The Convegan FAQ

Hi. My name is Nick, and I'm a convegan. this is my FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions list)

1. A what???
2. What's a vegan, again?
3. So, isn't conveganism hypocritical??
4. How did this start?
5. Why not just be vegan?
6. So what about this weight loss. How did you do it?
7. What about protein?
8. So, what do you usually eat?
9. When in doubt, meat or dairy?
10. How's ParisAnne doing with this diet of yours?

1. A what???

   Good question, and we may as well start here as anywhere.

   I coined the word "convegan" because I got sick of saying "convenience vegan." Basically what it means is that my diet is vegan when it is convenient for me to eat vegan. That means that when I'm in a restaurant, if I can order something vegan from the menu, or assemble a reasonable vegan meal by combining side dishes or asking the chef to leave something out of an existing item, I do so. If there is no good vegan option, then I choose an option that comes closest to meeting my dietary goals.

   If I go to dinner at a friend's house and everything they have made has meat and/or cheese in it, I go for the combination of items that best meets my nutritional goals.

   If I have been exercising strenuously, or I feel that I don't have enough protein in my diet, I will sometimes choose to eat chicken to get the protein I need.

   I make a blanket exception for sushi. I will occasionally ask for sushi that is vegan, but I have a deep craving for raw fish and wasabi that won't quit.

2. What's a vegan, again?

   Vegans are people who abstain from eating any animal products. You could also call vegans "strict vegetarians." Vegans are distinguished from the typical vegetarian by the absence of dairy or eggs in their diet. Really strict vegans omit honey and things like jello or marshmallows (which contain beef gelatin), and often abstain from wearing or using animal products as well.

3. So, isn't conveganism hypocritical??

   Well, that depends on how one comes by one's vegan diet.

   Many people eat vegan because they have a philosophical, moral, or religious abhorrence of the way we use other animals for food. They believe that raising animals specifically to use their meat, milk, eggs, skin, fur, etc. is fundamentally wrong. While I'm sympathetic to these arguments, this is not what I believe.

   Other people eat vegan because they believe that the meat, milk, and eggs produced by commercial farming is unhealthy, or that animal products contain the wrong mix of nutrients for the human system. Yeah, I think they have some valid points, but this isn't what keeps me away from meat and milk.

   My reasons for eating vegan are closer to the second point. I started doing vegan part time as a weight-loss strategy. What I found empirically was that I felt better, spent less time sick, lost weight, dropped my cholesterol, regained my ability to eat spicy foods, stopped getting sleepy after meals, stopped feeling uncomfortably full after meals, and stopped enjoying the flavor and texture of meats and cheeses.

4. How did this start?

   In late 2000, I got obsessed with the idea of doing this bike ride called RAMROD (see my RAMROD page or The official RAMROD page for more information). RAMROD is a very strenuous ride which includes about 10,000 feet of climbing over a 154 mile course. At the time, I was carrying about 45 pounds more than what I consider to be my ideal weight (about 155 pounds), and the extra weight absolutely had to go if I was going to actually fulfill this goal I'd set for myself. Pick up a 40 pound bag of dog food, and imagine riding a bike up three mountain passes carrying that around your middle, and you'll understand where I was coming from.

   My initial ideas on weight loss came from the hacker's diet. This is a pretty basic set of concepts based on a geek analysis of the human system. Basically, you look at the inputs and outputs of the system, and realize that the net gain or loss in energy of the system represents your weight. The actual system is too much work for me. The moment you ask me to count calories my eyes will glaze over.

   The next thing I came across was information on hydration, which was becoming an issue for me on long bike rides. One of the key pieces of information I took in was that our bodies are really bad at understanding when we're thirsty. Much of the time, our bodies tell us we're hungry when we're actually craving water. I already knew that adequate hydration was critical for processing food and wastes, and that most people in our culture are dehydrated for much of the time.

   The clincher was a mail that my friend Sara Ann Arenson posted to a mailing list that we were both on. The mail described her feelings on the vegan diet, and for some reason, her mail struck the right chord in me where no other description of veganism had done so. I had never thought that I could be a vegetarian of any sort, simply because I am of English extraction and am therefore genetically predisposed to eat milk and meat. I'd been raised on the stuff. I loved it. Somehow, Sara's mail was a seed that found fertile ground in me. I don't seem to have the mail anymore. The only thing I remember was her waxing rhapsodic about potatoes and how she could eat them all day and not get fat. Anyway, the message is not important, but the effect on me was.

   I decided to start experimenting with vegan foods. I decided to try to make choices that trended in that direction. I started out small - use less cheese on my pasta - or no cheese. Have a baked potato for lunch - no sour cream. That sort of thing. That worked for me. So, I decided to try to eat vegan three days a week. Thursdays was chili dog day at the cafeteria at work, so Thursday was one of my meat days :-).

