I don’t actually know the answer to this question! But since our friends at Well+Good are asking, it’s got me wondering. Do you avoid this super-processed soy? I’m about to go read a few labels…

Turn over many a nutrition bar or box of veggie burgers, and you’ll often find soy protein isolate (SPI) featured prominently on the ingredient list.

While there’s disagreement among nutritionists over whether soy is part of a healthy diet (some are concerned about its estrogenic properties but others like it as protein source for those who don’t eat meat), most agree that SPI, its super-processed offspring, should be avoided.

“A big issue with soy is that we’re eating more of it than ever before and in very processed forms like SPI,” says Middleberg Nutrition founder Stephanie Middleberg, MS, RD. So SPI may have started out as a plant, but once it gets to you, it’s far from it.

Here are four reasons nutritionists say you should probably ditch soy protein from your diet:

1. A lot of its nutrients have left the building. “Soybeans are a great quality protein because their amino acid content is similar to that in meat, and they’re a good source of fiber, minerals, and complex carbs,” says Middleberg. But to create SPI, soybeans are chemically engineered to “isolate” their protein, and this process strips out all of the other nutrients the original bean contained.

2. It contains unhealthy additives. Foodtrainers founder Lauren Slatyon, MS, RD, says that the chemical process used to isolate soy protein often leaves behind substances you don’t necessarily want to be eating, like aluminum and hexane. “Think of bathing in toxic bath oil,”Slayton says. “Even once you dry yourself off, some residue remains. Want to eat that residue?” The spray drying method used for soy can also form nitrites, compounds that can form carcinogens in the body, she explains.

3. It’s probably genetically modified. According to the USDA, over 90 percent of the soybeans grown in the U.S. are genetically modified, so most SPI comes from altered beans. “This means soy protein isolate is chemically modified, processed, and filled with pesticides,” says Middleberg.

Yikes! Finish the article here.

Meet Briana, an often-vegan-sometimes-omnivore—which is kinda how we roll here at NMDL too. The best part about this menu though, aside from the delightful-sounding flavor profiles (you had us at caramelized onions!), is that Briana has included links to other sites with the recipes. Very thoughtful!

Name: Briana

Hometown: New York, NY

My dietary leanings: My diet is mostly vegan, but I’m not a vegan. I will occasionally (though rarely) eat fish, eggs or chicken (super rarely!) and I don’t generally sweat it if I eat something, like a cookie, that has butter and eggs in it. So maybe I’m a mostly-vegan/sometimes-omnivore. I’m also really careful of how much sugar I consume.

My favorite vegetable: Tough call…I have to give it to onions, because caramelized onions are one of the most tasty things in the world, but beets and avocados are also frontrunners!

This morning I ate…

I had a very big green monster smoothie.  I made it with almond milk, chia seeds, peanut butter, 2 bananas, a handful of spinach, and a blob of chlorella cream. I like to make them in the morning and bring it to work in a jar (today’s was an old spaghetti sauce jar) and it keeps me full all morning and into the afternoon.

Then for lunch it was…

Salad wrap! I make these a lot. I put an assortment of veggies (lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, avocado, sprouts, grated beets) in a whole wheat wrap with homemade hummus and a little sprinkle of herbamare (seasoned salt…yummy stuff).

Snacks…

I like to sip on green tea sweetened with agave during the day, and I drink a TON of water (I suspect people in my office may think I have a bladder-related problem). I snacked on a package of Eden Organics trail mix a little.

Finally for dinner I had…

Beet burgers! These are SO good. We put them on wheat buns with vegenaise, ketchup, pickles, lettuce & tomatoes.

Last but not least, dessert…

SoDelicious coconut milk ice cream…the one with chocolate and pieces of almonds. I don’t miss ice cream in the slightest!

We heart SoDelicious too—and if you have yet to try their chocolate and almond covered almond-milk bars, you’re in for a real treat. It also seems like chlorella is showing up in everything these days, from moisturizers (see my new fave Acure creams—and feel free to make fun of the fact that I’m posing with them!) to smoothies. I have yet to try chlorella as food but am super inspired by the My New Roots post linked above. Have you tried chlorella?

