Committing to the lifestyle of a vegetarian definitely limits some of the food groups people are able to eat, and on top of that, low carb diets cut out even more of those food groups.
Through dedication and hard work, even a low carb vegetarian diet is possible to get you the results that you need. Creating a low carb plan for a vegetarian diet will start by looking at all of the foods that contain more carbs such as breads, potatoes, and fruits.
Now this sounds like it’s cutting almost everything out of your diet completely, but there are plenty of low carb vegetarian recipes on the Internet and lucky for you, low carb is just a phase and not necessarily a long-term lifestyle if you don’t want it to be.
All good things take a bit of sacrifice, so in the meantime, try looking to leafy salads and most nuts such as walnuts, cashews, pistachios and almonds that are low in carbs but high in proteins and healthy fats.
If the drastic change of available food in your diet is a bit of a struggle, try making just one meal a day have little to no carbs while not modifying your other meals for the day. Taking this process slowly one meal at a time will make the process easier and easier over the next several weeks.
Even though it takes some time, in the end you’ll be preparing all your low carb meals for the day much more easily. A good goal for weight loss when attempting a low carb diet as a vegetarian is to watch your macronutrients very closely and try to stay under 50 grams of carbohydrates, using plant-based foods that fit your new diet plan.
Macronutrients are your body’s essential nutrients such as Protein, Carbohydrates and fats. Low carb diets should be very high in protein, at least your body weight or more, low in carbohydrates, under 50 grams, and don’t be too concerned with the fats that you’re getting as long as they’re healthy fats from nuts, avocados and other organic sources of non-saturated and mono saturated fats.
When going through the macros of all the food consumed for the day, it should look like 65% is fats, 25% protein, and only about 10% of carbs. To assist with calculating these macros try to download a helpful counting app, and after a couple of weeks of tracking your progress you should be able to naturally go into the kitchen and mindfully make meals with fewer carbs and higher proteins.
Fruits that work well for vegetarians on a low carb diet are strawberries and blueberries. Vegetables that are perfect for meatless low carb meals include turnip greens, broccoli, and cauliflower.
