Beginner’s Guide to “Gettin’ them Gains” on a Vegan Diet. Part 1: Calories

Photo by Ahmed Carter

Vegan Nutrition is different. But not that different.

First things first, the absolute basics:

Calories

For those raw beginners who have no clue about the food they’re stuffing in their faces, here’s the most fundamental principal of thermodynamics:

“The total energy of an isolated system is constant; energy can be transformed from one form to another, but can be neither created nor destroyed.”

What does that mean for you, yes you, destroying that family pack of Skittles (vegan BTW) like they’re going out of fashion?

Well, unless you are a multidimensional space being (and you are probably not) you are an isolated system. So this means that the food that goes into your big, loud mouth is broken down into energy, that energy is used or stored by the body, and the waste (non usable energy) is expelled from the body. No exceptions. Well, kind of. (more on this in part 3)

So say you just love (vegan) doughnuts. You just can’t help yourself and you eat 30 a day. Your body is a survival machine and it will not waste energy unless it has to (again, Part 3) This means that your body has a grand total of two options of what to do with this energy: use it or store it. So if you move around a whole lot, (like, a super whole lot) you might actually burn them off. Otherwise, guess what? You’re now adding a layer of winter thermals to the underneath of your skin. That’s right, you’re getting fat, fatty.

But not necessarily. It can be stored as muscle too. Groovy. But only a small amount, and only if certain conditions are met (hint; it’s exercise).

What do we mean by used? Stuff like movement uses energy. So does all that thinking those smart people do that you watch, whilst you stand there looking brain-dead. That all takes energy. Your heart and other organs need energy to keep you from dying, which is pretty nice of them. The energy required to maintain these basic functions is called the “base metabolic rate” and to eat less than that is real stupid, so don’t do that. Add movement in on top and that’s the amount of energy you need to maintain your weight.

The units we use to measure this energy are something you may have heard of — “calories.” Yup, those markings on the back of those powdered noodles you can’t resist aren’t just for scientists: you can use them too.

Making your Greed work for You!

How can you use them? You are, hopefully, a living being, and therefore require energy to survive. You will also require energy to do more than that, like stand there looking all pretty, but also to move around. This is called your “maintenance” requirement. Why? Because that’s how many calories it takes to keep you, livin’ movin’ and unchangin’ in your weight.

Here’s where it gets useful: Stored Protein (Muscle) and Fat (Fat) depend upon this maintenance requirement in order to stay the same. Hence maintenance, genius. Increasing or decreasing calories has an effect on these two things. We said earlier that when we eat more than we need (our maintenance requirement) we store that as fat or muscle. With me so far? Well, when we eat less than this requirement, our body, clever as it is, uses up these stores for energy. So if your body needs 2000 calories a day, and you eat 1800, it has to take that 200 from somewhere, and it does so from your fat or muscle stores, depending on how “generous” your fat stores are (fatty).

Say you want to lose weight, what do you need to do? Simple, you need to:

1. Consume fewer calories than you currently do. This means that Calories in< Calories out
2. Move more than you currently do. This means that Calories in < Calories Out.
3. Consume fewer calories than you currently do, and move more. This means Calories in < Calories out.

As can be seen above, there are two methods we can use and combine, and obviously, the combination is the more efficient. And so, counting those pesky calories is the basic of managing weight and sports performance. However, determining the quality of the weight gained and lost (gaining/losing fat or muscle) will be the focus of part 2.

Next time we will look at what Calories are made out of. Yup, that’s right, you don’t just eat pure energy. Not unless you really are a multidimensional space being. In which case, why are you worrying about nutrition? Go be a beautiful trans-dimensional entity of awesomeness, and leave the Veganism to us mortals.