   It worked. I found places I could eat vegan and love the food. I learned ways to take a menu with no vegan options and create my own. I decided it was ok to be high-maintenance. If my refried beans at the mexican place came with cheese, I sent them back. I went from three days to four days. I did RAMROD. Then I decided to try to be 100% vegan.

5. Why not just be vegan?

   Several reasons. First, that would make life needlessly stressful for me. I'd have to worry at all times what was in my food, which I don't want to do. It would mean going without meals at times because I would be in places with no vegan options. Second, it would put needless strain on my marriage. My wife was a meat eater, and was pregnant at the time (pregnant women have increased protein needs). She was quite rightly not willing to cook separate meals for herself and me. Finally, I don't think I'm capable of being a purist about anything :-). I tried it, and it was too easy to cheat. I mean heck, I'm polyamorous in relationships - can't I have the same sort of customizable relationship with food?

6. So what about this weight loss. How did you do it?

   I did several things. The biggest thing was biking well over 100 miles a week (sometimes over 200 miles), including a 70 - 120 mile ride every weekend over very hilly terrain. The rest were diet-related:

   • I dramatically increased my water intake to metabolize food faster.
   • I stopped eating huge amounts of food right before bed.
   • I tried to decrease my sugar intake (sugar is instant energy, and if you don't need it it goes straight to fat.)
   • I cut out fruit juice entirely and replaced it with water (surprisingly, fruit juice is mostly sugar water - the nutrition in fruit is in the pulp and skin).
   • I voluntarily chose to eat smaller amounts of everything I ate and tried to make lower-calorie choices
   • When I did eat meat, I tried to make it lean chicken.
   • I restricted myself to a vegan diet 4 days a week
   This last part was surprisingly successful. I started enjoying vegan foods more and meats less. I stopped drinking milk entirely. More and more I voluntarily ate vegan on my meat days.

7. What about protein?

   Apparently, the human need for protein is surprisingly small. I haven't one the research myself, but I do very well. My doctor is happy, and my vegan friends assure me that I'm getting enough. I get protein from nuts and rice, tofu and other soy products, and occasional meats. I'd say I eat chicken or raw sushi fish at least once a month.

8. So, what do you usually eat?

   I'm pretty creative. Here are some of my favorite meals, or anecdotes about convegan moments...

   • Taco del mar: the vegan burrito (I live on this! Black beans, lots of jalapenos, on a spinach tortilla)
   • Subway - the veggie delight. No cheese, no mayo, all the veggies (extra pepperoncinis and jalapenos). I know we all hear about Jared a bit too much, but this is a seriously yummy sandwich.
   • Olive Garden - the house salad. - Ask the waitron not to put cheese on it. I salivate for this salad. Plus, it's cheap for all you can eat.
   • Any mexican restaurant - side of rice and beans (no cheese), side of pico de gallo, side of jalapenos (are you sensing a pattern here with the jalapenos??). Eat them with chips and salsa that come free anyway. Hey, did you know that most refried beans are prepared using lard? Go for the whole beans instead, or if you're at Azteca, ask for the ranchero beans which are fat-free.
   • Any Thai or Chinese or teriyaki place - you can order just about anything on the menu with tofu, or with only veggies, instead of meat.
   • Red Robin - the Boca burger. - They can make any burger in the place with a vegan Boca burger. I got my peppercorn burger that way the other day. The buns aren't strictly vegan, but that's getting a bit anal for me (that's why I'm a convegan, not a vegan)
   • Manresa Castle, Port Townsend. - We took my mom here for her birthday brunch. there was a yummy-sounding frittata on the menu with spinach, mushrooms, onions, garlic, potatoes... Problem is, a frittata is made with egg and topped with cheese. I asked them to pretty please omit the egg and cheese and replace the egg with an equal portion of potato. The result - yummy veggie hash brown scramble!
   • People who cook for a living do it because it's a creative act. Unless it's a minimum-wage hash-slinging establishment, a chef will probably be happy to be challenged to create something special just for you! It doesn't hurt to ask. I usually preface my unusual request by giving the waitron a big smile and explaining that I'm about to be high-maintenance. Because I'm a convegan, I accept compromises when necessary. And I try to leave a big tip for their trouble.
   • When we go to Karen and Lee's for a barbecue, Karen knows to make me skewers with lots of red bell peppers and mushrooms :-).
9. When in doubt, meat or dairy?

   Cow's milk is very rich, difficult to digest, and has a lot of fat. Cheese is really fatty. I'll gladly eat a meal of nice lean meat, but these days I rarely eat any dairy products.

10. How's ParisAnne doing with this diet of yours?

    Well, because Payton seems to be sensitive to it, she's cut out dairy, and she's gone back to her policy of eating no mammal meats. So, our diets seem to be converging. I can easily compromise and eat chicken or turkey, and she doesn't mind occasionally choking down some of my vegan cooking :-). The best thing is that the only milk in our refrigerator anymore is rice milk and soy milk. Now, if we could just agree on one of those... (I like rice milk, she likes soy)