Worried you are doomed with nutrient deficiency without meat? Plant-based nutritionist, Callum Weir, lays those fears to rest.

I'm so thrilled you're here today . Let's get started . Welcome to the show Plant-Centered Listener . My name is Ashley and I am your host today , and I am so excited that you're here for another story of how someone went plant-based and he also happens to be a plant-based nutritionist .

So you bet that we get into those common questions when it comes to going plant-based , like how to even respond to where do you get your protein , whether or not you should worry about it . We also talk about soy and if soy is safe to eat and , if so , how much .

What does it actually mean to be plant-based and what's the difference between going plant-based and being vegan ? I really enjoyed our conversation there . We also talk about does plant-based contain all the nutrients you need ?

So we go through these things at the end , but first we talk about Callum's story , and before we dive into that , I do want to introduce Callum , who is a plant-based nutritionist and the proud owner of Yumfoo , and he's also a journalist contributing to various vegan magazines , probably some that you've seen or even read yourself .

His vegan journey began out of ethical considerations , which we talked about , and it quickly evolved as he witnessed firsthand the numerous health benefits of a plant-based diet . This revelation sparked his passion for nutrition further than it was already , highlighting the intricate connection between the foods that we're eating and our overall well-being .

Now Callum helps others achieve their health and fitness goals by navigating the empowering world of plant-based nutrition . Callum goes through his story . He talks about a wild incident that happened in Budapest that just further pushed him towards going plant-based . So please join me in welcoming Callum to the show . Callum , welcome to the show .

I am so excited that you're here today .

However , my mum slowly as I can't remember the age I was maybe 10 , 11 , went back to eating me . So I knew what vegetarians were , because I know from a very young age people aren't too sure what a vegetarian is or a vegan . That didn't exist . I had no idea and basically from there . So I knew what it was and I just carried on eating meat as you do .

But you grow up with it and you're kind of like I was having issues and I didn't have that cognitive dissonance . It was there because at some points I knew what was happening and at some points I just kind of ignored it and I was like you know , here's what it is and you just don't really do anything about it .

And then there was a few kind of standout moments that I remember along the way of going out and meeting other people that are like my teenagers , and somebody was wearing like a peter t-shirt Is it Peter , peter , one of the two , I don't know how you pronounce it .

It was like a little cartoon chicken saying I don't want to be a nugget and I was like that's really cool , I love that . And asked a few questions and this girl was a vegetarian and I was like , okay , and I was very open to eating a more vegetarian lifestyle and I always wanted to go along that way , but never did anything about it .

I think it was just in my mind and skip forward a few years . I then kind of opened up to the idea of it again and started eating more vegetarian foods and I was like you know what ? I'm going to go vegetarian . But vegetarian in my mind was pescetarian . At that time , however , I was like you know what ?

I'm actually going to cut out all animals now , so going to cut out the fish . And then I was like vegetarian , that's fine , I'll be fine .

And then I was in Budapest with my friends and all of a sudden , I ate this like veggie burger with a lot of cheese on it and I feel sorry for my friends that were there at that time , because that is when I realized I became lactose intolerant , and severely .

I was probably lactose intolerant beforehand , but there's something on a cheese that just ruined me and I was like , okay , like I need to run , and this is in a public place , so it was very embarrassing . So I went to my mates are you okay ? I'm like I am not okay , like I don't know how I'm feeling . This is horrible .

And at this time I didn't realize this was the cheese . I was like maybe it's just the burger , but I was like it's harder to get food poisoning from a burger made out of beans .

Next day did exactly the same thing and I was like , oh my God , what's going on . So I then kind of got home , I went to a doctor and they were like you're probably lactose intolerant .

And then I was then getting all those questions . So I was like you know , you know where do you get your protein , things like that . And from that I was like you know what ? I'm going to delve into nutrition , because I was always also a yo-yo diet . When I was younger , I wasn't in the best shape or anything like that .

I would just go from like trend to trend to trend and see what works , and nothing ever worked . Either way , it's a loose bit , you know . Gain it back . So I started to delve into nutrition , studied that and then all of a sudden after I was like I'm not going to do anything with this , this is for myself . And next thing I know I've got a business .

