How to Eat at Restaurants on Vegan Diet

A few years ago, I was traveling around the world with my ex-wife for about 8 months. We managed to stay 95-99% vegan the whole time, and did a fairly good job at eating a healthy diet on the road.

But let’s be honest, it wasn’t easy.

Some countries, like Australia, Germany, Singapore or Thailand, had plenty of fresh and healthy options.

Other countries like the Philippines or remote places like Fiji were much more difficult.

And I’m not talking about vegetarian or vegan traveling, because many countries around the world have vegetarian options.

I’m also not talking about touring all the raw food restaurants of the world.

I’m talking about true healthy eating, which I define as:

Plant-based
Whole
Free of added oils
High in raw
Limited use of salt
No harmful ingredients or cooking practices, like frying

You can eat as a vegetarian in most countries easily. But if you rely heavily on restaurants, there’s no doubt that you’re not eating a healthy diet.

Everybody loves going out to restaurants because the food usually tastes SO good.

What’s the magic there? How come the food is so much more tasty and stimulating than the food you make at home?

It’s no secret.

Every chef uses a ton of:

Salt
Sugar
Oil (and other fats)

… in almost every single concoction. Salt and oil are particularly overused.

If you actually spend some time in a kitchen with a chef, you’ll be shocked at how much salt is used in the food. It’s easily 3 or 4 times the amount you’d feel comfortable using at home, even if you’re not particularly health conscious.

Same goes for oil.

And of course, many restaurants are very meat and fish centric, and offer almost no option for vegetarians.

So how do we solve this problem?

Restaurants are a part of life. No matter how well you follow your diet at home, there will be all kinds of social pressures that will bring you to restaurants.

Some people have also jobs that require them to attend many meetings at restaurants, making this even more difficult.

Whether you’re following a raw food diet, a low fat plant-based diet, or even just a basic vegetarian or vegan diet, you’re going to have this problem. And the same goes for an omnivorous or flexitarian person trying to eat healthy.

So here’s what to do:

1) First, don’t kid yourself. Restaurant food is almost never healthy. Just watch a few episodes of any famous chef on TV and you’ll know why.

2) Eat before you go out. Unless you’re traveling and the restaurant becomes your source of calories for the day, chances are that you’re going out simply for the social aspects of it. So it’s a good idea to fill up on something healthy BEFORE you show up at the restaurant.

Research has shown than when people consume salads, fresh vegetable soups, or whole fruits before a meal, they consume fewer calories at the meal (and fewer total calories). So it’s a healthy thing to do.

I recommend filling up on fruit, a big salad, a big bowl of vegetable soup (with no salt added), or some cooked, whole grains like brown rice.

3) Avoid a few key items

- Soups: If you’re watching your sodium intake, soups are ALWAYS a no-no. They are loaded with ridiculous quantities of salt, often lots of oil, and provide very few healthy calories.

- Bread: Bread rolls are made with refined flour and loaded with salt. I say avoid them, but they’re not the worst thing you can eat, as long as you do it infrequently. In most cases you should avoid them, but in some survival situations, you better keep them around in case there are truly no healthy calories to eat on the menu!

4) Go buffet style

I know, I know, you’ve heard all kinds of horror stories about buffet and hygiene. But I say buffets are great because they give you control about what you’re going to put on your plate. Salad buffets are excellent, and you can usually make a decent meal there. Even cooked buffet will usually have a few vegetable options and plain rice.

5) Order from the sides menu

Don’t despair if you can’t find anything on the menu. If you look closely at the “sides” menu, you’ll often find many healthy items. I’ve often created entire meals from the sides menu!

6) Hack the menu

You might look at the menu and find no single dish that completely meets your requirements. But you’ll often find plenty of items, scattered throughout the menu, that could be combined together to create a dish. For example, salads listed often contain chicken, tuna, eggs, or other items you don’t want. You can ask for a “custom” salad to be creating, combining all of the healthy ingredients that you can see in all of the salads on the menus combined. If you see they serve guacamole as an appetizer, there’s a good chance they have avocados in the kitchen. So even if no salad listed includes avocados as an ingredient, you can ask if they can throw that in there as well.

7) Call in advance

This works well for fancier restaurants. If the chefs are caught off-guard, it’s not certain they can prepare foods to your liking. But if you call or email in advance, you can make sure that your requirements are met.

I’ve had success with this strategy, especially when emailing the hotels. Some chefs have responded personally, and were very eager to try something new.

Don’t over complicate things for them though. Just list some ingredients you can and can’t eat, and let them get creative.

Tip well

When making all of those special requests, it’s important to tip well. I try to give a generous 25% tip whenever I make special requests.

Coming next: exactly what to order at different types of restaurants (including steak houses!).