Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:00

Welcome to the Deficient Vegans podcast. I'm the muscle deficient vegan here with the protein deficient vegan. Do you wanna say hi?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:05

Hi.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:05

Hi everybody. So this is episode 33 and happy Veganuary.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:10

Happy Veganuary guys.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:12

We're gonna start off this year and Veganuary by sharing a little bit about ourselves and our journey to veganism. We'll talk about how we became vegan, some of the struggles we had around that change, how our mindsets have shifted since becoming vegan, and what advice we might have for new vegans. So I hope everybody finds that interesting.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:28

And if you don't, just skip to the end.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:30

Yeah. I know this is a little different than some of our normal content, but it's Veganuary.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:33

It's Veganuary. So we talk about veganism.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:37

First up. New news.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:39

New news.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:40

So the new news is, it's Veganuary.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:43

Guys, it's Veganuary.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:44

I'm a broken record. Uh, yeah. So what, what is Veganuary? It's a global.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:49

No, no, it's vegan. Plus January.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:54

Oh, that's, I didn't catch onto that until now.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:57

Yeah, I know. It confuses a lot of people.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:01

Mm, that's clever. Anyway, it's a global nonprofit campaign that encourages people to try vegan for the month of January. And it's not just vegan diet, it's vegan everything. So, uh, it is a charity that is registered in England and Wales, so it's an actual nonprofit charity. It's a whole a whole thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:17

Yeah. And if you're new to being a vegan or if you just want more vegan information, because why wouldn't you? Their website is like packed full of vegan recipes and all kinds of other information that would help you go vegan. And they're really active on their socials too, so it's a good one to follow.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:34

Yeah, a lot of really cool stuff. Um, next, there was a big increase in the number of Mediterranean octopi off the coast of England this year.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:44

Oh.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:45

Yeah. It sounds like they think global warming is like pushing them north more towards the coast. Huh? They, they call it an octopus bloom, I guess, when there's a bunch of them in one area. The last one they said was 2023, and this one they just had was a 1500% increase over the number of octopi than the one in 2023.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:03

Boy, I don't know, like I wanna see an octopus, but this doesn't seem like maybe a good thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:10

Yeah, it's something about the way their eggs are and the right temperature of water for mating season, something like that. But apparently people were getting all kinds of videos of them, like walking and mating and like grabbing cameras underwater and all.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:22

It's still weird if you videotape other animals having sex guys. Leave them to their private business.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:29

I think most of the time they're recording an octopus and then it just starts waiting.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:32

And it just starts. Wow. There's no foreplay? Yeah. Interesting. I don't know. I don't know. I've never watched one of these videos, so.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:41

Moving on. Uh, finally, scientists at Italy's Public Research Agency have created 3D printed nutrient dense snack bars made from cultured plant cells and fruit residue.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:56

Wow.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:57

Yeah, so I guess in Italy they've been rejecting kind of the lab grown meat. So they're going with this alternative approach to just print these snack bars from the, you know, these cells and residues and stuff.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:08

Can we print them? We have a 3D printer. Can we make snack bars?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:11

Uh, well, we have to have the right material. I don't know.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:16

We need the goop.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:17

We need the goop. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:18

So what do you think they're gonna call these?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:21

I don't know. What do you wanna call 'em?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:23

Um, printer powered blobs.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:28

I like that. I was thinking extruded delights.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:32

That's like not appealing at all.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:34

No, uh, yeah. Luckily I'm not on their PR team, so.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:37

Hey, but if you need someone for your PR team, we've got ideas. They're not good, but we have some.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:45

All right. So, uh, let's go ahead and get into our main content here. So we're gonna talk a little bit about how we became vegan. Uh, so do you want to go first and tell us what your story is?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:53

Yeah, so I guess we have to start when I became a vegetarian, which was at age 12, um, I remember sitting in my social studies class and my social studies teacher was talking about how he used to do the Peace Corps for a few years back when he was a youth. And he was talking about how he did it in Nepal and a lot of people were vegetarian, so he actually went vegetarian for those couple of years. And like before that moment, I had never heard the word vegetarian and it like blew my mind. I went home and I was like, oh, I like, I just didn't know people could do that. I didn't know you could just not eat meat. Um, so yeah, I like wrote my parents a note about how I wouldn't be eating animals anymore. And then I said some really philosophical stuff about, you know, I can't eat cows because cows have mothers and daughters and aunts and uncles and I gave them the note and then, um, uh, you know, parents, they don't really like to be caught off guard, so it was a bit of a, it was a bit of a battle, I would say. But they eventually came around and let me go vegetarian and, and then. You know, I was a vegetarian for like, almost, I think probably 20 years. Wow. Yeah. So a very long time. I never met another vegetarian or a vegan in the wild in my entire life.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 5:11

That's pretty interesting.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 5:12

Yeah. Well, I mean, I, so, you know, I went to college, went to engineering school with a bunch of guys. There weren't any vegetarians or vegans. I did meet a vegetarian that used to be vegetarian, and then he wasn't vegetarian.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 5:23

So, yeah, I've met a couple of those.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 5:26

But then, yeah, then I started working in like male dominated workplaces and there weren't any vegetarian and vegans there. Um, and so, uh, eventually I just happened to read the book, eating animals and like all the dots connected because I guess I didn't really know. Like the difference between vegetarian and vegan? I guess I, I kind of always thought vegetarians were like doing it for moral reasons and then like the vegans were doing it for health reasons, which is funny now because I'm like, that's so obviously wrong.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 5:58

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 5:59

But yeah, I don't know. I just had never met any vegetarians or vegans, so like my thoughts were my own and I, I also was never really on social media much, so I never saw any of this stuff. Um, so yeah, I read eating animals and I watched the movie Cowspiracy and I basically went vegan overnight. It happened to be on Veganuary, January 1st actually.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 6:19

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 6:20

Um, and so I've been vegan ever since.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 6:22

Yeah. That's awesome.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 6:23

Yeah. And actually when I went vegan, I had just started working at a new job, so I didn't really know anyone either. And I was going vegan and I was kind of, I kind of like quietly did it, you know, like I, like didn't really tell many people. I maybe told like one or two people. And then that probably lasted for like a few months. And then, um, actually kind of like when you and I started dating again, I like started being a little more vocal.'cause we were going out to vegan restaurants Right. And like, you were like willing to eat all vegan when we were together and stuff. So like, my standards rose a bit and then, which, which actually made me a more pissed off person with like everyone else. Yeah. You know, like at work functions like. I, I had gotten so used to being like the vegetarian that never had any options. Like it was just like cheese pizza kind of thing. And so like as a vegan, it's like your options become even less limited. And I was fine with it at first and then I just started getting really pissed and like, I would just be like, well if that lunch and learn doesn't have lunch for me, I guess I'm learning elsewhere. And like I wouldn't go to that or I wouldn't go to like, work dinners if they didn't have solid vegan options. Like I just remember getting to a point where I was just like pissed at the situation and like, why aren't people more accommodating for us?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:40

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:41

Cause there's a lot of us and, and especially like, we live near Chicago, so like there should be no issue with having vegan foods.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:48

Yeah. Plenty to find.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:49

Yeah. So I remember like, yeah, that kind of changed for me. I became a more outspoken vegan and then, um, like you moved in and then, I don't know, I kind of got into like high protein cooking because you were worried about protein, you know, so. Yeah, then we started our social media accounts and now we're very outspoken.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:10

