How to Begin a Vegetarian Lifestyle

Replacing the flavors, textures and nutrition of meat, poultry, fish and seafood is one of the major challenges of beginning a vegetarian lifestyle. Gradually reducing your intake of these foods while substituting nutritionally similar vegetarian foods can ease your transition from meat-eating to pure vegetarianism. Although the challenges of a vegetarian lifestyle do not end with abstaining from meat, poultry, fish and seafood, the nutritional benefits outweigh the minimal costs.


Semi-Vegetarian
The semi-vegetarianism dietary movement, also known as flexitarianism, is rapidly growing. There is no strict definition of a flexitarian diet, but it typically involves eating at least one vegetarian meal a week. Introducing vegetarian meals -- and entire vegetarian days -- into your diet is a good first step toward vegetarianism. This also helps you to gradually become comfortable with replacing meat with vegetarian protein sources, such as soy products, beans and seitan. The federal 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend eating a variety of protein sources each day, so this first step toward vegetarianism is also a great way to immediately improve your diet.


Pesco-Vegetarian
The Dietary Guidelines state that most people should replace at least two servings of meat per week with fish and seafood. Replacing all meat and poultry in a semi-vegetarian diet with fish and seafood helps to accomplish this. In addition, this serves as your second step toward adopting a fully vegetarian diet. With only one animal food group remaining, you can now drop the "semi-vegetarian" label and identify yourself as a "pescetarian" or "pesco-vegetarian." This step has the added benefit of reducing your fat and caloric intake, as fish and vegetable protein sources are generally leaner than meat and poultry.


Vegetarian
Once you become comfortable with eating no meat or poultry and regularly having fully vegetarian days, you should start to eliminate fish and seafood from your diet. An easy way to do this is to drop one serving of fish per week. However, you can move more quickly if you make sure to continue eating sources of all essential nutrients. To ensure that you do not simultaneously eliminate some essential fatty and amino acids from your diet, replace fish and seafood with plant sources of these nutrients. You can accomplish this by eating soy products instead of fish and regularly adding flax seeds to your meals.
Considerations
Meat, poultry, fish and seafood are some of the best natural sources of essential amino acids, omega-3 fatty acids, iron, zinc and vitamin B-12. Therefore, you should consult with a dietician to ensure that you are not lacking in any nutrients as you begin to eliminate these foods from your diet. Although abstaining from meat, fish, seafood and poultry forms a large part of a purely vegetarian diet, animal products are present in a variety of seemingly vegetarian foods. Examples include the fish oils in Asian "vegetarian" dishes, animal-based rennets in cheese, meat stocks in vegetable soups and gelatin in candies and desserts. As vegetarianism is a lifelong process of learning and discovery, do not be discouraged if you accidentally consume these products. Instead, treat each as a learning experience on your path toward an entirely plant-based diet.

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