A vegetarian is someone who does not eat any meat, poultry, game, fish, shellfish or by-products of animal slaughter.
 
Vegetarians are divided into these most common groups:
 
  • Lacto-ovo vegetarians: Vegetarians who avoid all animal flesh, but do consume dairy and egg products.
  • Lacto vegetarians: Vegetarians who avoid animal flesh and eggs, but do consume dairy products.
  • Ovo vegetarians: Vegetarians who avoid all animal products except eggs.
  • Vegans: Vegetarians who avoid all animal and animal-derived products.
     
In our app this is defined as a preference and can be ‘switched on’ inside our settings - Food preferences. As soon as that happens we respect the preference and no animal recipes will be visible in the recipe tab, you can do this for any of our diet plans inside plan store.
Another option is to try out our meal plan ‘Vegan for a week’. For seven days you will be given 4 vegan recipes/meals each day. 
When eating a plant-based diet, and excluding food groups such as animal products, there are some things to keep in mind:
Aminosyra Profil (protein)
 
All animal products are complete amino acid sources (That is, they contain all the amino acids that are essential for us).
When it comes to vegetables, we need to eat a variety of foods to get all of the amino acids needed, since some vegetable foods don't contain enough specific amino acids. 
 
There are four essential amino acids we need to keep in mind when combining a vegan diet:
 
  • Cereals (such as  wheat flour, pasta and white bread) have a low content of Lysine and Threonine
  • Legumes have low Sulfur amino acid content
  • Corn has low content of Tryptophan
 
Since all food contains proteins, more or less, we just need to make sure we have a mixture of the food categories above during the day. Some amino acids complement each other and can therefore be easily incorporated into the main meals meal - or at least make sure they are included in the total ‘day intake’. Cereals and legumes have a complementary effect on each other regarding the amino acid content. 
 
Fibers
When eating a vegan diet, your fiber intake usually skyrockets due to an increased intake of legumes and vegetables. For the most part, this is beneficial. The downside is that fiber doesn’t always mean calories, meaning it can be difficult to eat the right amount of calories per day. If you need to enrich your meals, use healthy fats, such as oils, avocado, nuts, seeds, tahini etc. 
Some people experience gastrointestinal tract discomfort when increasing their fiber intake. If you’re experiencing IBS, a vegan/vegetarian plan can be hard to follow. For most individuals, the discomfort is just a symptom of a changed diet (meaning you may experience the same symptoms no matter which plan you change to) and the discomfort may decrease after a few days. 
 
Fat
Because the vegetarian diet does not contain fish, the content of omega-3 fat may be low. Therefore, it is good to use rapeseed oil or food fat made from rapeseed oil in cooking. Other good sources of omega-3 fat are walnuts, seeds (flaxseed, chia), soybeans.
 
Vitamins and minerals
All vegans are recommended to add supplements such as B12 and vitamin D as this is only available in animailer. If you are following a vegan diet for a long time, it is important to add these supplements in addition to the diet. 
 
Our ‘Vegan for a week’ Meal Plan uses different vegetable sources to get a mix of nutrients. We also use fortified products in our meals, meaning for such a short period, complementing your diet with supplements is unnecessary.
 
It's important to note that some foods and meals can end up with higher or lower score due to different nutritional information. If you're ever unsure, double check that all nutrition values are correct and if you find any errors you can always either edit the item yourself or report it. We do our absolute best to verify the accuracy of the nutrition information. Although, we cannot guarantee its accuracy.
 
If you are having any medical conditions or suffers from conditions like eating disorders you may not use Lifesum. In that case, always seek advice from a doctor first. 
 
To read more about the health benefits from a plant-based diet and see what we base the plan on, please see below:
Abrahamsson Lillemor, Andersson Agneta, Nilsson Gerd; 2013; Näringslära för högskolan, sixth edition, Liber, Stockholm, p.96-102