The term flexitarian is formed by joining the words flexible and vegetarian. Do not look it up in the dictionary because it is not recognized by the Royal Spanish Academy. The flexitarian diet continues to add followers, motivated sometimes by the search for a healthy eating pattern and others by the desire to consume more sustainable products from an environmental point of view. What does this diet consist of? Would it be more correct to talk about food philosophy? How is it different from the Mediterranean diet?

The dietician-nutritionist Rocío Aparici, member of the Executive Board of the Official College of Dietitians-Nutritionists of the Valencian Community (Codinucova), answers the first question: “It is based mainly on a vegetarian diet, with the occasional inclusion of source foods. animal. Mostly fish, eggs and dairy ”. More and more people choose to reduce the consumption of foods of animal origin, so they would be following, consciously or unconsciously, a flexitarian diet. “Approximately 10% of the population follows this type of diet”, calculates the expert. However, she also recalls that Spain “is one of the countries where the most meat is consumed.”

In the words of Rubén Bravo, dietician-nutritionist and gastronomy expert at the European Medical Institute for Obesity (IMEO), this model “is an alternative for those who approach veganism or a vegetarian diet but do not want to completely renounce derived foods. of the animals”. The proportion would be, approximately, 80% of products of vegetable origin and 20% of animal origin.

In reality, more than a diet, it would be a philosophy, that is, a way of seeing food. The motivation of those who follow a flexitarian pattern is usually more related to preserving the environment than to health care. They are attentive to issues such as whether food of animal origin comes from animals that have had a healthy life and good treatment. “It is about looking for what is ecological, sustainable, bio, respectful with the animal and also with nature in the crops,” explains Bravo.

“Its objective is to avoid the overexploitation of animals and the environmental cost of maintaining them for human consumption, because, if we continue to produce and consume food of animal origin as we have been doing until now, large amounts of water will be needed, farmland and use of fertilizers, which will harm the planet ”, summarizes Aparici.

If it weren’t for that more ideological nuance, the flexitarian diet could be equated with the Mediterranean diet, which is based on vegetables (daily consumption) and, to a lesser extent, meat foods (once or twice a week).

This is a flexitarian menu
This food model is characterized by having vegetables and greens combined with legumes, pasta, rice, flour, root vegetables and nuts at the base of the diet. The occasional consumption of foods of animal origin is mainly focused on dairy products and eggs and, even more sporadically, fish and meat.

An example of a typical flexitarian menu would be the following:

Breakfast
Toast of whole wheat or rye bread with hummus or avocado and a piece of fruit / coffee or tea, a whole wheat toast with cheese and nuts and a fruit / soy yogurt with almonds and mango.

Midmorning
A piece of fruit and a low-fat soy yogurt.

Food
Lentils with quinoa and vegetables / lentil burger with broccoli and a side of mixed salad / rice noodles with vegetables and prawns / zucchini lasagna with soy / vegetable paella.

Snack
A dairy with a small amount of nuts (three or four walnuts, four or five peanuts…) / porridge / toast with homemade jam / fruit and nuts.

Dinner
Grilled salmon accompanied with a grill of vegetables / omelette with garlic and pumpkin puree / noodle soup and soy auberge / oriental style tofu with vegetables / baked potatoes with vegetables and roasted chickpeas.