That's amazing , that's how that happened .

So I was also very aware of what was going on and it was just that shit , that shift that needed to happen and unfortunately it did take a few more years after that , but it does for some , it does for a lot of people . You have to keep keep like things need to happen for that to happen , and so that worked out for me .

So , yeah , it was the pita shirt and then it was the slaughterhouse videos back then and they kind of stayed in my mind and I was always very open to foods . I didn't want to eat meat in the first place and I thought I had to eat meat , because I had to eat meat is how I was going to .

So I'm like , oh , if I don't eat anything , I'm going to die , I'm going to die , and so , yeah , that's how that's how it started . So it was really from an ethical standpoint .

But then I think the the then when the electrocintolera came in , it became more of a health standpoint as well , and then later on down the line the nutrition came along as well for that . So that was very much on health . But the ethical side was the side that I went with first , as much as I didn't really know it at the time .

That is what it is , and it sounds very bland and boring to the rest of the world , but it is like a superior food is incredible it's . It's made me have to do it , right , however . So I was eating that and just kind of , you don't , you don't know that there's protein in it , but it doesn't say .

It says on the back of a can , but no one's reading the back of a can of beans off the time . So , yeah , I just I was like , oh , this is there's nothing . There's nothing in these . These are just kind of like you know , your , as you would your your salad or anything else that you'd kind of have as a side . You just think of them as a side dish .

Yeah , yep , and that was , yeah , it didn't really think anything of it , and then later in that line of like , oh , these things are keeping me alive .

that ? Because you were in the UK at the time when you went vegetarian and then vegan , like how was that transition ? Because I know , yeah , the options weren't great back then . But how did you kind of find things as you went along ?

You could get like a bean and chickpea burger and things like that , which most people turn nose upon , but I actually really like those things . They I sometimes I don't want an alternative or didn't want an alternative . I wanted something that was kind of a fail , healthier . So back then it was very much . There wasn't cheeses .

All these things were start starting to kind of like gradually grow , but there wasn't really anything around us like yet as veggie burgers , maybe veggie nuggets and then your kind of whole foods . So I really kind of stuck to the whole foods . I had a lot of love for tofu that appeared . I was like , well , this is going to be awful .

And now my favorite food . And then Tempeh started existing in the UK and I was eating a lot of that . I still would have had the alternatives at that point when they started gradually coming in , but then I realized I wasn't too overly keen on the taste of them . Like , I eat them once in a while , but if I want a .

If I wanted a burger , I didn't want a burger . The taste it like something that I was trying to move away from at that point . So then , yeah , there wasn't really . So when those things came in I didn't really I try them , but most of the time I kind of leave them . But I was quite happy . I'm quite a simplistic eater as well .

So like for me , tofu , beans , rice and think like just the other bits like UK on stuff on the side which sounds like some people would not know , but to me I'm so happy with that . Like I'm very simple when it comes to my food and that's fine , whereas the others I'm not .

I'm not overly worried about if I could just have like a bowl of rice and stuff , I'd be happy , but I'm not writing to give me why it needs that's true .

I don't think , however , many years ago , that I'd ever see those yeah , those kind of places .

So I think England's very progressive in that way where I think you can go to anywhere and there'd be vegan , vegan options or you'd have like rows and rows of like vegan shops and vegan eateries and , like you know , your groceries , the supermarkets and stuff like that , and even in supermarkets you got a lot of things . Australian .

Not so much there's in your main cities like Sydney and Melbourne . You've got a lot , you've got a huge amount , but I don't know if that's because purely down to tourism or it's because it is growing here slowly and I know Melbourne is very good for it . I think they were ready to like fall in the world for like being a vegan city .

I think they came off of like California . However , sydney is still catching up . So there we have quite a few vegan restaurants , but in your shops there's not so much going on . Like you can get like rows and rows of tofu , but that's because the Asian influence we have here is very close .

And then you got like rows of tempeh and other things , but a lot of the time it's like your whole foods that we're looking for . And then you go into , like your northern areas of like Australia where it's very outback and they never heard the word vegan . Yeah , they did not , and it was going on .