Sorry about that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:12

What about you?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:13

Yeah, so, you know, I met you when we were young and you were a vegetarian, so that kind of implanted that into my mind. So that was always in the back of my mind, like, hey, vegetarians are a thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:24

See I just need to have met a me. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:27

So, I've always had the growing up, the typical concerns that everybody has about protein and like, you know, what do vegans eat? And blah, blah, blah. And you know, I wasn't really even thinking much about vegan. I was thinking about vegetarian and like basically just not eating meat. Yeah. And what would that be like? So, uh, eventually I found like forks over knives and game changers and I was trying to look into like some health focus stuff and just found myself in that realm. And that, you know, was kind of my initial attraction was. One with forks over knives, like maybe the potential health benefits of eating plant-based. And then with Game Changers, it really, something clicked for me there and it was like, oh, well all these people can do all these amazing things and they're vegan. It sounds to me like there's really no limitations. Yeah. So why, you know, why would we not be vegan?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 9:14

Yeah. I remember having those conversations with you and we started dating again.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:17

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 9:18

Like a few years ago you were just like, I don't.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:20

Yeah. So then I just went through this kind of internal struggle for a while. It's like, okay, well all the objections I had in my mind, and they weren't really, like, I wasn't actively objecting, but just like all the things I thought I knew were like not right anymore. So I was like, okay, so what am I, what am I even anchored on here? Yeah. For not doing this. Um, yeah. So then when I moved in here, um, you know, the food here is vegan, so, and you make great food, so what am I arguing about? And basically I was just kind of a overnight vegan at that point. Yeah. Uh, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 9:49

I mean, yeah. Was it like hard for you when you moved in here?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:53

Uh, no, I mean, it really wasn't as hard as I thought it was gonna be. I'm not sure if it's just because like the, the food you were making or what it was, but I didn't really miss anything that I was used to having. There were some things where it's like, it, it wasn't really about the meat, but there were some things where it was like, okay, I like this food. Like how can we make something where I get the same flavors?'cause like spicy stuff, like buffalo stuff, whatever. Um, but you know, we figured you figured that out pretty easily. Um, so yeah, I mean it is mostly just like, how do I change old habits more than like actually missing any particular food.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:27

Yeah. I remember you were missing like, some of your mom stuff.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 10:30

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:30

Like your mom would make you special stuff on different, like holidays and occasions.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 10:34

Yeah, that was definitely the hardest one. Sometimes your parents make like some special thing. Yeah. The thing you liked your whole life. And I, you know, I can't really eat those anymore, but, you know, they're really supportive. So that was just like a conversation thing. Yeah. It wasn't too bad.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:44

Your family was really supportive, like instantly.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 10:46

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:46

Really. They caught up really fast on it, even though it felt like it, like came outta nowhere, you know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 10:50

Yeah. I got lucky there. I know a lot of people struggle with that component of it, so. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:55

Were people surprised, like when you told your friends and family and stuff?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 10:59

Um, yeah. I don't know that anybody really expressed surprise. I got a lot of the typical, like I could never do that, but I'm not sure anybody was like, oh, wow. When you initially went vegan to now, have any of your thoughts changed at all?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 11:17

Okay. Like, my biggest one was I was addicted to cheese. Like, I mean. Legitimately addicted to cheese, and.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 11:26

I think we all were at one point. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 11:29

I just remember that being like my big hangup and it was like a, a huge hangup to the point where, I don't know, I just had never talked to anyone that explained the dairy industry and the egg industry to me. So like I never thought that cheese was like morally wrong.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 11:46

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 11:46

Like I didn't think there was any like, harm being done to animals.'cause I was just an oblivious vegetarian, I guess. And I, and I like assumed vegans then. This is really stupid. But I assumed they didn't like cheese or like, they prioritized their health so much that they were willing to eliminate cheese. So like, I went basically 20 years of thinking like, oh, vegans just hate cheese. Vegans don't hate cheese guys.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:10

Yeah. There there's a, there's a real theme in this episode of like, all of the things I used to think seem so silly to me now.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:19

Oh, I know. I, I feel stupid even saying it 'cause it's like, but nothing, it hadn't clicked to me that like cows were impregnated.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:26

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:27

To produce milk.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:28

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:29

Duh. Like duh. Right. But in my brain, and I think it's like the way they do commercials and stuff. Yeah. But it feels like cows are always, they always have milk. Like they're just, and they have to always, with milk, have milk and they need to be milked. And like I remember talking to people that like, were. Like farmer types, you know, at some of my other jobs. And they were like, yeah, it like the cows get, they're in pain. Like if they don't get milked. Yeah. And it's like, yeah. But now I'm like looking back like, you impregnated them. Yeah. You made them have milk. Like, it's just crazy. But anyways, yeah. Severely addicted to cheese and like, that was a big concern for me is like, I knew I wanted to go vegan after I watched the documentaries and read the books and like, I did it overnight, but I was really, really worried about like missing cheese. Like severely concerned guys. Yeah. And like I remember I missed it. I missed it for like probably a month, but I was like eating, I tried every fucking vegan cheese option on like I could get my hands on. Yeah. And then like within a month I just like, I was fine.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 13:29

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 13:29

And like I don't think about it and like it seems now that I'm like past it, right? Like it just seems like such a dumb reason to not go vegan. Like. Uh, it was just like non-consequential. It wasn't a big deal. Yeah. You know, but like, it seemed like a mountain to me.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 13:44

Yeah. Cheese is like a little pile of fat and salt. And we can do that on the vegan side, just as easily. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 13:48

Like, we, you can do that. It, it will be okay. Like if cheese is your hangup, try some vegan cheeses, like it's gonna be fine. Yeah. So I would say that was my big one. Um, and then like, my other thoughts that changed, I guess like when I first went vegan, I wasn't very vocal about it. I was, I, I was very much of like, I don't want to inconvenience people. I don't want people to feel like put out for like having to make accommodations for me. That kind of thing. Like is very much, I don't want to be a burden on people. And then now I'm basically awful. Yeah. You know, like, like, I'm not gonna go to your thing if you don't have an option for me. I'm not gonna go to this thing. I'm, I'm like, not gonna come to your house. Like, I don't know. Yeah. I, I just feel like. I don't know. I look at it a lot differently. I look at it like, if someone had a peanut allergy, would I make only peanut dishes and then invite them over? Like obviously not, I would make accommodations. Right. And it feels kinda like that to me. Like I've, I've just gotten like past the whole, like not wanting to hurt people's feelings and like not wanting to put people out. It's like, if you want me there, like please have things I can eat or like, I don't know. I think the, I will say like, the one thing I think that really changed my mind on this is like, at work, this was a couple years ago, we were supposed to be locked in for strike coverage. Yeah. For two weeks. Not allowed to leave, right? Yeah. And they were like, I was like looking at the menu and they didn't have a single vegan option. And I was so stressed. So like I, I sent an email to like the person, like arranging all that stuff. And I was like, what are your vegan options? Like, I'm vegan and I'm gonna be locked in here for two weeks without anything. You can't get delivery like it's a strike, you know? And she was like, oh, well, we'll have oatmeal and you can make that with water. And then we are also gonna have mixed greens so you can get a bowl of that for lunch and dinner, but you'll need to bring your own dressing. And I fucking flipped out. You remember me like?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 15:50

