

Diner.

Because I usually come home late, and don't want to stuff myself with a big meal before sleep so I go for a salad.

The salad consists of lettuce, cucumbers, radish, olives, and corn or kidney beans. I also make my own salad dressing which usually contains some soy milk, juice of half a lemon, salt, pepper, garlic powder and I might add some oat powder to get that thickness once again but that's totally optional.

Also this diet plan, along with being 100% vegan, is also affordable, surprisingly filling, relatively low in calories, oil-free, free of refined sugar and gluten-free. Kicking out gluten out of your diet, even if you are not intolerant will make your digestion smoother I find.

A few notes worth mentioning... Yes, I'm aware of the amount of soy I consume might raise some concerns regarding phytoestrogen content, but I've researched that thoroughly and it seems that this amount isn't that high to cause concern regarding major changes in hormones. A bigger concern for regarding your food turning you into a woman would be meat, conventional dairy, beer, and drinking out of plastic which nobody seems to have a problem with and it is usually even associated with manliness.

Consider increasing your Fat intake a bit.(Some ground up Flax Seeds in your Oats for Omega3; Kashews for Omega6 & Tryptophan; Brazil Nuts for Selenium)

Supplements are in my opinion a Necessity. (B12, D3 (,Methylsulfonylmethane), Iodine depending on where you live )

"Three Meals a Day" is a Meme. Intermittened Fasting seems to be the Way to go.

Don't mean to be overly dismissive of other peoples suggestion, it is after all the suggestions that lead me to come up with this diet, so let's examine what you told me to consider.

Increasing fat intake a bit and adding some seeds and nuts for that as well as omega 3/6, tryptophan and selenium.

Supplements which I forgot to mention I still take a quality multivitamin because I have it left-over from my fasting experiments.

Let's start with fat, in my opinion this diet plan doesn't lack them at all.

Soy milk has some fat in it, tofu also, not much, but still... not to mention sunflower seeds, cacao nibs and olives which are actually quite high in natural fat content.

Now for the omega 3/6/9

Boy I don't even know where to start, all the legumes have them lentils, kidney beans, peas, green beans, soy, chickpeas... Also cruciferous vegetables, not a lot, but present. Sunflower seeds, olives and cacao nibs also contain them. Seems like it adds up just fine.

Tryptophan

Can't seem to praise that soy enough, we got even tryptophan there, also oats, sunflower seeds, bananas, cacao nibs and that's just from the top of my head. Tryptophan also doesn't seem to be lacking at all.

Selenium

Beans again, all the kinds... also sunflower seeds, cacao nibs and to a lesser degree even olives.

Supplementation...

As mention before, I do take a quality multivitamin that contains all of those + more in just one pill, but I take it because I have some left over, and a little extra nutrients certifiably won't hurt me if I get in a situation with prolonged periods of not eating.

B12 - I don't wash or peel my veggies, I get B12 along with other immune boosting compounds with the little amount of dirt I ingest.
D3 - Sun?
MSM - Fruits (including tomato), corn, black tea.
Iodine - Salt

And the last statement which you so surely claim to be the way to go...

Intermittent fasting

This could mean several different regimes, but I assume you mean the OMAD regime. While it has it's benefits, and while I did practice that for a long time unintentionally due to work it shouldn't become a lifestyle because it has it's drawbacks.

Nutritionally, you might get all you need in the day from just that one meal but you're going to get tired and experience a crash in energy levels mid day, not to mention the hunger pangs. After some time you learn to deal with them, but if you don't have to, why would you? It's annoying and not at all pleasant.

Call me crazy, but I prefer to have a steady flow of energy through out the day instead of crashing like a maniac after work. It's all about feeling good and being healthy, and sometimes a detox is beneficial but cleanses should last 10 days to two weeks max, otherwise you just end up hurting yourself.

3 meals a day, for the sake of spreading out energy and having some variety between meals seems just fine. I don't see anything wrong with it, but I got to agree that spontaneously skipping a meal isn't a big deal.

3 meals only? Seems a bit small portions in my opinion, only breakfast sounds correctly. How much do you weight? Do you count callories? Do you workout?

Im vegetarian with 2800kcal(about 75kg) diet and calisthenic workouts 5 times a week. When i have a moment i can write down my daily diet to show you how big difference it is. In short i would add one more breakfast of about 15% bodyweight intake (even a shake) and some snack (you can make one of oats+banana+some dried fruits).