A lot of them are like cattle ranchers out there or others , literally like a town of like you know , 10 houses and a shop and they're like , but they would waddle enough . Everywhere I've ever been , and even in the middle of the outback , they have alternative milks . So I don't understand .

They're like oh , I never heard of like a vegan or these things that exist here , but everywhere you have an alternative milk and I've never been to a place where they haven't had one and they normally have four on offer . They normally have soy , almond and macca .

You say that because I was at a show a few weeks ago and someone we were like it was like a vegan booth basically , and we had like vegan snacks and different things and someone was like , oh , I don't eat vegan , and I'm like in my head I'm like but you don't like bread or bananas , like you know , just like , come on , it's like the same thing .

It's just yeah , no animal products involved .

unless you're eating meat or you're on a carnivore diet , then you're very much eating like your fries or like your , your bread or your like your vegetables or your sides are normally very much plant based . They may have like butter on them and stuff like that , but the majority of food that you're eating is plant based .

It's just you have that meaty option and that's what you imagine . The main bit of the meal is because you want to leave everything else . But everything else around there that you are reading is very much vegan friendly .

So I would love to go through just some of these common questions and kind of just get your your feedback on them , one being I'm actually curious to see how , or hear how , you respond to when someone asks you where do you get your protein ?

But a lot of the time it's very , very annoying because you are growing up thinking you know me , and I'd like to point out to them that obviously what you're eating is amino acid buildups , and then we'll explain those of how our body needs them . We need these nine essentials and every plant on this planet has them in varying different amounts .

So they may be like you know . They may have , let's say , 80% in one and 100% in the other , and that would count as an incomplete protein . It's not incomplete , it's just varying .

But it may be higher in calcium and I'm like but you're not just eating isolated food on its own , you're mixing and matching and these things you're building and building , and building and building . Like , yeah , there's gonna be some foods that have very low protein content , like your kale , for instance .

Some of the leaves that you're spinaching aren't gonna have a huge amount . They got them in there , but not a huge amount . They're not gonna live on spinach . No one's just eating spinach . So once you mix and match your food over time , you're building them . Like we have a few complete proteins , that's fine .

If you're gonna eat soy every day , if you want to say that , that's fine , you can and you will hit your markers with that .

But the rest of your time , like when I first realized about , like , when I started like going into nutrition and just wrote down what I was eating and then put it into like chronometer , I actually realized I was actually eating a lot more than I actually actually needed as well .

So all these things have it in there and you're slowly building and building and building and I was having double the amount that I needed , just by accident , and that's without even measuring .

So when you are actually like , let's say you have a goal , like you want , like you know , want to be a bodybuilder , or you kind of want to like , just build some muscle and you do actually put that in , you are creating so much more than you probably actually need . So it's yeah , from like a curious mind of people .

I'm just like you know what this is the stimulus , the stimulus structure . This is how it works . All these foods have it in there and it's mixing and matching and you just need to kind of be mindful of what you're eating .

If you're going to eat a salad every like you know , breakfast , lunch and dinner or something along the lines of that , then yeah , you're going to have a very low protein marker . People do ask me that as well Like , don't you live on protein powders ? I'm like , no , no , I'm like . But also , protein powders aren't exclusive to vegans .

Protein powders have been so used constantly throughout time by , like athletes , bodybuilders , people generally just going into fitness . They use every day and like the bigger market of it like plant-based proteins is probably about 1% of the protein powders .

I agree with you that it's been hyped up to be a bigger issue than what it is , and I think it's just because there's so so much misinformation on social media , online things that we're still believing that were told to us in the 70s and 80s that we need to like , combine our proteins and all these things , when those myths have been busted for decades , but

people are still talking about them because they haven't been caught up to what the science is actually saying now , which is we don't have to worry about our protein , and the variety piece that you're speaking to is what's really important . You don't want to just live off of a salad every single day or your only source of protein coming from beans .

You want to make sure you get variety in your diet and you'll be fine . Yeah , yeah .