Oh, I remember.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 15:52

I had a meltdown, guys. Mm-hmm. And I was like, I, I emailed the refinery manager and was like, yo, I need real options. Like I'm a human, not a rabbit. Like I need. Fat. I need protein, I need things other than a hundred calories worth of lettuce. Yeah. And I think that was like my breaking point as far as like, I think, and I think every vegan comes to that point where they're like, I'm tired of being accommodating. I'm going into bitch mode.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:17

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:17

That was mine and I haven't recovered.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:19

Yeah, that would've been a really interesting diet. It's like reverse keto. You're 95% carbs, which happens to be the only thing your body doesn't need to be alive.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:28

And it's only like 300 calories also, because I was like, am I gonna have my own fridge? No, we can't do that. Okay. Um, do I just die? I don't know.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:36

Yeah. So not super vegan friendly.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:39

I would say that was like one another thought that's changed my views on what activism is. Yeah, I, I think, like for me, I always thought activism was like, you have to be standing out on the street and like holding signs and stuff, but I, I, I feel like my views have changed a lot on that. Not to say that that's not like good.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:57

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:57

Do your activism, like whatever speaks to you do it. But like for me, I, I'm a very introverted person. Like, I, I'm not the kind of person that's gonna like go do a group activism thing. Like, I'm not gonna talk to strangers. Like, that's just not my personality type. I can't do that kind of thing. But I feel like, you know, like I think this podcast could be an effective form of veganism sharing recipes I feel like is. Like vegan is like an effective form of activism. Like, uh, you know.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 17:25

Education and, you know, awareness is activism and really, but yeah. But an education like this where, you know, people who want the information can come get the information mm-hmm. Is still a form of it. So.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 17:34

I feel like even just talking to your friends and family or telling 'em about the lunch you made. Yeah. Like those are small forms of activism, but they add up like that one-on-one connection with people, like it changes minds. Yeah. You know, so I feel like that that changed a lot for me. Like there's stuff that you can do, even if you're not like the type that's gonna go stand on the streets, you know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 17:54

Yeah. Right. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 17:57

And then, yeah. I mean, what's, what's changed for you?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 18:00

Yeah. So for me, I originally started looking into plant-based, plant-based for health reasons, not even really veganism. Yeah. Just like reading, like the plant-based authors and stuff like that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 18:10

Yeah. I remember you were doing that before we even started like dating again.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 18:13

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Forks over knives. I was kind of looking at, and I was kind of noodling around the idea of doing like a whole food, plant-based diet really strictly for the health reasons. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. Um, but, you know, then like, I slowly had the realization, I think, and this is kind of what changed for me, it's like, okay, well as I learned more about this, you know, there's nothing really in meat that we even need. So like, why are we, you know, why are we doing this animal thing at all? Yeah. Right. So, yeah, that slowly for me turned into like an animal thing because now I don't understand why we're doing any of the animal farming really. Because there's nothing special in them. You know? We can all eat vegan and get everything we need. Yeah. Uh, so, so my thoughts on that evolved over time.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 19:01

Yeah. Like, logically it doesn't make sense. That's where you came to it from. Right? Right. Like an logical perspective of like, I'm getting everything. Why are we doing this?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 19:09

Right, exactly. And something else that changed for me was. I guess like understanding why I like certain foods, for an example, like a barbecue sandwich or like a buffalo sandwich or something. Like, you always thought it was because, you know, it was buffalo chicken. Yeah. That I like, like I thought I liked buffalo chicken. I, I found out that if you do buffalo tofu, it tastes pretty much the same because most of the flavor, most of the taste really comes from like the seasoning, the preparation, the things like that. So it's not even like when I have something now, I'm not like, Ooh, I wish I had the meat version of this, because there's really not that big of a difference in the taste.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 19:43

Yeah, I remember you came around on that really fast actually.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 19:47

Yeah. Yeah. I mean there's a lot of good, a lot of good options in Chicago. You make a lot of good food, it's pretty easy to come around.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 19:52

Yeah, I remember like I kept checking in with you over the first few months or something like, are you having like cravings? Are you good? Like.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 20:00

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 20:00

And you weren't even relying that much on like meat alternatives, so.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 20:03

No. Yeah, I was just all in. Yeah. Uh, yeah. And then the other thing that really changed for me is once I started having these realizations, because I've been in fitness communities and circles for a long time, so I like, I know all the typical things and I've said all the typical things and read the stuff. So like for me, once I like have these things start to click for me, I just felt compelled to a certain extent to try to educate people on , hey, all this stuff you think about veganism in terms of fitness is kind of nonsense. So maybe we can get on board and you don't even have to go vegan. Like I'd be happy if I could just convince some people to add tofu, you know? Yeah. As, as a meat option. Maybe they eat a little less meat. So that is still beneficial for the vegan cause. But just in general, try to get rid of some of the stigmas around like tofu, specifically soy, protein quality and things like that. Because the things that you think before you go a vegan just aren't real things. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 20:56

It's always funny for me looking at like high protein recipe creators in the omnivore space and they're just like using the same, like they're using egg whites and they're using like cottage cheese and like ingredients that aren't even like delicious when it's like you could be using, they're like vegan options that will add just as much protein, but like it will taste better.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 21:19

Yeah. So that's also something that's changed for me. You know, I, and I think this is common, I've had this discussion a couple times on, you know, social media or whatever, but it's the idea that like the vegan diet is restrictive really seems kind of misleading to me because I've tried way more different ingredients in food since going vegan than I ever did when I wasn't vegan. Kinda because of what you said, like especially in the fitness arena, we've got like. Uh, maybe, I don't know, five to 10 ingredients. Yeah. That we just kind of put on the plate every time and revolve around so you've got, you know, the same thing over and over and over. Whereas if we're doing vegan high protein, I mean, just go take a look at your website. There's like a different ingredient in every dish. I mean, we use, we use tofu for a lot of stuff, but it's not the same because like we have like silken tofu, we have tofu in cubes. We have tofu that's like shredded, like it's a totally different type of thing. It is just kind of like a, a soy product, a soy product that is protein. But then we try a bunch of different vegetables and fruits and all kinds of different like sauces and TVP muffins and things like that. Like, I've just tried way more different things as a vegan. So to me, the idea that a vegan diet is restrictive, just, it doesn't pan out in reality for me at all.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 22:34

Yeah. I remember having that thought too though.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 22:36

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 22:36

Of just like, I'm not gonna be able to eat anything.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 22:37

Yeah. And there, there, the only restriction is like, it's harder to find at restaurants. Yeah. And it's harder to find packaged foods, but as far as like the actual food available to you, you're going to eat a much bigger variety.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 22:47

Oh yeah. Like, I would say like what 90% of the grocery store is actually vegan. Yeah. I mean, as long as soon as you get into the package items, like it becomes less. But like all the fruits and vegetables are vegan, like tofus, vegan, like. So like, so many things are vegan Yeah. That you probably don't even really think about.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:04

Right. No, I agree a hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. Those are some of the things that have changed for me. And, um, you know, really just flipped a lot of switches in my head that now make it, I mean, it would be impossible to go back now because there's no reason to. Like, I don't, I don't miss anything. I know I don't need anything that comes from animal products, so it just, it wouldn't even make any sense. Yeah. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:22

Along those lines, are there any like miscon, other misconceptions you might have had before going vegan?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:26

Yeah, the big one was tofu sucks, right?'cause like I did try tofu, you know, just a couple of times, not because I was like, Ooh, I'm trying tofu. I was just like, oh, I'm interested, like what is tofu?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:35