Also consider using cronometer to track your nutrition: https://cronometer.com/

I second the suggestion for cronometer, its free and very useful for creating hard data to examine.
As for the fat suggestion, I cant imagine how his diet would need more fat. The healthiest diets ever studied generally got 8-12% of calories from fat. Its hard to go below that while eating natural food and the western penchant for 40% fat diets has no basis in health science.
I've rarely seen multivitamins that provide iodine, especially regulated doses of iodine. The iodine content of kelp pills varies 100 fold and the label is invariably incorrect on iodine dosage. As an 8 year vegan iodine is the one and only nutrient I clearly got in trouble with, developing overt hypothyroidism at one point. Lacking any reasonable and reliable supplement options I make my own with potassium iodide and distilled water, it provides 200 µg KI (150 µg iodine) per drop. I just need a drop a day, and I have a 4-lifetime supply of KI The amount of iodine in fresh iodized salt is low, you'd have to consume too much salt to get enough iodine. The iodine content of table salt is also variable, unregulated, and could conceivably decrease over time as the potassium iodide finds things to react with and the iodine evaporates. This is why iodine deficiency is rampant in the USA and much of europe, and is on the increase ever since the dairy industry phased it out as a disinfectant. Regulators have no incentive to fix the situation, since they get paid by the groups who profit by treating simple iodine deficiency with a lifetime of thyroid hormones and lab tests instead of iodine.For most of the year this is true. There is evidence that supplementation in the winter time is beneficial. If pills are unwanted then in summer one can 'sun tan' dried mushrooms gill side up for an hour at noon time and store for the winter. It charges them with D2. Shiitake and button mushrooms work great, but to really see the summer sun again in january cubensis could work too Our distant ancestors getting their vitamin B12 from a few milligrams of dirt on a carrot grown in deficient soil under plastic domes in arizona is an urban myth. Its clinically proven to be ineffective, sometimes tragically so. Our ancestors got their B12 from fetid water and rotting vegetation. (In deference to McKenna fans I should add unwashed coprophilic mushrooms to the list.) They also got cholera, dysentery, liver flukes, and other such things from the same sources. Supplementation isnt hard and if one wants to cut costs to the minimum just get a bottle of 500-1000 µg or stronger solid pills, the cheaper the better as they'll be larger and more chalky, then powder them and add the equivalent of a tenth of a pill to each meal at the end of cooking.
Fun lacto-fermentation fact: Lacto-fermented vegetables can make variable amounts of B12 and pseudo-B12 but the pseudo-B12 is worse than useless. However if the bacteria are given B12 they will just incorporate that into themselves without even trying to make their own version. So add a sprinkle of your pink powder to your next batch of kraut-chi.

Eight years as a whole food vegan and I only ever had 3 problems:
Iodine deficiency
Calorie insufficiency at the very beginning
Having to behave while listening to peoples opinions about my diet

Cronometer is great. I've been using it for quite some time now.



Yes, they have some fat. Not enough in my opinion.
You'd have to eat for example 2.5 kg canned kidney beans or 800g of tofu to get enough omega3 (source cronometer). The omega3 to 6 ratio should be between 1:1 and 1:4 by the way. Since you are eating olives and sunflower seeds your ratio is off.



You're probably not lacking. I didn't want to say that. I was just pointing out, that kashews are a great tryptophan source and therefore preferred by me as a omega6 source. Also there is no too much tryptophan.



You'd have to eat a lot of beans. A single brazil nut however contains your daily required selenium.


I skip breakfast since I don't get hungry in the morning. Lunch at 11:30, dinner at 17:00.


D3 - you can only produce it if the suns angle is steeper than 45°. That means only during midday. Usually people are indoors during that time of the day. Statistically your deficient.

B12 - I doubt there is an adequate amount of B12 on your veggies.

Iodine - I don't eat iodized salt since I don't have control about the amount iodine consumed.

MSM - It's not essential, however I've been taking it for 3 months now and my hair roots got much stronger. My hairline has been starting to recede. It's reversing now.

I say pay attention to your cravings: your body will let you know what's needed. You may not get the message right away, but if you stay on the path it will probably happen eventually.

Another thing that's worked for me is not getting too attached to labels and lifestyles; I've spent years without consuming any animal products, but for the most part I didn't think of myself as a vegan, and was open to adjusting my diet as necessary.

On the same note, not everything needs to be taught, or learned, or researched; often times you already know what needs to be done, and you just need to let it happen!

You call that a diet? Not even a single mention of mangoes!

Seriously though,

Watch those DHA levels for proper nervous system functioning, the importance of including aquatic foods in the diet is vastly understated imo.

Diversity in selection of whole foods will ensure the widest possible array of micronutrients, locking in a few good staples like morning oatmeal and a daily salad is an important routine, but make sure to balance that by trying a new recipe or a new food once or twice a week.

I'm gonna echo the B-12 and D3,supplementation of these (and a good multivitamin) is pretty much required for maintaining adequate health long-term.

In addition to the good recommendations from others (mushrooms, mangoes, etc), I would add hemp hearts. They are a really good source of Omega fatty acids and crunchily delicious