Meal planning can be a gamechanger for any successful plant-based or vegan diet. Planning meals ahead of time takes the pressure off of trying to figure out what to eat in the moment and ensures you get the nutrition you need, like plant proteins.
Meal plans provide structure and organization and are a great way to discover new recipes.
Here is a round-up of some plant-based and vegan meal plans from around the web that I found to be well-structured and (in most cases) high in protein.
You can always mix and match these meal plans, or choose to use a plant-based meal planner app instead. Either way, there are definitely ways to maximize your plant protein by picking and choosing recipes as you see fit.
1. CookingLight: The Ultimate 3-Day Plant-Based Meal Plan for Beginners
Even though it’s just three days’ worth of recipes, this is a great place to start if you’re looking for an easy meal plan. It utilizes a lot of plant protein like chickpeas, tofu, and tempeh. Plus, the recipes simply look delicious.
2. EatingWell: 7-Day Vegan Meal Plan: 1,200 Calories
With seven days of vegan recipes, this meal plan is definitely a viable resource. However, I’d be cautious about the 1,200 calorie restriction. Though helpful for weight loss, you should definitely calculate how many calories you need (even for weight loss) for your weight and age before following a calorie-restrictive meal plan.
3. Veggies Don’t Bite: Weekly Vegan Meal Plan 1
Sophia, the author of this plant-based food blog, puts together a very delicious vegan dinner plan that’s designed to produce zero waste by utilizing leftovers. This is especially ideal for those of us on a budget–she even provides a shopping list for increased convenience. There’s also a second plan in case you need more ideas.
4. Veggies Don’t Bite: Easy 7-Day Vegan Meal Plan
If you like Sophia’s meal plans but you want to plan more than just dinners, then she also has a 7-Day plan with all three meals, which you can mix-and-match to your liking.
5. Veganuary: Vegan Meal Plans
This is actually a collection of different meal plans catered to more specific diets, which is great if, for example, you’re plant-based but also gluten-free. I like the Sports Nutrition one because it’s deliberately high-protein.
6. PETA: Two-Week Vegan Meal Plan
If you’re into planning ahead, then this two-week meal plan will give you plenty to work with. The layout of this meal plan is very user-friendly and almost every recipe utilizes plant-protein in simple ways. Plus, there’s a photo for every meal, and they all look delicious.
7. SkinnyMs.: 30-Day Plant-Based Meal Plan
This site offers less structure and more of a pick-and-choose sort of vegan meal plan (each of the three meals is just a list of recipe links), but if you prefer to mix and match and try new recipes, then you’re likely to find this site helpful. Not everything appears to be high-protein, but you can definitely tweak things as needed.
8. Running on Real Food: 3-Day Whole Food Plant-Based Meal Plan
Another good resource if you’re just starting out with a few days of planning at a time, this blog post also lays out some basics of plant-based vs. vegan diets and provides a very useful “Ingredients to Avoid” list.
9. Whole Foods Market: Plant-astic Plant-Based Meal Plan
I love the way this meal plan is laid out, with tabs for each day and photographs that are easy on the eyes. There’s also a “nutrition tally” at the bottom, which is useful if you’re keeping track of macros. It does repeat some of the same recipes day-to-day, but you could always swap them out with others.
10. Whole Foods Market: Best of Beans Meal Plan
Do you love beans? Then you’re going to love this vegan meal plan, because, as the name implies, it’s chock-full of bean recipes. It’s laid out exactly like the previous one, just with more, well, beans. If you don’t want to repeat the same recipes, you could always swap them with other plant-proteins.