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:36

And you know, it always came out in like some bland little cube and a couple of times I tried it and I was like, okay, well this is like a rubbery little, I don't know what this is, but it's not good.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:43

No, I remember you trying and like texting me about it. Yeah. And being like, this is garbage.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:50

Yeah. And, uh, you know, it's, and I'm sure some people like it that way, it's just not something I liked because I like, I like spicy stuff. I like barbecue stuff. So like, I really like kind of a strong flavor in a lot of things. Uh, but yeah, it's not really like tofu sucks. It's like I didn't like it prepared that way. Yeah. Which is probably, it should be pretty obvious, but, you know, tofu has this stigma anyway. Mm-hmm. So it's just like, oh yeah, everybody was right. Tofu sucks. I'm done with that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:13

Which meanwhile, tofus like in my being like the most versatile and best ingredient ever.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:18

Yeah. I mean, now I have tofu two outta my three meals a day, probably. Literally, and a lot of different ways. Like a lot of times, you don't know, it's tofu in, there's like tofu in a smoothie, tofu cube, shredded tofu, whatever.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:29

Like it's tofu and a sauce.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:30

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:31

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:31

It's just like a infinitely flexible protein source.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:35

Yeah. You'd literally just had tofu in a chickpea salad, right? Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:38

So anyway. Yeah, that, so that was a huge one. Um, the other misconception for me was like, I, I never really looked a lot into veganism, so I just assumed for the vegan diet specifically that vegan food was just like various forms of salad. Yeah. Which I think, and again, I, I wanna reiterate that a lot of the things in this episode sound extremely silly to me now. So, uh, yeah. But anyway, I thought it was just various forms of salad. There's like, you know, you probably have like your tofu on top of your salad or whatever, but everything was like based around salad. No. Yeah. Which didn't sound very appealing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 25:07

I feel like this is partially my fault because when we were dating in high school, like we'd go out and the only thing I would order as a vegetarian was like cheese pizza and salad. So maybe you just thought that's all vegetarians eat. So vegan would, yeah, like the cheese would just remove the cheese.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 25:21

Yeah. The cheese pizza's not an option now. Although I have found out also that side note, and this is probably not a, uh, common opinion, but I actually like pizza without any cheese on it at all. Just like the, just the marinara, the toppings, vegetable toppings, and the bread. I mean, you know, it's not as good as if you put vegan cheese on it, but it's not like a bad.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 25:41

No, it's not horrible. Yeah. I used to think it was an abomination and now I don't.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 25:45

And I think a lot of that is also like your taste change over time. Yeah. So like, even if you were really used to like these very specific things, like that's gonna change anyway. And I know that's really common with the whole food plant-based people because they do low salt, low oil. So, you know, a lot of people are like, oh, well there's all the flavor. But you know, they talk a lot about how your palate changes over time. So I mean, whatever you end up trying, you will end up liking at some point. Yeah. In almost all cases. So, um, yeah. Then also I thought the protein options were pretty limited. I didn't really know about anything other than tofu for a protein option. Uh, but it turns out there's a lot of different forms of soy. There's like, you know, wheat, gluten, which I didn't even know was a protein. Mm-hmm. At all. Literally didn't know what gluten was a protein before, before this. So we've got a lot of options as far as like seitan and things like that. And then, you know, several other things. Like I know, you know, you always know beans are like a protein, but you know, always knew beans weren't like high protein.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 26:36

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 26:38

Yeah. A lot of misconceptions there around like just protein availability, not necessarily protein amount.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 26:43

No, I had the same ones 'cause I was eating a lot of like egg whites and cheese and dairy products to get my protein as a vegetarian. So I was like, what will I be eating?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 26:52

Yeah. And then the last one I think is, I didn't really understand that strength and power athletes could successfully be vegan. Like, I always kind of knew there were ultra marathoners and Ironman athletes and stuff like that, that were vegan, but I never really saw any, like football players or power lifters or something like that, that was, that were vegan. So between watching game changers and finding the website great vegan athletes, uh, I, you know, that, you know, kind of flipped another lever in my brain where it's like, oh, well okay, so you can even do this as a vegan. So between great vegan athletes like showing off Olympians and football players and everything like that, it's like, okay. So the argument that there's some kind of physical limitation on a vegan diet is just totally out the window at this point.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 27:35

Yeah, and I think that's really interesting because like if you are in vegan spaces on social media, you probably feel like there is just so much vegan content constantly there. Yeah. But like, if you're not in those spaces, you won't see it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 27:49

Oh, for sure.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 27:49

Like, I never saw that stuff. You never saw, obviously you never saw that stuff.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 27:53

No, I mean, I'm. All the time. I just like send people to great vegan athletes.'cause like, uh, there are always people who are asking like, can I do this as a vegan? Can I do that as a vegan? And it's like, okay, if you're talking about physical, like performance, there's no limitation there. Yeah. So like, just look at this list of athletes. A lot of them are like Olympic gold medalist. A lot of them are huge, you know, strength, bodybuilder, power athletes, whatever. Like, that's not a limitation. So yeah,

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:19

I feel like if you're wanting to do vegan activism that's not in the streets, just educating people on a one-on-one basis. Like go through social media comments where people are saying you can't do this on a vegan diet. And show them the reasons you can, or like.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:31

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:32

Reddit questions. I mean, I feel like you can make a lot of impact by answering those questions and like educating people on it because if you're not in vegan spaces, you're not gonna come across that naturally.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:42

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:42

Which is another good reason. If you're a vegan, just make a social media account, show all your pretty vegan food.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:47

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:47

Hopefully someone will see it, you know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:49

Yeah. So what, what were some of the misconceptions that you had?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:52

Yeah, so I think the biggest one was I thought that, and this is really stupid, but I thought vegetarians were vegetarian for moral reasons. And I thought vegans, all vegans were just vegan for like health reasons, because I genuinely did not understand like the evils of the dairy and egg industry had no freaking idea on that. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 29:15

You didn't realize there was still a moral issue with vegetarian.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 29:17

Exactly. I thought I was doing everything I could as vegetarian and now I look back and it's like, God, I was so stupid. But like, it also, it kind of makes me sad 'cause I'm in a lot of vegan spaces and vegans will like kind of be shitting on vegetarians as a group. Yeah. And it's like, I was, I was a vegetarian like not too long ago and I, like literally, I genuinely thought I was doing everything I could. So like I think if you're having conversations with vegetarians, like educating is helpful. Like right. And then if they're like, yeah, no, I get it and I'm still vegetarian, well then, okay, yeah. Maybe that's like a little hypocritical, right? Yeah. But like I, I would, I would say there's probably a lot of 'em that we're like me and they just didn't know. About like the dairy and egg industries.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 29:56

Yeah. And you know, as far as the vegan cause of reduction of animal harm, vegetarian is still a great middle ground. Yeah. So, I mean, I definitely wouldn't be hating on vegetarians.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 30:08

And they're like the easiest to turn guys.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 30:10

Yeah. Right. Yeah. It's like, oh, let's figure out how to get you some milk and cheese and you're Yeah. On, on the dark side.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 30:14

They're like some great non-dairy options, so you don't need them.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 30:18

