How Do You Eat Vegan?

Two questions I get asked pretty often are 1) What kinds of things do you even eat as a vegan? and, 2) I have been thinking about going vegan, do you have any suggestions of how to get started? I wrote this post to explain how I feed myself on a vegan diet.

Breakfast

I start out each day with a large bowl of oatmeal, into which I slice 1-2 pieces of fruit (or 1 piece of sliced fruit + berries). I drizzle honey on top of that, then add a bit of almond milk.

I really like bananas; the optional second piece of fruit on my oatmeal varies with the season.

Lunch

I eat a quality PB&J sandwich. I use whole-grain wheat or multigrain bread, the kind of peanut butter that is just peanuts and salt, and jam or jelly that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup.

Snacks

I snack almost constantly for a couple hours before and after lunch. Some of my snacking favorites include carrots, mixed unsalted nuts, apples, oranges, and clementines.

Dinner

This meal gets a lot more variety than breakfast and dinner, but tends to follow a simple formula.
Starchy base + Veggies + Seasonings + (Optional Beans).
The foundation of my meal is a starchy base. I like rice, quinoa, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and pasta.
Next, I cook up whatever veggies I might have at the moment--usually 3-4 different varieties, whatever is cheap. Some common favorites are broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, tomatoes, carrots, spinach, mushrooms, asparagus, and bell peppers. I usually either saute them with a bit of oil or vinegar, or oven roast them with a bit of olive oil drizzled over the top.

And that, my friends, is how I eat vegan. There are lots of recipes that are more intricate or complicated than what I've mentioned here, too--if you want to try some I'd recommend Pinterest.