When you don’t have the time or appetite for a full meal, vegan snacks fill the void. You’ve got a dizzying assortment of possibilities. In this guide, we’ll run through all the very best choices.
Convenient Ready-to-Eat Vegan Snacks
Most snacks require little or no preparation time. Many are ready-to-eat. Others need only a couple minutes nuking in the microwave. If you want quick and easy snack ideas, start here:
- Fruit
- Vegan yogurt
- Nuts and seeds
- Dark chocolate (check ingredients for milk products)
- Energy bars (we recommend: ProBar; Raw Rev Glo; Clif Bar; Luna Bar)
- Cookies
- Crackers
- Toast spread with jam or nut butter
- Soup cups
- Edamame (soybeans in pods)
- Roasted seaweed or dried dulse
- Popcorn
- Vegan ice cream & sorbets
- Vegan jerky
- Papadams (microwaved 25-35 seconds)
- Nuts and Seeds (raw or roasted)
- Dried fruit, raisins, or trail mix
- Take-out vegan nori rolls, sold at any sushi restaurant and most natural food stores.
- Mochi (a mildly sweet Japanese rice snack sold in Japanese groceries)
- Peanuts in the shell
- Tortilla chips with jarred salsa or bean dip, or boxed pressure-packed guacamole
For entire meals that are comparably easy to make, check out our Easy Vegan Foods page.
Healthy Vegan Snacks
Both vegetables and fruits are loaded with nutrients. But remember that fruits contain a lot of sugar so you should eat them in moderation.
Vegan yogurts are likewise both healthy and convenient. Opt for yogurts made from soy milk, as they have significantly more protein than those based on almond or coconut milk. But remember that most brands contain a fair amount of sugar. Several companies make unsweetened plain soy yogurts, which is a great choice. You can always blend in a little fruit for sweetness.
Fruit smoothies are another terrific and healthy snack. Preparation and cleanup takes only a couple of minutes. Choose unsweetened soy milk or Ripple for more protein and better nutrition. Any sort of frozen fruit or berry works wonderfully in a smoothie.
Chocolate gets a bad rap since most of chocolate bars are full of milk and sugar. But a couple squares of vegan dark chocolate, labeled 85 percent chocolate or higher, is one of the healthiest things you could nibble on. Better yet, get ahold of some cacao beans. They are bitter and may take getting used to, but they’re wonderfully satisfying and nutritious once you acquire the taste.
Middle Eastern Snacks
Better natural food and gourmet groceries offer olive bars that also feature hummus, baba ghanouj, tabouleh, and dolmas. You can also buy these foods to-go from any Middle Eastern restaurant. In my experience, the hummus and baba made by Middle Eastern restaurants is much better than the commercial brands sold at groceries.
One of the healthiest snacks imaginable is raw carrots, cauliflower, or celery dipped into hummus. Keep a container of hummus and some veggies in the refrigerator and you’ll always have a nutritious and filling snack on hand.
Quick & Healthy Light Meals
Sandwiches take just a minute or two to make, and you can prepare them in endless variations. To make your sandwich more of a snack than a meal, make it a half-sandwich using a single slice of bread cut in two. Also, you can turn any sandwich into a wrap by swapping in a large tortilla in place of the bread. Regardless of whether you’re eating bread or tortillas, whole grain offers fiber plus better nutrition.
Canned chili is a super easy light meal, and takes only minutes to heat up. Amy’s makes several varieties, from mild to spicy, using organic ingredients.
Baked sweet potatoes are one of the easiest and healthiest snacks going. But since they require an hour in the oven, they’re not a good choice if you’re already hungry. You can also bake and then mash them along with some chopped nuts and a dab of maple syrup, then refrigerate them in an airtight dish. In Japan, many groceries have a mini oven of bagged sweet potatoes next to the checkout aisle.
Junky Vegan Snacks
The question of what qualifies as junk doesn’t yield a clear-cut answer. But let’s just say that if it comes out of a deep fryer, you can accurately call it junk food.
You can choose from plenty of delicious junky snacks. Since deep frying at home is time consuming and hazardous, I prefer satisfying my fried food fix at restaurants. I typically check to see if the deep fryer oil is also used for non-vegetarian foods, since I’m grossed out using oil that’s come into contact with shrimp or chicken nuggets.
You can buy vegan-friendly junky snacks at most fast food restaurants. These items include French fries, onion rings. And many vegan restaurants will sell you a heaping plate of nachos loaded up with vegan cheese and sour cream.
Donuts are prohibitively time consuming to make at home. But there are vegan donut places all over the world. And many Whole Foods Markets carry locally-made vegan doughnuts. Cupcakes are somewhat less unhealthy than doughnuts since they’re not deep-fried, and they’re also much easier to make. Any good vegan dessert cookbook will feature vegan cupcake recipes.
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