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It’s safe to say that we have more questions than answers about zinc in vegan diets. This mineral is found in a wide range of plant foods, and many studies show that vegans have intakes on a par with omnivores.

But other evidence suggests that vegans fall short. In addition, zinc absorption from plant foods can be low. In fact, the percent of zinc absorbed from different meals varies dramatically—from around 8 to 32 percent.

Because of the absorption issue, some experts suggest that vegetarians could need as much as 50 percent more zinc in their diet than omnivores.

There is no evidence that vegans suffer from overt zinc deficiency. But zinc is needed by the body for more than 50 different ... Read More >

I love products that help make vegan diets effortless. Lately, I’ve become a devoted fan of the Follow Your Heart company, which makes it especially easy to whip up many of the foods I love—homemade pizza, traditional potato salad, and mac ‘n cheese. I’ve been using their Vegenaise for several years. It’s a huge leap forward in taste and texture from the tofu mayonnaise products of the past. In fact, it tastes more like real mayonnaise—the old-fashioned homemade kind—than commercial mayonnaise does.

More recently, I’ve discovered their Vegan Gourmet line of dairy substitutes. I recently used the sour cream and cream cheese substitutes in place of my usual favorite Tofutti brand for my favorite mushroom strudel recipe and was very happy with the results ... Read More >

I’m going to make these tomorrow for friends who are stopping by for dessert. Chocolate chip pancakes are so divine and since they are served hot from the griddle, they feel sort of gourmet-ish.

It’s easy enough to make these from scratch, but obviously even easier to use a mix. If I’m making them just for my husband and me for a little treat, I try to be as healthful as possible by using a whole grain mix. If it’s for company, I want them to be super light and fluffy so I go with a standard white flour mix. (This is dessert, after all, hopefully following a very healthy dinner!) Pancake mix is usually vegan, but do a quick label scan; the more ... Read More >

In the midst of a potential swine flu pandemic, we are being reassured that it’s okay to eat pork. News releases from the government and industry declare that swine flu is not transmitted by eating pork, and my fellow dietitians are busy advising consumers about safe pork cooking practices.

Pork is safe? Doesn’t this miss the point completely?

We have factory farms because there is no other way to satisfy appetites of Americans and other westerners for meat. Among their other horrors—which include environmental destruction and horrendous animal cruelty—factory farms are breeding grounds for disease. So now we have swine flu. And the response from the farm industry and even from health experts is to encourage people to engage in the very habits ... Read More >

I had a question from a reader about the 2005 study on German vegetarians that showed higher mortality for vegans compared to other health-conscious eaters.

The researchers asked nearly 2,000 subjects about diet, exercise and smoking habits, and then followed up over a period of 21 years, tracking deaths from cardiovascular disease, cancer and other causes. Overall, the death rate was similar for lacto-ovo vegetarians and meat-eaters (most of whom had moderate meat consumption), but higher for vegans.

But while that fact was reported in some news media, the researchers didn’t even mention it in their discussion of the findings. There were only 60 vegans in the entire study, just a little bit more than 3% of the whole study population. Given the ... Read More >

To me, being vegan is about finding the best way to live that is both healthful and humane. I often feel greater kinship with near vegetarians who are striving to live more ethically than with those who eat a strictly vegan diet for reasons of personal health.

Here, and in my examiner column, I choose to focus on diet—practical, health and philosophical aspects—because this is the area in which I have expertise. And diet has a huge impact on animal suffering. But being vegan is not about “what should I have for dinner?” It’s about “what choices can I make today to minimize animal suffering?”

Do we need some new terminology to describe that difference? How can the word vegan mean someone who ... Read More >

Dietitian Jack Norris has published an excellent overview of research on vegan diets and diabetes on www.veganhealth.org.

Please note Jack’s comments about fat in his discussion of the findings. I agree with him that adopting a very low fat diet over the long term may not be advisable. I’m also not convinced that severe fat restriction is helpful in managing diabetes; other research suggests that replacing carbohydrate in the diet with monounsaturated fats improves diabetic control. Higher fat diets may also improve blood cholesterol (as long as the diet is still very low in saturated fat).

Finally, weight loss is among the most powerful ways of improving diabetes control, so it’s very hard to draw any conclusions about impact of various dietary factors when the ... Read More >

Just published this month in the journal Osteoporosis International, a new study revealed that bone health was similar between vegan Buddhist nuns and omnivore women even though the vegans had much lower intakes of calcium and protein.

The study involved 105 vegan nuns and 105 omnivore women in Viet Nam. Average calcium intake was 375 mg per day for the vegans and 682 mg for the omnivores. (Some of the vegan women did use very small amounts of milk in meals.) Vegan women also had low protein intakes averaging around 35 grams per day compared to more moderate intakes of 62 grams for the omnivores.

Bone density between the two groups was similar—slightly lower in the vegans, but not to an extent that ... Read More >

Vegan diets usually include some excellent sources of vitamin A–but it many take a little bit of planning to make sure you get enough on a regular basis.

While vegans don’t have any preformed vitamin A in their diet (it’s only in animal foods), it can be synthesized from compounds called carotenoids found in plant foods. The best known and most biologically active carotenoid is beta-carotene.

As recently as ten years ago, nutrition researchers believed than 6 micrograms of beta-carotene produced one microgram of active vitamin A. But newer research on absorption of carotenoids shows that it actually takes twice that much—12 micrograms of beta-carotene—to produce a microgram of vitamin A. That means that vegan intake of carotenoids is actually only about half the ... Read More >

I made my yummy mushroom strudel yesterday with a few changes. As noted in the comments on that post, I found a whole wheat phyllo at the local food co-op. For this special occasion recipe, I’m perfectly happy to use the refined flour version, but I thought it would be fun to try something new. And my only dinner guest was my husband who, in addition to his other excellent qualities, will eat pretty much anything. I never really have to worry about recipe disasters.

To counteract the somewhat drier aspect of whole grain flour, I replaced the olive oil in my recipe with a combination of olive oil and melted coconut oil—a healthy saturated fat source. I would have used all coconut oil, ... Read More >