Flexitarian Diet: A Flexible Plant-Forward Eating Plan

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The flexitarian diet is a semi-vegetarian pattern: most meals are built from plants, and meat, poultry, or fish show up when you want them. Dietitian Dawn Jackson Blatner popularized the name. U.S. News often ranks the flexitarian diet near the top of best diets overall because it is easier to keep than a strict vegetarian or vegan diet and still tracks with a plant-based diet for heart and metabolic health.

A flexitarian meal plan leans on vegetables, fruit, whole grains, beans, lentils, nuts, seeds, and dairy or fortified alternatives. Eggs are common. Fish can be a weekly protein. Red meat is the item you cut back first. You do not need a scorecard, but beginners often start with a few meatless dinners each week, then grow toward meatless lunches as well. Meatless Monday is one simple on-ramp.

Similar in benefits to DASH or Mediterranean Diets with focus on avoiding meat based ingredients.

What to eat on a flexitarian diet

Fill half the plate with vegetables. Use beans, lentils, tofu, or eggs as the default protein. Choose brown rice, oats, whole-wheat pasta, or corn tortillas. Cook with olive oil. Keep yogurt, cheese, and milk if you tolerate them. When you eat animal protein, pick smaller portions of fish, poultry, or lean meat and treat them as a side, not the whole plate. Ultra-processed meat substitutes are optional; whole legumes usually cost less and add more fiber.

A sample day: oatmeal with berries and walnuts; a chickpea-vegetable bowl with tahini; salmon or a lentil stew with salad. That pattern overlaps the Mediterranean diet and many health diets already on this site. It also works next to DASH if you watch sodium. A flexitarian diet is not automatically low-calorie. Portions, oils, cheese, and desserts still count if weight change is a goal.

Shop Flexitarian Diet Products - Plant-Based Diet

Affiliate disclosure: Some links in this section go to commercial sites. If you buy through a tagged URL, this directory may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Educational links above are not affiliate offers. Plant-based packaged foods vary in sodium and protein; read labels.

Flexitarian and plant-forward cookbooks

Meal kits and prepared meals (easy meatless nights)

HelloFresh — use veggie / vegetarian boxes
Green Chef
Sunbasket
Blue Apron
Hungryroot
Daily Harvest
CookUnity
Purple Carrot (plant-based kits)
Factor

Grocery staples for a flexitarian kitchen

Programs and kitchen tools for Flexitarian Diet

Mayo Clinic Diet (vegetarian / Mediterranean-style plans)
WeightWatchers
Noom
Amazon: Instant Pot / multicooker (fast beans and grains)
Amazon: air fryer
Amazon: meal-prep containers

Note: The flexitarian diet is a flexible pattern, not a medical prescription. People who cut most animal foods should watch protein, iron, B12, iodine, and calcium, and check changes with a clinician if they have a diagnosed condition.

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Vegetarian Diet Plan - Useful Tips

If you’re interested in being a vegetarian, you need a vegetarian diet plan that will work. You need a vegetarian diet plan that will help you get the right mix of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. It’s not enough to simply exclude meat from your foods. You need to make sure you’re getting enough nutrition.. and nutrition you’d normally get from meat must come from elsewhere. Simply eliminating meat from your diet could cause problems for you if you’re not careful about what you do eat. If you’re willing to eat eggs and dairy products it is a bit easier to get your required protein and other nutrients. If not, you’ll have to make even more of an effort to be careful with your diet. Vegetarian Diet Plan

Track your food intake so you can keep an eye on your mixture of carbs, fat, and protein. This can help you make sure the ratios are healthy. A good ratio, depending on you, could be 45% carbs, 30% protein, and 25% fat. Depending on your size, you’ll need between 40-60 grams of protein every day. That’s not always easy when you don’t eat meat. And make sure your vegetarian diet plan takes this into consideration. Here are some good food choices to sprinkle into your diet to keep things moving in the right direction: beans, peas, lentils, quinoa, tofu, whole grains, nuts and seeds, nut butters, milk and cheese. Many vegetables contain incomplete proteins but when combined with other veggies, can become complete proteins so a good vegetarian diet plan will have a wide variety of foods. You might opt for a protein supplement as well. Hence, a good vegetarian diet plan should have several servings of various foods per day.

An example is:

6 servings of whole grains
5 servings of food that have high protein levels
5 servings of food that have high protein levels
4 servings of vegetables
2 or 3 servings of fruits
About 2 serving equivalents of fat (25% or less of your calorie ratio is ideal)

There is a false rumour that vegetarians are not typically overweight. On the contrary, many vegetarians struggle with waist circumference due to too many carbs (for help with this, read our article on vegan weight loss). Make sure your carbs are complex and that you keep an eye on your food ratio so you can be a healthy vegetarian with a healthy body mass index. If you’re not following a good vegetarian diet plan, consider making a plan that starts with a weekly menu to help you stay on track.

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Flexitarian Diet