And as soon as you like , and I was being very much alive without nutritional knowledge , when I wasn't eating , like when it started not eating me and I didn't have anything , I had no nutritional knowledge whatsoever . And all of a sudden , now I've got it , I'm like , oh , like it's great , like I know where to get these things from .

But nobody asked , nobody was asking the questions back then . It just seems like in the last kind of like yeah , seven or eight years , that people are now kind of very much this , this where you get any protein . Why is this ? What is this ? Where do you get it from ? Whereas before no one get .

But then we were obsessed with carbohydrates , being low carb , and now we're obsessed with being very high protein . And it's just interesting to kind of zoom out and just look at this like wave that we've been riding in our diet culture .

If you're not , and you live in a very sedentary lifestyle , why are you having 140 grams Like there's no need ?

So you had mentioned soy and a question I was going to ask you . A common question that we hear is well , is soy safe to eat ? Can I have it every day ? What are your thoughts ?

You could be eating it three times a day and I don't think there's going to be any any issues there . I've never seen anything where the only study I've seen that says those issues was done on catfish , and that study is the one that says that soy decreases testosterone and gives you estrogen .

And also , soy has been prevalent in the Asian diet for like a lot , however many thousand years , and most of them are absolutely fine . They're very much , very soy based where it is , like you know , tofu , soy sauce , you know tempes and other bits and pieces that have soy , soy curls and like you know your TVP bits and pieces .

But I think people get once again they have , they hear estrogen and they hear phytoestrogen and think that the same thing . They're not . And I think , like estrogen , yes , and I'd be more worried if I was drinking dairy which is full of estrogen , right when it's eating , eating a soybean . It has phytoestrogens that block estrogen receptors .

But apart from that , soy , soy is a very healthy , nutritious . It's being shown to , you know , reduce certain types of cancers and diseases and stuff like that . It's a very healthy food to be eating . And there's no from what I've seen , there's no upper dangerous limit from anything I've seen .

So that could change in the future , and if that does change in the future , that's great , we'll talk about it .

Well , and going off of that like the only reason we don't recommend , like , eating 20 servings of soy a day is not necessarily because there's going to be harmful effects to you , but because if you're eating 20 servings of anything a day , then you're not getting variety into your diet , and variety , we know , is very important , like we said , to get all those

amino acids and different micronutrients . So that is really the most important thing there . Yeah , I eat multiple servings of soy a day and it's amazing .

I'm fine , I'm still alive and I haven't turned into a woman yeah , which I've been told that's going to happen to me many times by random trolls on Instagram and they're like oh , you're going to grow boobs , and that's another thing that you get as well is that you're going to grow man boobs , and I'm still yet to see them .

I've been doing it for a long time .

takes on it . My version of plant-based is eating 100% plants , like I avoid all animal products at all costs , as much as I know possible that there's nothing in . So I will majority a whole foods plant-based diet . So that's what plant-based means to me .

I know in some countries plant-based means , you know , had a bit of dairy or something else to it and it's still plant-based . It doesn't involve a first piece of animal product , like an animal product has , like a secondary beast , like cheese or butter , but for me it is .

Everything is a plant , so everything is 100% made from plants , or as much as I know possible . Whereas people stick plant-based and veganism in the same .

I am both , but veganism is an ethical lifestyle , whereas people can , you know , eat a plant-based diet and not have the ethics to water , or they can be vegan and not have a whole foods plant-based lifestyle that eaten a very much vegan diet .

So it's like , you know , oreos and things like that , which is , which is also great if that's what you want to do , that's what you want to do , but for me , those two things can go hand in hand . Some people they don't , but my plant-based , completely whole foods , plant-based diet , as far as possible , that's what plant-based , I would say , means to me .

But I think it's really good to know kind of what the difference is , because when I started going plant-based , it's like , oh yeah , I'm also vegan , but it really it took a few years to kind of figure out oh , that's what vegan is , like it is . It's , it's just a different way of living . So , okay , we touched on this just a little bit .

But does eating plant-based give you all the nutrients except I know we need to talk about one but does it give you all the nutrients that you need ?

