Welcome to The Beet, Your Guide to Eating More Plant-Based

The Beet is your all-in-one guide to eating a more plant-based diet. If you want to boost your energy, feel your best, and reach your personal health and wellness goals by adding more plant foods to your diet, we’re here to help.

We're a new plant-based platform where food, health news, product launches, plant-based restaurant reviews, expert advice, and the mainstreaming of plant-based culture meet. The Beet covers everything from where to "Find Vegan Near Me" to the latest plant-based or vegan food products that make it even easier to eat plant-based and love it. We cover the newest studies that inspire us to want to be healthier (the "why" go plant-based) and how to get the right amount of protein, iron, calcium, B12, and other essential nutrients (the "how").

Eating more plants is great for you— whether you’ve just tried your first Beyond Burger or you’re already eating plant-based a few days a week, whether you call yourself a vegetarian, vegan, pescatarian, flexitarian, plant-leaning, plant-forward or plant-based – on The Beet, you’ll find what you need to reach your goals. The more you know, the more you care about where your food comes from, including the practices used in factory farming, and how our food choices impact the planet, climate change and the ethical treatment of animals. Whatever your motivation –to align your food choices with your ethics, your health goals or your concern for the environment – The Beet is here to get you further on your plant-based journey.

Whatever your motivation: To be healthier, to lose weight, to feel less bloated, to perform better on the bike or tennis court, to stay heart-healthy, or to get off the meds, or if you want to eat in a way that is best for the environment, spares animal suffering or to align with your value system, or for any other reason, we can help guide you toward your plant-based lifestyle goals. (A note: We don't call ourselves vegan but we want to be a resource for anyone who wants to eat plant-based and eschew animal products, so if a non-vegan ingredient such as honey is used in a recipe we will always tell you and give you the substitute of something fully plant-based that can work instead).

We believe that eating a whole-food, plant-based diet can be healthy and delicious. You don't need to subsist on avocado toast and hummus alone. Filling your plate with mostly vegetables, legumes, grains, nuts and fruits is beneficial to you and the planet, which is why 80% of Americans are trying to eat more plant-based foods, according to a study done by Numerator. No matter what your eating habits, you can try it—today.

And check out The Beet Meter, where we give you the real deal on what's healthy, what's tasty and what leaves a little to be desired. (Not all vegan food is good for you... and that's where we come in. We'll show you what to savor and what to steer clear of.) Chime in with your vote and add to the crowdsourced Beet Meter score. We'd love to know what you think of all the plant-based milk choices, ice creams, and other products—and together we'll create the one-stop resource people need and trust.

No labels necessary. Don't want to call yourself plant-based or vegan or anything in particular? No problem. Anyone is welcome to comment and engage, share your favorite snack, story or helpful hack. At The Beet, we welcome all plant-based eaters, at every stage, age, level and plant-eating approach, whether you've had your first Beyond Burger or been eating vegan for years. We invite you to share your journey, to be healthier, happier and live better, one plant-based food at a time.

Who's behind The Beet? I am, with a team of smart, savvy content people (our editors are all plant-based eaters) dedicated to helping you feel and look your best and live a long healthy life, or do whatever you can to up the odds of that and lower the risk of disease, now or in the future. Yes, you can achieve all that just by adding more plants to your diet and ditching meat and dairy. I was the longtime editor-in-chief of SELF magazine, and now I’m eating plant-based, too. I've been following a mostly plant-based diet since 2019. Prior to that, I was basically pescatarian but also somewhat addicted to cheese. Sidenote: I've lost weight and I feel more energetic, less bloated and a recent trip to the doctor showed that my cholesterol had dropped by about 35 percent in just the first three weeks of being plant-based.

Diets—in the strictest definition of the term—are not for me. What is? A healthy lifestyle and a commitment to investing time and energy into sustaining that lifestyle for the longterm. I've read the science, and I'm convinced that a whole-food, plant-based approach is the healthiest way to eat, from what we know now about the benefits of plant-based nutrients on every cell in our bodies (hint: it all comes down to fiber!).

I'm not perfect, but I eat plant-based 95 percent of the time. When I choose to cheat it’s usually with a little cheese on my pasta or the occasional bite of fish. (And when my host puts a light dusting of parmesan on my kale salad, I won’t send it back.) This plan works for me and keeps me happy (and sane!)—and not locked into rigid rules. Do what works for you. If everyone did their best to be a little more plant-based it would positively influence the planet, their health, and the welfare of animals more than if just a handful of people went vegan. We hope that we can help everyone go more plant-based, one incremental change at a time.

We want to grow The Beet — together. Please email me with any comments, requests or thoughtful critiques about how to make The Beet even better. See that tote bag below? Give me an excuse to make a whole bunch of them. I'm taking orders ($20). Email me your interest, or anything else you want me to know about, improve upon, or just to say hi.

See ya on The Beet!

A note about our contributors, experts and writers: It's our aim to bring you the best ideas, recipes, expert advice and practical solutions to help you get closer to your own plant-based goals. That said, our experts may be plant-based, vegan or vegetarian. What they cover for us will be fully plant-based, with no animal products included (unless we are trying to show you the comparison of an Impossible Whopper to the original Whopper on a chart, for instance). What these experts include on their own social feeds or for other media outlets is up to them, and we respect their choices. We have lined up plant-based doctors and nutritionists, writers and health editors, taste-testers and athletes who can attest to this way of living. If you would like to contribute to The Beet, please email me and suggest story ideas.

Like Dr. T. Colin Campbell, I agree that eating a mostly plant-based diet is healthiest for us and the planet, and the more people who try to do it, the better off we'll all be. The best way to do that? Be inclusive and welcome anyone heading in that direction. After all, you have to get them into the tent before you start the revival. We hope that you'll appreciate the inclusive approach we take here and that you'll join us on the journey to getting many more people (millions of them) to embrace the plant-based life, on The Beet.

Sign up for The Beet Newsletter and follow us on Instagram, Twitter and like TheBeetOfficial on Facebook. Want a spiffy tote bag? It is yours. Just let me know and we can send you one for $20. How awesome is that?