The KInd Life Community Forum

good luck with the superhero! Thats great! Yeah when your baking, it never hurts the recipe if you use less sugar, my sister always does that and cuts the amount in half, or if you want I'm sure the maple syrup would work. But has anyone tried the whole wheat biscuits in alicia's book? I love them!!!

Hi everyone! I'm 22, so not a teen anymore :), but I get exactly the same flack from people that you are getting! "You're so young, your bones are still developing, you are depriving your maturing body of nutrients...etc." so I know how that is! I can only imagine how my parents would have reacted if I went vegan in highschool! Anyway, here are some yummy items for a school lunch: carrot sticks with sunflower seed butter (I throw chia or ground flax seeds on for added omega 3s), wraps (less calories than bread, still has a sandwich feel): Easy ones are hummus with greens and/or sprouts, some seasoned tofu or tempeh, and maybe a dressing on top. You could pack nori roll-ups: just wrap some veggies (ahem, avocado!) and rice in nori and you are good to go. Perhaps bring a piece of fruit, and if you want to get fancy, amasake. If you like substitute meats, Gardein makes some yummy ones you can eat plain or in a sandwich/wrap. Good luck!

Thats a great idea! I dont know how natural boca burgers are but they are my weakness!! I like to sautee them with tomato sauce...shame shame shame. But its for when I dont have the time/energy to cook!

I take B12 and vitamin D, but depending on how much you are outside, vitamin D is not a must. If you get at least 20 minutes of bright sunlight every day, you should be good on that front. So I would say, as long as you get a nutritious diet full of legumes, whole grains, tons of veggies and some fruits, B12 is all you need. In terms of iron-rich foods--there's kale, chickpeas, broccoli, sea veggies, many types of beans...a fair amount of veggie foods have iron in them, luckily. I don't like the idea of having to rely on supplements because I think if our diet is balanced, we should be getting all the nutrition we need through food. B12, however, is from the soil and since the industrialization of agriculture and our squeaky clean way of modern living, we rarely get adequete B12 anymore unless we eat meat, hence the supplements.

You probably should just to be on the safe side. If you ate a lot of meat, chances are you have B12 stored up, but eventually you would run out if you remained vegan for a while. If you eat a medium amount of fortified vegan foods such as cereals, store-bought milks, fake meats, etc, you should be fine without the supplement. Also, Red Star Vegetarian support formula nutritional yeast (long name!) has B12 in it. These are just options if you don't want the supplement. I ate meat all my life, but since I don't buy many fortified vegan products, I take the supplement. Hope this helps. Good luck!