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 30:18

Oh man. I think another misconception I had was like, I, and it's, I don't know if it's a misconception, but like a concern I had was like, I just didn't know what I was gonna cook because so much of my diet was relying on like egg white. Like I remember I'd have like an egg white omelet and like I'd have like Greek yogurt for lunch and like whatever else. But like a lot of my protein specifically. Was coming from dairy and eggs and like some tofu, but I definitely didn't know about TVP or seitan or Vital Wheat gluten. And I think like a lot of that has to do with the fact that I just didn't have any vegetarian friends and I wasn't on social media much. So like I just didn't, I didn't know any of that stuff, you know what I mean? Like I was like, I don't know, completely in the dark on that. Yeah. So like I was really worried like what am I gonna be eating? Which I think allowed me to be really creative in like finding new ingredients and stuff. And then like when you moved in, I knew you were really worried about the protein thing. So like that also made me more creative in the kitchen. Like I have gotta find some options for this guy so he doesn't want to eat meat. Well it worked. Yeah. Oh, and another one I had was like, it would be more expensive, but that, that was mostly 'cause me, like I was looking at like packaged options. And some of, and if you're only eating packaged vegan food, you know, like your meat alternatives and your vegan cheeses and stuff like that, stuff is gonna be expensive.'cause they're smaller companies. But like if you're doing more whole food, it's actually a lot cheaper. But I just remember looking around and being like, oh this is gonna be really expensive. Did you feel that way? Way?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 31:50

Yeah, definitely. I mean, especially when you see like the obvious like soy milk markups and stuff like that on menus. And then some of the packaged vegan foods are significantly more expensive. Yeah.'cause mainly, I think it's mainly'cause they're small brands. Yeah. So they don't have like the economies of scale. They don't have a giant presence in supermarkets.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:07

So we need to make 'em more popular.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 32:09

Yeah, right. It did seem that way at first. But then you can always go back to like, oh, beans and rice are some of the cheapest foods ever. So I don't have to buy this fancy, small brand thing. I could technically just buy beans and rice. Exactly. So, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:21

And then I think like the last one that I was really hung up on was like, I'm not gonna be able to eat out anywhere. And that was based on, as a vegetarian, I found it really hard to find options at a lot of restaurants. Like whenever I'd go places with people, like I basically had one menu option even as a vegetarian. So I remember being like, very concerned that like, I was not gonna be able to eat anything anywhere. And then, I don't know. Then we downloaded Happy Cow. We happened to download Happy Cow. When we were in Gatlinburg, we went on our first vacation in Gatlinburg and there were like no vegan food options. It was really bad. Yeah. And then you stumbled upon Happy Cow. And then we were like, holy shit. There's actually like a, there's still not that much in Gatlinburg.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:03

No. But that was our, the first time we went to a place that was fully vegan. Yes. Which was, uh, Cinnaholic. They make cinnamon rolls and stuff.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:10

Oh my God. I like viscerally remember walking in there? And like, I, we didn't believe it. Yeah. Like, I remember we went up to the counter and we're like, so what's vegan? And she's like, the whole menu. And we're like, um, do you know what vegan is? Like? I remember we a, we were like so nervous about like that maybe they didn't know what vegan was.'cause we had never been to a fully vegan place. And she's like, no, it's, everything here is vegan. And we were just like, holy shit. Yeah. It was like life changing. We probably went there like five times when we were in Gatlinburg.'cause we couldn't find food options.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:45

Yeah. I think it was just, I think they're there at that point. It was just the Cinnaholic. And then like one of the pizza places had vegan cheese.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:52

Uh, what the mushroom place? The Mad Mushroom.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:55

Uh, mellow Mushroom.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:55

Mellow mushroom. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:56

So either way we were eating junk food.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:58

Yeah. No. It was like, we don't go there anymore for vacation because they don't have options. But that is where we discovered Happy cow. Yeah. Life changing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 34:05

So what's some of the advice that you might give to a new vegan?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 34:08

Okay, so my advice would be obviously like learn to cook.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 34:12

A big one.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 34:13

Yeah, I think especially like if you're in a smaller town, like if you're in Chicago, you probably don't need to ever learn how to cook if you have a lot of money because there's just like a hundred places you could go in Chicago. But if you're in like a smaller town, you might not have any vegan options or restaurants. So like you really do need to know how to cook. I think that's like a big one. And then, um, like figure out what proteins you like. So try a few different dishes, like try TVP, try tofu, make your own seitan. Or maybe like buy seitan.'cause like making your own can seem a little stressful for the first time. But like, try out some different protein sources and see what you like.'cause I, there are a lot of people I've heard that just hate TVP in all. Like they have some kind of weird taste thing they can. I don't know. I don't have that, so I, I can't really describe it, but I think it's a little bit like the cilantro thing, like where I hate anything with cilantro. They hate anything with TVP, so like, they figured out TVP's not for me. Right? But like, you're gonna find stuff maybe you don't like as much, but like, I bet you find a few that you really like. And so learn a couple recipes with those and then download Happy Cow.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 35:19

Oh, a hundred percent.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 35:19

That's like one of my biggest recommendations for a new vegan. It'll help you find vegan options at non-vegan restaurants. And it'll also help you find like maybe secret vegan restaurants you didn't know exist.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 35:30

Yeah, we've had a couple big wins on there.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 35:32

We found a whole vegan restaurant in our neighborhood that we didn't even know was there. Yeah, it was crazy. Um, oh, you know, another one that I would suggest, and this is funny coming for me because I really wasn't on social media much before going vegan, but like I, I feel like if you're just starting out vegan, it can be very isolating if you don't know other vegans in real life. So like starting a social media account or something, or like talking to vegans on social media, following some vegans on social media or like Reddit or just like find a place where you feel like you can ask questions and have community. I think it makes you feel a lot less alone because it can feel really alone. Especially like, I think a lot of people deal with just being pissed off when you first go vegan because like, you know, you, you have this big moral realization of why you're not eating meat and animal products and then you look around and all your friends and family are still eating it and they just, they don't get it. Yeah. And like you look at the world and it's like very set up against you as a vegan and you just feel pissed. Like, I just remember feeling pissed off. You know? And I think like having social media and finding community is really helpful in dealing with that. I don't know. What do you think on that?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 36:50

Yeah, no, I found it really helpful too, just basically for the same reasons. Like I can see first of all, vegan people that are out there being high performing, and then like other people having like struggles and things I can kind of address and that I can even ask questions and say like, how do you deal with that? So yeah, I mean, it's definitely super helpful. Community's always good.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 37:07

Yeah. Especially since it's is really hard to find those people in real life. So I didn't like social media before going vegan. Yeah. Another one I would say is like, if you need vegan junk food in the beginning to help with transition or even like many, many months into transition just to figure your shit out, eat it. Like, there's a lot of stigma around eating vegan junk food, but like, damn, they need, they wanna go vegan, let 'em eat their fucking Yeah. Vegan cheese and their vegan hamburgers. Who gives a shit.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 37:36

Right? Yeah. And, and you know, you'll eventually figure out how to cook, but like, you know, uh. Going vegan isn't really a health thing necessarily. Yeah. So if you're going from non-vegan junk food diet to vegan junk food diet, like you're still part of the cause. Like there's no, unless you have a specific health goal, there's not really a reason you have to eat healthy to go vegan at the same time. Yeah. Like, so it's.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 38:01

