Nutrition

What is a plant based diet, that everyone is taking about recently so much? Why is it so popular and what makes people go vegan overnight these days? These are the common questions nowadays, and bellow I will try to answer all of them. First of all, a plant based diet is a vegan diet. Industry players sometimes like to substitute one term with another, depending on their main target customers. For example, if they do not want to scare the omnivores, they prefer to use ‘plant based’ description. Sociologically, it does not provoke as much criticism with people as ‘vegan’ or ‘vegetarian’ terms. To explain even more fully, a plant-based diet is simply a diet that includes solely plant-based sources of nutrients, such as soy products that include complete proteins and vegetables, that include necessary vitamins, mostly healthy fats and carbs. Photo by Anna Pelzer on Unsplash Scientific evidence shows that a plant based diet is associated with better health outcomes (1). So much so, that the new revision of the Canadian Food Guide, that is due in 2019 is expected to emphasize on the plant based sources of nutrients, instead of familiar animal ones (2). That is a huge shift in the official recommendation towards eating habits for the nation and an undoubted evidence of the popularity and healthiness of the plant based diet overall. The obvious health benefits of the vegan diet are: Absence of saturated fats  (saturated fats come solely from animal sources). Saturated fats cause high blood pressure, and consequent problems with the heart and many other organs where blood flows, supplies them with oxygen and necessary nutrients. Vegan diet is usually richer in certain nutrients, such as fibre (necessary for healthy digestive system), potassium (necessary for the regulation of blood sugar level), magnesium (necessary for bone health), folate (necessary for the production of DNA) and vitamins A (necessary for good vision, formation and maintenance of teeth and bones), C (necessary for strong immune system) and E (necessary for healthy skin) (3). It can protect you against certain cancers. World Health Organization claims that 30-50% of all cancers are preventable and one of the major prevention tools – a healthy diet. “Diets high in fruits and vegetables may have an independent protective effect against many cancers” (4). Besides the above, many people also chose to follow a plant based diet due to other non-health related issues. Some are concerned with the environmental benefits. It’s a known fact, that a current animal farming industry is a main cause of global warming. Other people are concerned with the ethical and moral factors, they do not wish to harm the animals. I, myself, am a huge believer in the future of a plant based diet. It is a growing niche in food industry and I believe that it will be one of the major ones very-very soon. Most of my recipes are vegan or at least vegetarian, and I constantly strive to learn more adaptations of dishes to plant-based ones. As an example, please see my latest recipe of a ‘Vegan vegetable Dauphinoise” here. So far the most challenging part comes, when trying to provide an equivalent in taste substitution to an ordinary animal based dairy cheese. However, the technology is developing, more and more people turn vegan and share their recipes, thus, creating an open-source vegan cheese recipe development process. I truly believe that soon enough, the world will know a plant-based cheese that tastes exactly the same as our beloved dairy one! I encourage everyone to try plant-based dishes from time to time. Have an ‘Animal-free Tuesday’! It is not as hard or challenging as it seems at all. Vegan diet is far from just salads! It is a very tasty and nutritional combination of foods, and not as boring as haters describe it! Stay tuned for more blogs and recipes. Follow my youtube channel for more findings. References: (1) Scotti.M. (2017, December 18 ). “New Food Guide’s ‘foundational statements’ may emphasize veggies, plant-based food over meat”. Retrieved from: https://globalnews.ca/news/3922379/canada-food-guide-new-emphasis-vegetables-healthy-fats/ (2) Howard C. and Culbert I. (2018, February 11). “Food Guide revamp encouraging plant-based, low-meat diet is good for people and the planet”. Retrieved from: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/opinion-canada-food-guide-1.4530058 (3) Petre A. (2016, September 23). “6 Science-Based Health Benefits of Eating Vegan”. Retrieved from: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/vegan-diet-benefits (4) “Cancer Prevention” (n.d.) Retrieved from: http://www.who.int/cancer/prevention/en/ on 2018, June 14