However , all the other essential nutrients that you need you can get from a plant-based diet , whether that be like a whole foods plant-based diet , maybe that be like , you know , a vegan diet , full of , like alternatives and stuff .

They will be four to five , like four to five different foods in different foods , but everything that you every vitamin , every mineral , every macro , micronutrient you can get , whether that be from your you know , your proteins , your fats , your amigas , you know , going down to your ions and the ones that nobody knows of , like your copper , your like like Kohl-ion ,

things like that , because most people aren't aware that some of these tiny ones exist , but majority of those you are getting from your daily diet anyway , like copper is . I don't think copper deficiency is a thing , because I think most people , most people , get that on a daily basis , just on their natural foods , no matter what it is .

Yeah , there's some foods , some nutrients , that may need to be slightly wary of , but that's also depending on what the person's eating . So that would be I don't think that's so much your protein , but that's more your iron and that's more your calcium and things like that .

If you're not eating soy or you're not eating your dark leafy greens or you're not having any like plant milks , that may be like fortified or like beans , legumes , you may be lacking in calcium , but if you do have a well rounded diet , you're going to be . You're going to have those iron .

I feel like I know more people with an iron deficiency that eat me than I do that he plants .

So I think out like , if you're , if you're not following guidelines , then yeah , you're like iron can be slightly lower .

But if you're eating relatively healthy and you are eating your vitamin C and eating a lot of iron foods with your food would be in each meal , and avoiding caffeine , like how , four hour after , you should be getting all the iron in it as well . The small ones that people forget about , which is like iodine .

Iodine is a great one and it's hard to get on any diet . It's not , it's not prevalent on any diet . So that's not just a vegan issue . That's why iodine salt was created and it's put into like bread and things like that .

However , if you're eating a lot of like seaweed or like sushi roll paper stuff like that , you're getting a substantial amount of iodine from oh , omega freeze that's . That's another one . Yeah , there's various types of Omega , but if you're eating once again like seaweed or howky , you're getting a lot .

If you're eating your things , like your chia seeds and your ground , your flax seeds and your various other seeds as long as they're ground up , you're still getting those , as far as , obviously , how they don't , you don't absorb the enough to having all those .

They're getting converted into the immediate you need and obviously it does vary from person to person how much you you absorb . But if you're eating a once again , well rounded diet with , like these bits and pieces in amongst every day , you're not going to see issues . I had people ask me the other day like but where do you get your creativity in from ?

I'm like it's not an essential nutrient . Yeah , yeah , we create it . So , yes , you're essentials . Everything that you essentially need to thrive , you can get on a plant based diet . Anything that's not essential that you don't need to thrive , you sometimes you can't get a plant based diet , but that , once again , they're not essential .

But we always say that supplementation is the most reliable source just because it's so easy and it's really affordable .

Just to just a nutritional yeast . Yeah , take it , just take a supplement . People assume that B12 does come from like animals . It doesn't . It's not . It's not . It's not a , it's not even a vegan issue .

It's a worldwide issue because it's supplemented to animals as well , or , if they are getting it , it's from the bacteria in the soil , if they've got a rich land to be eating off , which , for the majority of the time , what we've done to the world it's not .

So it's very much supplementation is done to cows , animals , us , so that it's not a vegan issue when the small percentage of a population is vegan and the rest are there just of knocking them out . They need as well .

So do you actually do supplement with anything in particular ?

But when I'm training I will throw in a magnesium powder once in a while , just to replenish . But that's not essential or needed , it's just to help your body . Oh , a protein powder once in a while as well , apart from those , oh , when I was in England , d3 .

I don't take as much here , but I will take . However , if you are living in a country like England , then vitamin D3 is essential .

However , people are supplementing on a day-to-day basis . Literally the majority of the population like supplementing in some way , shape or form , whether they know it or not . So don't be demonized by supplementation . If you need it , or it's something that's going to help you thrive , or it's going to add to your diet .

If you can't get everything in , then absolutely supplement .

Ok , callan , if someone wants to connect with you or work with you because you are taking on clients , is that right ?

follow along there . But , callan , thank you so much for joining us today . I really appreciate it .