Like if you're going vegan for moral reasons around animal welfare and you need something to get you through that until you figure out how to cook, there is no shame in using vegan junk food. Yeah. It is more expensive, but like if you can afford it, eat whatever you want. Like. Yeah. I feel like some other advice I would give is like being upfront with people about why you're vegan because like. I don't know. This is just like personal experience, but I think being wishy washy on it or not being like totally honest in the beginning, you're only gonna get more questions and stuff. Like as soon as you just address it head on, like maybe your first like lunch and learn where you're asking for vegan options. Be like, Hey, I'm vegan for ethical reasons. Like, are you gonna provide vegan options? Like, let people know. Otherwise you're gonna keep getting disappointed and you might still get disappointed when you tell people, but like, I don't know, at least you feel like you have a little more control of the situation. I don't know. Does that resonate with you at all?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 38:57

Yeah, I think it makes everything go a little smoother. If you know why you're a vegan, and you can just say that upfront rather than being kind of like, oh, I don't know. I'm just trying out this vegan thing and you're real wishy-washy. And then they're like, oh, well, so like, you don't have to do that today. Right?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:13

Yeah. You do get a lot of that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 39:14

Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, I think it does help a lot.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:17

I remember I went vegan and there was already another, there was a freegan at work that people had interacted with a lot, which I guess.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 39:26

What's a freegan?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:26

Okay, so this is my understanding based on only meeting one.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 39:30

Not the parks and rec definition, right? No, no. It's like you only eat food out of a dumpster or something.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:34

No, no. I, I think he, he actually bought real food.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 39:36

Oh, okay.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:37

But I think it was basically, if he's preparing it, if he's buying it, it's always going to be plant-based. But if he is at a work function or something like that, and there are no vegan options, like, and if there's a vegan option, he's gonna choose a vegan option. But if he goes and there's no vegan options, he's gonna eat a chicken sandwich. Yeah. And. That was a little unfortunate for me because people didn't really understand that I don't operate that way. Yeah. And there was like this also this other girl at work who used to be vegan and then like she was like kind of on and off again vegan. And so like those were the people that the people I interacted with had met the only like vegan types that people I worked with had interacted with. So they had this like misconception that I would also be like willing to eat things that were not on a vegan diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 40:24

I, I don't think I'd be trying free-gan after I've been vegan for a while because my reaction to anything even remotely like dairy is very bad.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 40:32

It is very bad. Yeah. I don't think you'd want a chance that. Yeah. And then I think like my last one would be when you're first going vegan, watch some documentaries. Now I'm not necessarily suggesting Dominion 'cause I personally haven't watched Dominion. I've purchased really graphic. I don't need that to be sure in my beliefs, but like I know a lot of people like the. To see the real, um, you know, nitty farming, nitty gritty footage. Nitty gritty Yeah, exactly. To see what's really going on. But I think there are other ones you can watch. Like I thought Cowspiracy was really solid, but like I read Eating Animals, it's actually the book that turned me vegan. And I think it just sheds light on what's actually going on. It gives you a really solid why, which is like, will help you when you're craving things or like when you're feeling like breaking the diet part of veganism, like knowing your why and being really sure about your why will help you through those things, you know? Yeah. Because I mean. Like I've said before, like I was addicted to cheese, but like I knew my why. I was like, I will not ever eat dairy again. Intentionally. Like I'm not going to do it. And it really helped me through like days when I was like missing it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 41:48

Yeah. Yeah. I mean it's definitely helpful to have something that's like, okay, I feel a little pull for whatever, and then it's like, oh, well that would be, I'm not gonna like throw this all away for that. Yeah, exactly.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 41:59

So knowing your beliefs, knowing your why, I think is really helpful.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:02

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:03

What are, what are yours, the tips that you'd give?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:05

Yeah. So, uh, for a new vegan, I think especially one who's fitness focused, like, don't be afraid to use protein shakes. It's probably gonna take you a little while, like you were saying, find the protein sources you like, but also figure out like how to incorporate'em into meals and things like that. It can take a while. Right. And, and especially if you're trying to like, hit a specific goal. So it's just, you know, a lot of stuff we don't wanna, uh, overload with. So I would say just use protein shakes a little more than normal, maybe from the beginning.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:29

Yeah. I think that's good advice. Especially like if you were already had a protein goal, you wouldn't wanna feel like defeated. Like you can't make it work.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:37

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:37

By trying to just cook all of your protein.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:39

Yeah. And you know, don't, don't do this to the extent where you're not getting nutrients because, uh, you know, one of the issues as you transition into a vegan, you might wanna make sure you're not missing any nutrients. So we don't wanna make that worse with like four meals a day or protein shakes or something crazy like that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:53

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:53

Um, yeah, I mean like three servings, four servings a day, maybe when you only did one serving a day. Yeah, fine.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:58

Like training wheels basically.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:59

Yeah. Yeah. Also take some upfront effort to find like some solid go-to options at restaurants around you. So maybe you could use Happy Cow and just find like two or three things that you know, have some protein or whatever your goal is. If you don't have a protein goal that are just like, okay, I really like this and this works for whatever I'm trying to do in my life. So now whenever you're like, oh, I can't cook, or Oh, this ingredient, like my mushrooms went bad in the fridge or whatever happened, you're like, okay, I know I like this thing from this place. I'm just gonna order that and now I won't have like an issue.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 43:31

Yeah. Like I'm having a bad day. I would normally order McDonald's. I can't eat McDonald's anymore. What do I do? And then you have a meltdown, but you won't, you have a plan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 43:40

Yeah, exactly. Um, also, you probably wanna have some go-to easy to make things at home, like protein oats is my big one. Like oats. Yeah. You love protein powder, blueberries. Flax seed and cinnamon I think.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 43:52

Isn't there also concrete in there?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 43:54

Uh, yeah. I mean, it kind, it kind of turns out that way. Oh, soy milk and soy milk. Uh, yeah, so anyway, have a couple of like really easy, make it in a bowl, in the microwave, whatever. Go-to options that you can make at home and try to just always have some shelf stable ingredients around for those kind of. Uh, that way again, if you run into a hitch, you've just got something you don't have to think about.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:14

Yeah. I think one really good one, like if you're a gym bro type, is getting those prepackaged seitan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:19

Oh yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:20

And like, just like oven roasting broccoli.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:22

Yep. Yeah. Blackbird seitan is good. Uh, and with the broccoli.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:26

Oh, we relied on that pretty heavily for a few months.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:28

Yeah. We had a Blackbird seitan fridge, mini fridge there.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:30

We literally bought a mini fridge to, 'cause we didn't have anywhere local that sold Blackbird. But you can buy it on their website. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:36

Um, also don't let people like guilt you into cheating on the vegan diet front as you go, like as you're first starting out. Because like I said, people will kind of be like, oh, like you're just starting on that. Do you have to do that today? Like when we go to dinner tonight, can you just get the pizza or whatever?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:52

Oh yeah. Or like parents Yeah. For holidays or something. Oh yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:54

I mean, it is gonna happen and you just have to be like, no. No.'cause then if you do it once, you're gonna set the expectation that you're like, you only do it sometimes. Yeah. That you're wishy, which is gonna make it harder.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:04

You're never gonna win.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:05

Yeah. And then if you have any mental tricks, one that like kind of worked for me and it's super silly. I don't know if it'll work for anybody else, but like I, I kind of think of like non-vegan food as just like rocks. Like, like you wouldn't eat 'em. Yeah. Like, like I can't eat rocks, so I can't eat not vegan food. And I know like, nutritionally, that's not how it works. I'm not saying it's like a rock, but. So for me, it's like when I'm driving down the street and I'm driving past all these fast food restaurants, like they might as well just be blank buildings like McDonald's. Oh, they, they sell rocks. What am I gonna get there? So.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:36

