Getting Started on a Whole Food, Plant-Based Diet

You’ve just watched a great documentary and you’re ready to do this thing. So now what? Where do you start? We can help you!

Here are some tips to help you get started. This is a big change, so we will just give you the basics for now, and get more in depth each week with more posts.

“Knowledge is stronger than willpower.” Joel Fuhrman

We believe that continuing to educate yourself is one of the best things that you can do to keep yourself motivated during your transition to a WFPB diet. Documentaries are a great way to learn. Some people may be hesitant to watch a vegan documentary because they do not want to see anything that goes into animal cruelty. Trust me, I totally get that. Forks Over Knives, What the Health and Gamechangers are all great documentaries that are focused on health.

You can also check out some videos on YouTube. Look up videos by doctors such as Caldwell Esselstyn Jr., T. Colin Campbell, Michael Greger, Neil Barnard just to name a few. There are plenty out there that are less than ten minutes long.

Here is a great 20 minute video by Dr. Joel Fuhrman: I Love Nutritional Science

Read books like Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, The China Study and How Not to Die. These are all written by doctors and are backed by scientific evidence and studies.

Research the facts and you will continuously be reminding yourself that you are doing the right thing.

Keep It Simple!

During your first couple of weeks you should focus on the main elements of a WFPB diet and don’t get too caught up in the details. Eat nothing with a mother or a face, meaning no meat, dairy or eggs, no oil, and minimally processed foods. Find a few recipes that you like and stick with them. You don’t have to make gourmet meals. You are not only learning a new way of eating, but also a new way of cooking. Eliminating oil was certainly a challenge for me, but I quickly learned how to cook without it by substituting water, vegetable broth or wine.

Our first WFPB dinner was grilled Portobello mushrooms with mashed potatoes and broccoli. Oh man, I think we ate frozen broccoli with practically every meal when we first started! Other dinners we ate were whole grain pasta (we like Barilla whole grain) with grilled or roasted vegetables like zucchini, peppers and mushrooms, rice & beans, and lots of soups. We pretty much repeated this every week at first. By the way, don’t torture yourself trying to find a jarred spaghetti sauce without oil. Very few exist including Engine 2 brand (everything Engine 2 is compliant) and I think there is also a Trader Joe’s brand. I just use canned tomato sauce and I prefer Muir Glenn Crushed Tomatoes with Basil.

For our lunches, we will always bring a salad along with leftovers from dinner the night before. If you do not have leftovers, you can always throw some canned beans, corn and salsa into your salad.

Throughout the week, we generally eat oatmeal and fruit for breakfast. If you don't like oatmeal, there are plenty of other options. You can have compliant cereal such as Kashi or Grape Nuts with unsweetened almond milk. Toast or English muffins with cinnamon or bananas are a good option. Ezekiel makes compliant breads and muffins and they can be found in the frozen section at the grocery store. Alvarado Street Bakery makes a great sprouted grain bagel (also in the frozen section). On weekends we will sometimes make pancakes or tofu scramble (which I was surprised that I really enjoyed because, well, it’s tofu...)

Make sure that you have snacks with you pretty much all of the time so that you are not tempted by junk food. Get yourself an air popper to make popcorn. You can spray it with Bragg’s Liquid Aminos (similar to soy sauce but less sodium and more nutrients) and then sprinkle it with some seasonings. I love popcorn. I just may dedicate an entire blog to it one day! If you are hungry you are not going to succeed. Of course, fruits and veggies are always a good snack. Other snacks that we lived on when we first started included Kashi cereal (the biscuit variety is oil free) and Mary’s Gone Crackers. Mary’s is a little higher on the fat content due to the seeds so try not to eat the whole box (yes, they are that good!) If the fat content doesn’t slow you down the price may. They can run about $5-$6 per box, so pace yourself. Go for the Superseed Everything variety, yum!!

Do a little prep work when you have time

In the beginning of the week you can bake some potatoes for when you don't have time to cook or don’t have leftovers for your lunch. You can make a double batch of salad dressing. The easiest tasty dressing recipe has only 3 ingredients. Balsamic vinegar, dijon mustard and a small amount of 100% pure maple syrup.

Make good use of your freezer. Most soups freeze well as well as many other dishes. I will rarely make a single tray of lasagna. I will always make a second one for the freezer.

When you are cutting up your vegetables for your dinners, cut a few extra carrots and celery sticks for your snacks during the week.

I try to buy big onions. When a recipe calls for a small onion, cut a large one and put a portion of the chopped onion in the freezer. Oh what a glorious moment when you are short on time and realize that you don’t have to cut up an onion! Or, when you run out of onions and remember that you have some in the freezer!

“There are no rules except the big rules!” Denise Callery

Eat! Don’t be hungry. There is no calorie counting with this way of eating. Eat until you feel satisfied. If you are hungry you are not going to keep with it. Really, it's ok.

And this is big. Are you ready? Carbs are not your enemy! Enjoy your carbs. We eat baked french fries & sweet potato fries with dinner a couple of times a week, plus as snacks. Seriously, I’m cooking for two of us and there are two baking sheets full of fries in my oven. Of course you want to load your plate with a lot of leafy greens, but enjoy your carbs

too. (For fries: cut up potatoes, season, place on baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake on 425 for about 30 minutes.)

Eat whatever you want within the limits of the big rules. Have salad for breakfast if you feel like it. Put beans in your spaghetti sauce. There is a great recipe for oatmeal with onions and mushrooms in it in the Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease Cookbook. My husband puts Liquid Aminos on his spaghetti. All of these things are weird, I know, but there are no rules!

Welcome to your new life! I can’t wait to hear about your experiences! Please feel welcome to comment or send me an email.

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