 Vegan is not ideal
I honestly feel that being a vegan is not ideal for optimal health. Yes you maintain a healthy weight and have overall health being vegan if you do it right, however doing it right is the tricky part. Erin, Steve's wife, told me a few months ago on this forum that she was not eating a healthy vegan diet at the time because she was eating too much vegan "junk food".
I personally went on the vegan diet for 3 months. I am overweight and I stayed overweight. In three months I may have lost 5 pounds. I did not exercise, which is key to lose weight. However, at my bodyweight I should have lost more weight than 5 pounds in my opinion. My blood pressure did go down and I usually was satisfied.
I honestly think the most efficient and health diet consists of a proper ratio of carbs, lean protein, and fat. The Zone by Barry Sears seems to be a great diet and lifestyle to live. He states that for every 3 grams of lean protein you eat, you should eat 4 grams of good fibrous carbs and 1 gram of good fat (extra virgin olive oil and unsaturated fats). He also states that we should eat 6 times a day (smaller portions than meals). When we eat several times a day we are communicating to our body that there is plenty of food out there and we will not need the fat for future use. When we only eat 3 meals a day (and especially a larger dinner) we are telling our bodies to store fat because we are eating too far between meals. So a great small meal would consist of a small salad, piece of lean chicken, and some walnuts. The Abs Diet that is also popular goes by this same mantra (6 meals a day, lean meats, fibrous carbs). It expresses the importance of exercise and building muscle. For every pound of muscle we put on it takes 50 calories just to maintain it sitting. That is an awesome incentive to do resistance training along with a great diet.
Now I'm not saying you can't build muscle and lose weight on a vegan diet, it is just a hell of a lot harder without animal protein, period. Animal protein gives you a solid and efficient supply of protein that provides that sixth amino acid that our bodies can't make by itself. It's so easy to deprive yourself of this protein when we are not paying attention with the vegan diet.
Animal protein helps make losing weight a lot easier, however after you are at a healthy weight, maybe a vegan diet is ok........I just think it makes life a lot difficult and who the hell doesn't want to eat fish, turkey, chicken, fish, and cheese the rest of their lives?  |