Imagine an island, in the Meditation sea, where sun shines 350 days a year, fish jumps right from the sea to your plate and oranges get squeezed into your glass directly from a tree… Correct, the island that I am talking about is Cyprus! I had lived there for more than 7 years and can tell you for a fact, that Cypriot diet is historically balances with appropriate amounts of VEGETABLES, MEATS, MILK and GREENS. Thus, people there have no concern about nutrition whatsoever and the term “ORGANIC” is never heard. Paradise places, like Cyprus are simply blessed with everything being freshly caught, cut, cooked and served. Wait, what about Canada, what about us? We do not have a luxury of having a freshly caught fish every day. We have to travel miles to work daily. We do not have time to cook ourselves. We do not have time or resources to balance out our food intakes regularly. Sometimes, we barely have time to eat at least something, and most of the time it’s not the most heathy or nutritious choice we make… Well… the situation is NOT HOPELESS for us! Photo by Tristan Gassert on Unsplash Nowadays, the topic of nutrition is becoming more and more popular among the masses. There are 3 major concerns that, I believe, influence will continue to stimulate the growth of the importance of nutrition among a population. These are: HEALTH & FITNESS ETHICS ENVIRONMENT With a great help from various media, NUTRITION IS GROWING ITS’ POPULARITY. Influential talks (e.g. Leonardo DiCaprio’s speech at Oscars in 2016), documentaries (e.g. Netflix original series “What the Health” and “Cowspiracy”) and other promotion activities, all impact the attitude of consumers. People are becoming INCREASINGLY CONCERNED ABOUT THEIR FOOD CHOICES and overall nutrition. They want to be healthy, they want to be fit, they are warried about the ethical side of butchering animals, they are concerned about the environmental footprint of farming and so on. It is well-known, that where there is an interest, there will be demand, and where there is a consumer demand, will be supply. At this moment, I believe we are on the verge of our escalating interest to be turned into a stable and maybe even growing demand. Thus, the supply from the culinary industry is not too far away, after all. As it was said above: it’s not all that bad and there is a LIGHT AT THE END OF A TUNNEL! Photo by Becca Tapert on Unsplash Trying to meet the growing demand out there, more and more nutrition websites appear. Most of them cannot be trusted, unfortunately. One should consider the following to determine the website is credible: Credentials of the author/s. A credible nutrition author is a Dietitian, for example. Is the website trying to sell/promote something? If the website that is offering you ways to purchase a product/service that is being described, it is more likely to not be so credible. References to actual nutrition studies. The best example of such a credible website would be the World Health Organization website. All the posts published on this website, had been written by accredited authors. WHO is not trying to sell us anything apart of good health. Finally, all the opinions are usually supported by studies. A non-credible website, on the other hand would: Provide mostly personal opinion and examples. Not discuss other/contradictory opinions on the subject. Heavily advertise just 1 kind of a product/brand. Contain contradictory opinions and statements of the author. Have an author that cannot/does not provide a clearly supported argument to defend his/her original statement against the contradictory comments from the audience. Many of the nutritional blogs, could not be considered credible, based on the above criteria. A specific example of such a non-credible website would be Sarah’s Day blog. An author does not mention any personal certifications, or credentials in nutrition. As a support to her nutrition philosophy, she provides mostly the blogger’s own experience and examples. Sarah is constantly trying to sell her e-book and other merchandise. Her opinions on nutrition also vary throughout periods of time, based solely on her own experience, and not on any actual studies or theories. So just be cautious, and do not believe information on every website out there! Photo by Epicurrence on Unsplash If you read up to this point, it can be stated with confidence that my readers are all highly concerned about nutrition. I, myself am especially interested in a PLANT-BASED NUTRITION, the ways of balancing PB meals and the positive and negative effects of such a diet. I am hoping to learn more about the influence of a PB diet on fitness, and share this information with you, guys. How to stick to a PB diet and grow muscles at the same time, without taking in any extra supplements; or if one does take supplements, how to balance out the rest of the diet to avoid malnutrition? This is a hot topic, that interested if not all, then most of the vegans around the world right now. Hopefully, we will know the answer to it very soon.   Thank you for your time and please stay tuned! More blogs are on the way.   P.S. NUTRITION ACTUALLY MATTERS!