Onion Ring Snack (Baked) – Plant-Based Diet

Onion ring snack can be a healthy stack when not fried, but baked. Because onions are one of the healthiest allium foods out there.

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They’re prebiotic foods that are fiber and feed the good bacteria in the gut. AND they are great for immunity. Plus they add so much savory flavor without much effort.

Baked onion ring recipe below 🧅

In cold and flu season, I stock up on onions. And they’re such an easy and affordable add to foods and plant based dishes. One that I didn’t like when I was younger. Today, it’s a staple because I know how healthy they are!

Onions are a good way to start a plant-based diet morning. They are part of the Crudite I begin with. And a more plant-forward intention for the day, along with healthy proteins from all sources.

Plant-based diet doesn’t mean you  have to give up non-plant based foods like meats. It simply means adding more natural plants into your diet (and less processed plants 🏭).

While a full plant-based diet is not what I do, I have incorporated one plant-based meal per day that matters. I share below a meal plan that I think is a good way to maintain a consistently healthy ideal weight, year after year.

Eating healthy and balanced doesn’t just affect your physical body, it also positively impacts your brain, daily thinking mind, and mental health.

Getting proper vitamins and minerals that come from animal proteins help our brains function properly, that helps us keep our mind-body system balance.

I believe that not including fish, meats, carbs, fruits, and vegetables is missing what God gave us here on this earth.

We hurt our bodies when we don’t eat enough from any of these categories, or we eat too much.

In most meals, strict vegetarians don’t receive enough vitamins and micronutrients (minerals), some that are richly found in animal protein.  Fish that are also considered animal meat, contains necessary B vitamins and good omega fat sources that healthy vegetarians usually come to realize they’re missing.

If only we could take vitamin supplements as a 1:1 nutrient exchange for food, but that’s not the case and especially with diluted vitamin pills.

And onion is food medicine with Vitamin C and some B vitamins.

And was is every diet book I was looking into.

My favorites were The South Beach Diet and The Inflammation-Free Diet.

Today those are evolved to a Mediterranean diet and an anti-inflammatory diet that I prescribe to that has a list of foods that are healthy and easy to find at the grocery store.

And there are similarities like plant-based food, and a baked onion ring snack that would fit the bill.

I do my own meal prep that incorporates these more sustainable and healthy ways of eating daily, and that includes a hybrid plant-based diet and a wide array of foods.

Everyone’s immediate health goals can be slightly different. Overall we all want to maintain a consistently healthy weight, have more energy and vitality, and prevent disease and inflammation.

Aligned to those goals, I’ve noticed this is the eating way my body appreciates and my healthy mind works to prepare meals.

Here’s a quick overview of my meals today…

Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner

Eating 3 meals per day, balancing roughly one plant-based meal per day (dinner preferred as later in the day), a heavier lunch with chicken or fish, and a health-conscious breakfast, I believe is a way to maintain your ideal weight, year-round, and what I practice to stay a consistent size 4 for over the past decade.

Breakfast for me can be a smoothie, cereal, or oatmeal which sounds healthy but these are all still either high in sugar, acidity, or both. That’s why athletes and extreme health fanatics eat lean protein for breakfast, such as fish. They’ll include non-sugar carbs and sprouted bread.

Egg whites (and eggs) seem to be the safe breakfast protein. In my balanced natural Vata form, I like to mix it up. But if someone comes up with a plant-based diet for breakfast I’d definitely try to incorporate. Easy foolproof poached eggs and onion are a great healthy start and tasty combo.

Bearnaise sauce (like in bougie Eggs Benedict served in fine brunch restaurants) is so easy to make at home deliciously and healthy (without butter).

I consider breakfast the creative meal of the day where you make it interesting. For a typical Vata (that’s me!), every morning it’s a brand new day to choose a mix of healthy sweet (e.g. cereal or smoothies) and salty (e.g. eggs and potato) desires.

A sticky sweet bun would be too cloying for me now because I’ve trained myself to not like super sweet items as they make my skin crawl. And that evolved into my blindsiding adult eczema.

And I had to re-learn (again) healthier ways to not-tip-the-(skin)-scales. Thank goodness low-sugar recipes work for a sweet tooth… and is a good formula for healthy and happy long living happy missions in life.

You find what works for you.

And then for lunch, I consider the energy and productive meal that keeps you going…

For lunch, I have a filling carb like pasta along with chicken or another low-fat protein that hits the spot and I know I won’t be hungry for hours so I can make it through the afternoon. Rarely will you see me eat a light salad bowl for lunch as high calories burned in the daytime.

Without sustenance, especially if you have a dominant Vata body (or have a combination Vata body), you can have a tendency like I do for your blood sugar level to drop fast so you wanna stay ahead of those crashes.

For me, I learned in those past situations where I felt light-headed or a bit jittery.

You know exactly what I’m talking about if you try to carry a dry snack or some in-between snack (like an onion ring would be good) with you around when you go out in the day.

So I eat or snack before any hunger sneaks up.

And the big switch that I’ve made over the years is eating a plant-based meal with sauteed spinach salad. Some are harder to spell than to add to the diet like broccoli or Brussels sprouts (named after the Belgium capital so is funny with two ending “s”).

For variety and taste, I will add some tofu or garbanzo beans, but it’s not necessary. That’s the meal I keep light.

The difference is that I’m not hungry by dinner so eating a light meal makes sense.  If you find you’re most hungry around dinner time, then you may want to experiment eating heavier meals earlier in the day, seeing how that lands, so that you can try a lighter, plant-based meal way in the evening.

That was a gradual shift for me from years before, but definitely a healthy move.

When I used to go out to restaurants at night to eat a substantial dinner (or after eating a heavy Thanksgiving meal), I’d find that hard on the digestive system… maybe that’s what you’ve found in your experiences.

Without taking a digestive aid to help break down the food enzymes or drinking peppermint tea afterward to calm the stomach, that could keep me (or you) up all night or bring on nightmares and a rough night of sleep. Maybe you’ve experienced that before?… if so, you could take advantage of eating at home more often that can change your habits to the healthier ones you want to make like eating heavier meals earlier in the day.

As you get older, your body changes, and what you could do to your 20-year old body doesn’t work anymore.

Plant-Based Meal vs. Vegetarian Meals

We all know vegetables (like this onion ring that looks like another planet) are good for us.

Strict vegetarians and vegans won’t eat fish and seafood.

As the Vata body I live in (and the one you learned about above)… I know I would just graze and graze all day, still being hungry, if I ate beans and vegetables all day.

A variety of protein fills the hunger in a good way and provides healthy vitamins that aren’t filler like processed sweet and salty snack substitutions that are empty calories.

So that’s how I moved toward a plant-based meal in the evening.

I just listened to my body.

I never called it a plant-based diet that you hear about everywhere now…

Having one plant-based meal (over a fully plant-based diet) plus one low protein animal meal daily or regularly, I think you get the best of all worlds–having energy and vitality, and looking young, as your food and what you ingest shows up on the healthy glow of your face and skin.

Having a regular, healthier eating plan to stay consistent gives you the best chance for achieving and sustaining an ideal healthy weight and energy that we all desire.

These tasty plant-based onion ring snacks can help you toward your goals! 🎯

And when you’re feeling like you’re coming down with a cold, eat onions for some assurance.