That, so funny.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:37

It works for me and I feel like. It did help.'cause I thought one of the things I would have trouble with was like driving down the road and being like, yeah, oh, I like that place and that place and that place. But then not just like now even walking through the grocery store, like half that food. I mean it might as well be nothing like just because.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:51

It's just a bunch of rocks.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:51

It's just a bunch of rocks. So anyway.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:53

That's so funny.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:54

Things like, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:54

That is like a way healthier way to look at it because I think of it as like individual animals and it makes me like really depressed. So, you know, um, maybe I'll try the rock thing. I don't know.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:05

Yeah. Whatever works for you.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:07

If you don't wanna be sad going through the grocery store, you think of it as rocks. Yeah, I like it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:11

Anyway, try some stuff like that. And I think I mentioned on the last one, like framing things as um, like I don't eat that anymore instead of I can't eat that anymore. That kind of thing's been helpful for me in the past too, so, yeah. Uh, I think that's the advice I would give new vegan.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:24

Some good advice. Yeah. If you have any advice, feel free to share it in the comments. We always like reading these.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:29

Oh, for sure. Yeah. All right. So I think that's it as far as our new vegan journey. So now we can talk about our myth of the week.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:36

Hmm. What's this week's?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:37

This week the myth is going all in in January is an effective way to get in shape.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:43

Obviously that's true. Right?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:44

Yeah. It happens every January.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:46

It happens every January. Every January I'm all in.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:49

So yeah, if you've compared the gym population in January to the gym population in March, you probably know that this is not a real thing and not the right way to approach it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:57

Burnout is real.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:59

Yeah. Um, and you don't wanna burn yourself out by stacking on a ton of new things at once. Yeah. Because like people will come into January and they're like. Okay. I got my new gym clothes and my smoothie I make every morning.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 47:11

And my fitness tracker.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 47:11

My fitness tracker. I'm going to the gym every day. I'm doing cardio and a workout every day.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 47:15

I got my new journal that I'm writing in.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 47:17

Yeah. The journal working out seven days a week. Mm-hmm. Oh, I'm also gonna go running three. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 47:22

I'm also gonna Yeah. Go to the sauna every day and like Yeah. Now you have four hours worth of new habits you didn't have in December.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 47:29

Right. And, uh, shockingly those will not fit into your schedule.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 47:32

Yeah. Not for long anyways. Yeah. You gotta like build those into your schedule over time.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 47:38

Yeah. So, and you know, part of the reason is because you feel really motivated in January with the new year. So there's maybe a mental thing to think about kind of motivation versus dedication because a motivation will wane. Like you will not always be motivated. Yeah. So you just need to be, you know, dedicated to improving your health for whatever reason. And your why is in your head.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 48:00

Yeah. And I think the motivation thing may really makes you want to go do all the things. Oh yeah. It's like, it's like very exciting.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 48:08

It's a double-edged sword.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 48:08

Oh yeah. It's like I am gonna go, this is like my new schedule and I'm gonna do all these things and like you're really excited about it, but then you get into like day 15 and you're like, I am exhausted. Yeah. And then the motivation's gone well this year we did mood boards or vision boards. Yeah. Which I don't know if that resonates with anyone else, but like I thought it might be kind of nice. Yeah. It's like you throw all your motivation into a vision board of what you wanna do for the rest of the year. So then when it starts waning, you can go look at your vision board every day.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 48:38

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 48:38

And then like. Be reminded of why you wanted to do all those things.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 48:42

Right. You want to end up in a spot where even on a day where you feel super not motivated, you're still making the right choices. So it's like, there are plenty of days where it's like, I do not want to go to the gym today, but I, you know, try to make myself go anyway. And there's even little stuff you can do inside of that. It's like, okay, you really don't feel like going to the gym just like. Uh, go to the gym with the intention of not doing your whole workout. Just go there and like do one exercise or do some treadmill and leave. That way you still kept up the habit of like walking into the gym and you're like, you did something. But if you get in there and you're like moving around, you're like, man, I, I'm really not feeling this shit today. Then you just go back home. It's fine. Yeah. But you didn't break your habit of like, I'm a person who goes to the gym.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 49:23

It's funny, I always see that advice and the person's like, and then I always feel like doing it. And I'm like, well, you don't have the kind of periods I have. Yeah, because we've done that and you're like, just go down for 10 minutes. And I go down there and I'm like, okay. And now I feel like passing out, I'm gonna go back upstairs.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 49:37

But you went to the gym. I did go. Yeah. So, yeah. Um, yeah, so I think things like that, um, I would say try to focus on a couple of little things at first and build 'em up over time. So I would just like, maybe if you're just getting into fitness in January for the new year, just kind of start paying attention to nutrition. Not really have a defined goal that first week. Maybe, uh, maybe possibly start tracking your food. Just so, and again, not like changing anything, not setting anything, but just start tracking so you understand where you're at now so you're not, again, doing all this at once. Um, find some food swaps you like over maybe the first couple weeks of the year. So you have some things slowly or like, okay, well this is like a junk food, unhealthy thing. Here's like the snack I like instead, or something like that. And then like dry

Protein Deficient Vegan: 50:23

roasted edamame.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 50:24

Right. And then just kind of have a goal of just move a little more than normal. Maybe you don't have a goal that's like seven exercises, seven workouts a week. Your goal is just like, okay, well I'm gonna, you know, get, you know, 2000 more steps today than I have been on average. Yeah. And slowly work it up over time. I mean, it takes a long time to get outta shape and it's gonna take a long time to get back in shape, so. Well, especially

Protein Deficient Vegan: 50:47

if you spent your December, um, watching Christmas movies and eating cookies, you know? Yeah. Like, you, you might need like a bit of a windup to get into, like, I'm someone who goes to the gym five days a week.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 50:59

Yeah, for sure. I mean, it's, you know, there's a really old cliche, it's like, this is a marathon, not a sprint. Yeah. But this really does apply to fitness because if you feel like you have a lot of progress to make, I mean you should really probably be thinking in terms of like, uh, months to probably years. Really. Yeah. To undo, you know, whatever you've done and you wanna make that progress. Uh, so this isn't something where it's like, I have to do it all in January. Yeah.'cause you know, this is gonna be a thing that you need to be able to reliably, consistently do month after month after month. And I mean, really technically for the rest of your life, although the intensity might change, um, but you're probably gonna wanna stay active and fit for the rest of your life. So don't get too hung up on like trying to stack on everything all at the same time and just slowly build up.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:40

You know? Yeah. And I know that can feel like really lame because you've got all this like, motivation in January. Like you have all this like energy towards this thing you want, but I also think you can use that to like. Lay out a plan. Yeah. For like how you're gonna build up the goals. When are you gonna like, move from just like tracking your food to like, trying to add more protein in fiber or like vegetables and like, when are you gonna go from like, I'm someone who like walks in the morning for like, until I'm tired to like, I'm actually trying to get to like 10,000 steps. Yeah. You know, and like have like kind of a calendar, like maybe put your motivational energy into like a vision board or like a, like a schedule plan kind of thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 52:21

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 52:21

I don't know. Yeah. That's just my advice.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 52:23

