u/crisponline

On track to build some serious muscle this year as a relatively broke vegan, with a bulk and cut in the first half of the year giving me an estimate of 5-7lbs lean muscle. Now I’m trying to save money and lock in by doing it mostly with stuff available at Costco. Think lifting-bro approach but make it vegan. Dumb simple. Cheap. 40+ G protein per meal.

For context: I have been vegan a long time, love cooking, and can definitely make some amazingly tasty dishes when time is on my side. Life stuff is forcing me away from multi-hour cooking sessions/expensive ingredients/multi-store grocery trips, and that plus the health goal is making it hard to use my staples of incredibly delicious though labor intensive dishes. Also yes, I’m taking a multivitamin, and not focused on micronutrients for this prep. Also yes, one of my meals per day is a protein shake.

Here’s what I have been eating so far:

Tofu rice bowls. Tofu, frozen mixed veg, and rice. Main issue here is I can’t find a reliable, easy af way to make the amount of tofu i need to eat to hit 40g protein not taste like… warm unflavored tofu with stuff on the outside. It’s the cheapest and best protein source at Costco but baking a ton of marinaded tofu just isn’t hitting, nor are scrambles, pad krapow etc. Was easier using the high protein tofu from other stores bc it’s less volume, but alas, Costco doesn’t have.

Beyond meat kibble. You guessed it, it’s two beyond burgers with rice and frozen mixed vegetables, typically doused in hot sauce. This one rocks for me, but is significantly more expensive than other sources so I’d like to mix it up.

Chickpeas + protein pasta + tomato sauce. Easy as heck but the protein pasta isn’t at Costco, and is pretty expensive. Could just use beyond meat and regular pasta here, but still kind of expensive.

Please save me from eating 4 beyond burgers a day. Thanks in advance for any other ideas you have.

On track to build some serious muscle this year as a relatively broke vegan, now trying to save money by doing it mostly with stuff available at Costco. Think lifting-bro approach but make it vegan. Dumb simple. Cheap. 40+ G protein per meal.

For context: I have been vegan a long time, love cooking, and can definitely make some amazingly tasty dishes when time is on my side. Life stuff is forcing me away from multi-hour cooking sessions/expensive ingredients/multi-store grocery trips, and that plus the health goal is making it hard to use my staples of incredibly delicious though labor intensive dishes. Also yes, I’m taking a multivitamin, and not focused on micronutrients for this prep. Also yes, one of my meals per day is a protein shake.

Here’s what I have been eating so far:

Tofu rice bowls. Tofu, frozen mixed veg, and rice. Main issue here is I can’t find a reliable, easy af way to make the amount of tofu i need to eat to hit 40g protein not taste like… warm unflavored tofu with stuff on the outside. It’s the cheapest and best protein source at Costco but baking a ton of marinaded tofu just isn’t hitting, nor are scrambles, pad krapow etc. Was easier using the high protein tofu from other stores bc it’s less volume, but alas, Costco doesn’t have.

Beyond meat kibble. You guessed it, it’s two beyond burgers with rice and frozen mixed vegetables, typically doused in hot sauce. This one rocks for me, but is significantly more expensive than other sources so I’d like to mix it up.

Chickpeas + protein pasta + tomato sauce. Easy as heck but the protein pasta isn’t at Costco, and is pretty expensive. Could just use beyond meat and regular pasta here, but still kind of expensive.

Please save me from eating 4 beyond burgers a day. Thanks in advance for any other ideas you have.