Overview
About Vegan
Vegan compatibility reflects how well foods fit a fully plant-based diet of legumes, tofu, whole grains, and vegetables, with no animal-derived ingredients.
A vegan diet excludes all animal products including meat, dairy, eggs, and honey. It focuses on plant-based foods like vegetables, fruits, grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds.
In the data
What the grading picks up
- Not vegetarian or vegan, and scored pro-inflammatory as a red meat if you are following an anti-inflammatory pattern
- Not vegetarian or vegan
- Vegetarian but not vegan
- Not vegetarian or vegan
Examples
A few ingredients either way
Grading
How we grade Vegan
Every ingredient in the database carries one grade for vegan, and this page, the checker and the app all read that same grade. It describes the ingredient as it is usually eaten. Portion size and preparation move it.
Vegan is kept as a rule. In the app, an ingredient you would have to check the label on still counts against the day.
Practical
Following Vegan
- Check labels for hidden animal products like casein, whey, and gelatin.
- Combine legumes with grains for complete protein.
- Ensure adequate protein from varied plant sources
- Supplement B12 - it's essential and not available from plants
- Consider omega-3 from algae-based supplements
- Iron from plants requires vitamin C for better absorption
- Plan meals to ensure complete amino acid profiles
Method
Test it with a diary
Most people find their own triggers by logging meals and symptoms for a few weeks and reading the result back. Three steps.
- 1Log every meal for a few weeks. Type it, say it out loud, or scan a barcode, and it lands as a list of ingredients.
- 2Rate how you feel through the day on whatever you are tracking, whether that is bloating, headaches, skin or sleep.
- 3Read the pattern back. Every ingredient you logged is scored against the days you felt worse, and the result ranks vegan against everything else you eat.
Read next
Where to go next
References
Vegan sources
Where the vegan grades come from: food composition databases, clinical guidelines and patient organisations.
4 sources from peer-reviewed research, regulatory bodies, and clinical guidelines.
Get started
Following Vegan?
Log what you eat and how you feel, and the app finds the pattern for you. Or look an ingredient up here first.
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