And this also applies to like your food intake because a lot of people will start off the new year trying to diet immediately. And so if you've been eating like 3000, 3,500 calories a day, just naturally, and now your new diet target is like 1500 calories a day right off the bat. Yeah. You're gonna have a bad time. You should probably try to, you know, uh, slowly every week move it down a little bit.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 52:43

Yeah. I mean, you're gonna go from potentially like a calorie surplus of eating whatever you want and not moving to like. Like now you're on a very restricted diet and you're trying to move a bunch, you're gonna be hangry. You're gonna be evil and mean.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 52:57

Yeah. And yeah, maybe if you've been like gaining weight you didn't want lately, you actually just go down to maintenance for like the first month. Yeah. You, you're just not gaining, you're not losing, but your diet is still like significantly different than it was. And then, you know, for you do that for a month and then you can start a little bit of a deficit.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 53:12

Yeah. Learn how to track, start moving a little bit. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 53:14

So I think that's definitely a more sustainable approach.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 53:17

Yeah. I think depending on where you're coming from, like baby steps are sometimes better for long-term success.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 53:23

Yeah, definitely. So, yeah. Uh, going all in in January is not an effective way in shape in most cases. I mean Sure. There are probably people who've done it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 53:32

Oh. I think like if you are like a bodybuilder or something. Yeah. And you, you've been doing this for like five years. Oh yeah. And you're like, I am cutting hard in January to like, I mean that's like a different situation.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 53:42

If you already have a routine and you're just kind of like amping up the intensity on your routine. Yeah. That's way more likely to be successful.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 53:49

Yeah. This is more advice for people like starting a nutrition fitness journey Yeah. In January.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 53:54

Yep. Definitely. Okay, cool. Uh, yeah. So I think you on the protein deficient vegan front have some updates for us. What do you got going on?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:02

Yeah, so. The Veganuary ebook, the free Veganuary ebook is now out.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 54:09

110 pages.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:10

110 pages. It's got 40 recipes, it has sample meal plans at 1500, 2000, 2500, and 3000 calories. And just some other like tips and tricks that I wrote in there. Uh, yeah, so get it. And then, um, I have a new series I'm gonna start doing on my socials on Monday. That is making recipes out of my Veganuary ebook.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 54:34

That's gonna be fun.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:35

I think it's gonna be fun. We'll see if it actually does well you never really know with like the algorithm.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 54:40

The algorithm gods.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:42

The algorithm Gods may shine upon me favorably, or they may not, but you did. You. Okay, so this sounds really silly, but like, I wanted it to be kind of fun. So we bought really cool sparkly die dice, like two dice. Two die, two dices?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 55:00

Dice. Multiple is dice. One is die.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 55:02

One is die. We bought two sparkly dice sis and you 3D printed me this like pretty little tower thing that I can like throw them in and then they like roll. Yeah. So that I don't have to worry about rolling off the table. Yeah. So anyways, I'm gonna roll the dice and I have numbers assigned to all the recipes and then it'll figure out like what I'm cooking for each of the videos I'm putting out.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 55:28

Sounds like a good time.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 55:29

I think it kind of fun. I don't know what we have learned so far is that the odds of like, okay, this, so they're two.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 55:39

They're two 20 sided dice. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 55:40

Two 20 sided dice because there are 40 recipes. So it was like kind of perfect. Um, that's how we got there. We were like, anyways, he's been doing a lot of magic the gathering and I don't think he actually uses the dice for anything. I don't know. I've never been to a game, but he has 20 sided dice, so I was like 20 plus 20, 40 we should do the dice thing. And they're always really pretty and I think they're fun anyways. Do you use 'em for anything?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 56:04

Um, yeah. In really casual games you can use 'em to count your life.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 56:08

Okay.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 56:08

But usually people just use pen and paper.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 56:10

Um, alright. We have a bunch of dice laying around, but we got special ones for this 'cause I wanted 'em really pretty and sparkly, but that's not important at all. It's basically, so we were looking at this, the odds of this and 21 is the most likely number to roll and your odds of rolling 21 are like 20 out of 400. But your odds of rolling a two with two dice are like one out of 400.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 56:36

Yeah. Because one and one's the only thing that works for that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 56:38

Exactly. Yeah. So you're 20 times more likely to roll a 21 than a two. Um. So yeah, that's been really interesting.'cause I like math. I don't know if that's interesting to anyone else. Probably not, but I thought it was interesting and it's kind of like an upside down V as far as like likelihood of probability. Like you start at 21 at the top peak and then like it descends after that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 57:03

Yeah. So if we just roll 'em, we can make recipe number 21 a whole lot.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 57:06

Yeah. Which I think was like no knead bread or something.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 57:09

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 57:09

Which actually is the first one. Surprise. That's what's tomorrow.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 57:14

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 57:15

Anyway, what's going on with muscle deficient vegan updates?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 57:18

Yeah, so, um, it's gonna end pretty soon, I think, after this podcast comes out. But, uh, for the beginning of the month I had put out a giveaway where I'm gonna be taking 10 clients for a hundred percent online personal training for free for a 12 week program. So I've got that on my Instagram which is linked in the show notes. And then I sent something out to the mailing list. And also I had a couple posts on Reddit. So I've had a bunch of people enter for that. So I'm gonna randomly select five people and then five people I'm gonna kind of manually select based off of, they send me a little blurb about what they have going on and kind of what their goals are and their struggles and equipment. I'm just gonna pick the five people who I feel like I can help the most over the 12 week period.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 57:58

So if you're interested in that, go find one of his posts. I mean, how will they enter?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:03

I'll put a link to my Instagram post in the show notes and I'll put a link to the Reddit post in the show notes. So you can enter by either commenting on those posts or DMing me on either Reddit or Instagram. The word Veganuary.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:15

What if they haven't neither?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:16

If you don't have either Reddit or Instagram, if you go to muscledeficientvegan.com and sign up for the newsletter down at the bottom of the website, I'm gonna be sending out a kind of last call email, uh, the day before the drawing, which is probably the day after this podcast comes out. So you can enter by basically just replying to that email with Veganuary. You got a couple of options there.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:37

Yeah. And you've got a lot of people so far.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:39

Yeah. More interest than I expected, which makes me sad to a certain extent, because I can only pick 10 people, so. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:48

Yeah. But we gotta plan for, like, anyone that doesn't win. We're gonna have like a, like a system.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:52

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:53

That you can kind of follow on your own. And then we're gonna start an accountability type of channel in our discord.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:58

We added the accountability channel to the Discord and we put kind of in the notes there, some daily themes that we have in mind. So starting next week, we're gonna try to get in there every day and start some discussions about accountability.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 59:08

Yeah. So even if you don't want a personal trainer, but you'd like some accountability buddies, you should join our Discord.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 59:13

Yeah. Which is also linked in the show notes, the Deficient Vegans Discord server.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 59:17

He's been personal training me for a while and he is really nice, so I can vouch for him.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 59:22

Yeah, so thanks for listening. If you could review us on Apple Podcast or Spotify and make sure you subscribe or on YouTube, um, you can leave comments on Spotify or YouTube under the podcast feed if you want to get with us. We have several people leaving comments on the Spotify now, so that's pretty cool.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 59:37

And they're always great.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 59:38

They are always great, very entertaining. Also in the show notes, you can go to our websites or social media. You can reach out and contact us or sign up for the mailing list for either a protein deficient vegan or muscle deficient vegan on the respective websites, depending on your interest. And I think that's it. Do you wanna say bye?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 59:55

Bye.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 59:56

Bye everybody.