I'm feeling weak... and strangely whenever I feel week / sick / tired / stressed ... I crave tuna! help... .I dont want to go down that path
You definitely need to watch your diet more carefully when you're vegetarian, and especially if you're vegan. If you're weak, you're probably lacking in iron & B-vitamins. Eat lots of leafy green vegetables (spinach & kale are especially good), quinoa (a grain like cous cous that is high in iron), fortified cereals & soy/rice milk, fortified tofu, and lots of brightly colored veggies. Complete proteins like hemp seed, brown rice with beans, etc. are also a good way to get all your essential amino acids. Variety is very important. I suggest getting a chart on vegetarian nutrition to hang in your kitchen. I have one that lists all the essential vitamins & minerals and lists foods that have them underneath. Green, leafy veggies are in almost every category. I think I got my chart from the Vegan Society: http://www.vegansociety.com/html/ in their shop. You can also cook with an iron skillet to boost your iron a little. A supplement might also help but ideally you want to get all your nutrition from a healthy diet. One thing I love about being veg is it has forced me to pay attention to what I eat and my nutrition, and I've also become a lot more adventurous in my cooking and tried a lot of new foods I wouldn't have otherwise tried. It's a little more high maintenance and you need to watch your nutrition more carefully, but it's soooo worth it. Your body (and the animals you don't eat) will thank you!
ignore it and add some seaweed to mashed chickpeas prepared like tuna salad. I used to think it was a protein jones, then discovered kelp powder fixed it. tases like the sea.
or Tuno, made by Worthington foods. I know some here swear that is it the best mashed salad ever. comes in a can, for those who don't know about it. I've not tried it, myself.
It's NOT iron, you get iron from veggies. It's B-vitamins. Eat some tuna for godssake. Just don't go nuts with it. You're body needs it. I suppose you COULD take supplements, but they aren't as good & impossible to find vegan. Just consider fish. Fish are beautiful, so respect them when you eat em like a good Native American. I'm sure there are alternatives if you really wanna dig. "The ability of a strict vegetarian diet to supply adequate amounts of B12 remains controversial, despite increasing evidence in support of vegetarianism and its nutritional adequacy. The controversy is fueled by two somewhat divergent schools of thought. One school emphasizes the fact that most animals, including humans, are capable of storing long-term supplies of B12. In humans, these stores may last for twenty years or longer. Given this potential for storage, a daily requirement for B12 is regarded as highly unlikely. A second school of thought, however, points to the unreliability of plants as sources of B12. For strict vegetarians who eat no animal products whatsoever, this unreliability may pose a problem. Since no plant is capable of making B-12, the amount of B12 in plant food depends upon the relationship of the plant to soil and root-level microorganisms (bacteria, yeasts, molds, and fungi) which make the vitamin. Cultured and fermented bean products like tofu, tempeh, miso, tamari and shoyu may or may not contain significant amounts of B12, depending upon the bacteria, molds, and fungi used to produce them. The B12 content of sea vegetables also varies according to the distribution of microorganisms in the surrounding sea environment. Unfortunately, reliable nutrient analyses are often unavailable for consumers of these products, and labeling for B12 content is not required. In general, tofus, tempehs, and sea vegetables tend to be more consistent sources of B12 than misos, tamaris, and shoyus. Depending upon the medium in which they are grown, brewer's and nutritional yeast can also be significant sources of B12 in a strict vegetarian diet. " http://whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=nutrient&dbid=107 Good luck in whatever you choose.
ahha- so the kelp has B12, fixing the jones.... (had to look that up, amazing what you don't bother to retain) so, you do NOT need to eat fish if you are an ethically-based veggie. Given expected world seafood supplies and mercury concerns, chickpeas and kelp sounds like a better deal, too.
Doesn't nutritional yeast have B-12 as well? It's easy to put in a shaker & use as parmesan. I love it on pizza & pasta. I forgot all about seaweed - it's pretty much a magical food, very good for you (I'm not a big fan of the texture though). Vegan sushi rolls are soooo good!
chickpeas & kelp... hmmm... (takes notes) Sounds like a recipe I could stomach! I keep noticing that I miss "salty" foods. love, mom
