gaining weight as a vegan / vegetarian

[Kyorax]

Hi everyone,
I'm currently a meat-eater, but after discovering "TheVeganAtheist" on youtube and taking a look at the arguments for a vegan diet, I've become really interested in trying that out for me. I would like to start out as a vegetarian, as this is pretty new to me.
Most people I know eat meat, a few are vegetarian. My problem is that I'm a bit underweight so I'd like to ask you about a good way to gain weight with this new lifestyle. It is probably only because I'm not informed well enough about the vegetarian diet yet, but I'm afraid I might lose even more weight.
Do you know what I could do to gain weight with a vegetarian lifestyle?
Thanks a lot in advance.

[TheVeganAtheist]

Welcome!
In order to gain weight, and by weight I would think you mean muscle mass, you need to eat more calories from healthy food then you burn. Do you work out? How tall are you and how much do you weigh?

[brimstoneSalad]

Hi Kyorax,

It's great that you've decided to give it a try.

There are a few body builders here who may be able to give you some advice from personal experience, but generally, eating more healthy food is the way to gain weight, and for putting on muscle mass, cut down on cardio and do strength training (exercises that you can only do five or so reps with) every three days or so.

One clever trick I like is to fill a backpack with water bottles, and just do some basic calisthenics -- push-ups, pull-ups, etc. with 50 pounds or so of added weight (or less if you can't do at least three or four reps to start out).

[miniboes]

In my experience a healthy vegan diet (by which I mean one based on whole plant foods; legumes, grains, vegetables and fruits) will generally nudge you to an ideal weight, whether that is heavier or leaner. However, if it doesn't work for you, there's tons of processed vegan crap out there. Although I would advise against adding saturated fat or oils to the diet as they have terrible health effects even beyond weight gain, adding more sugar probably won't hurt too much. Nuts are not a good way to gain weight, although high in calories.

[LogicLover]

There are tonnes of vegan athletes out there.. to gain high quality muscle you need to:

1) eat more plant based calories than you burn
2) do strength training

simples

Check out http://www.greatveganathletes.com/ for motivation if you want!

[PrincessPeach]

I was under weight as a meat eater and I actually gained weight when I became vegan.

You are probably not eating the correct fats, try adding more nuts, seeds and oils to your diet!

[codyedwardwilliams]

Eating vegetables and eating the right foods is not enough to gain weight. You need to be physically active to get the right body mass you acquire! Good luck