Meet today’s vegan chef, Chloe: She loves carrots (sometimes pickled), and her vegan diet skews largely Japanese-Korean. I don’t know about you, but after reading this, I’m definitely inspired to eat something super-healthy with chopsticks today. Like many asian-leaning and vegan diets, Chloe’s seems to feature a fair amount of soy though. Which soy camp do you fit into?

Name: Chloe

Hometown: San Francisco

My Dietary Leanings: Vegan, very fruity, and Japanese and Korean oriented. Eat like a queen in the morning, a princess midday, and a pauper in the evening. Oh, and I love all things and anything green tea♥

My Favourite Vegetable: Carrots

This morning I ate…

Because breakfast is so important, I have three parts of a meal of which I rotate two at a time each day. A large cup of matcha green tea always begins it, of course! Today I had two slices of sprouted wheat toast, one topped with half of an avocado and the other topped with Rawtella and a sliced banana (berries taste lovely as well with the cacao). There is also something I do where I fill a bowl with chopped strawberries alone or with other fruit (today it was blueberries) and then pour organic unsweetened soymilk on top of it, so that it’s a sort of cereal without the cereal because I don’t like cereal. It’s lovely! Sometimes I substitute it with plain or vanilla soy or coconut yogurt with raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, and kiwis instead. Another cup of green tea and then I am off to go on the day’s ventures (school)!

Then for lunch it was…

A bowl of miso soup made with kombu seaweed stock and tofu. I also made inarizushi, which is rice stuffed in tofu pockets, as well as futomaki, which had yellow picked radish, cucumber, avocado, carrots, a thin layer of tofu, portobello mushrooms, and spinach, with pickled ginger, daikon, and Japanese greens on the side. Croquettes with tofu, bellpepper, and potatoes are also yummy with it. Instead of eggs to dip, you can use soy milk or rice milk or silken tofu, the panko still sticks very well. I snack on blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries or pop chips sometimes.

Finally I had…

A small tofu scramble with minced onion, garlic, bellpepper, potatoes, kale, carrots, tomatoes, pretty much every vegetable I could find in the fridge over rice, you can eat it with quinoa too. I only use extra virgin olive oil for cooking. I usually don’t eat dinner because I never eat after five p.m. unless I go out with friends or family. Breakfast and lunch keep me full all day…

Last but not least, dessert…

That doesn’t stop me from eating sweets instead, so bad! After seeing a recipe for vegan matcha green tea banana ice cream I am in love. With another cup of matcha green tea to end the day as well.

Yum! Chloe, would you mind posting the recipe for the ice cream in the comments? Thanks! Reminder to all: Don’t forget to send in your MM menus!

It all started when Alicia Silverstone told Woody Harrelson she wanted to take a bath with his kids.

Wait, what? When Alicia announced this to a roomful of writers at a recent event in LA, I nearly spat up my vegan cappuccino. But as the story unfolded, it made a little more sense. Alicia, who is friends with clean-boy Harrelson, had his kids over at the house and wanted to give them a bath. Harrelson, however, said no way. He didn’t want his kids splashing around in toxic bubble bath, and believe it or not, Alicia hasn’t always been a clean girl. Consider this her a-ha moment—and we’re super glad she had one.

Why? Because the longtime animal right activist and environmentalist is now championing clean beauty. Could we have asked for a better poster girl?

Now, she’s got a super-clean line to show for it. It’s called Alicia Silverstone for Juice Beauty and it so far has five products: There’s a lipstick, a cleanser, a moisturizer, a blushy-highlighter, and a pressed powder. They’re all vegan, of course, and they feel more like mainstream products—something Alicia says she wanted to get just so. The ingredient lists are through-and-through clean, and mostly organic.

Alicia is hardcore about ingredients—she told me she actually read a very early version of our book (!!) that we’d printed at Kinkos or something and sent to her—but she’s not the kind of dirty-clean girl who’s going to stop washing her hair, or say, test-drive the oil cleanse method. “I don’t like cream cleansers,” she says. “I just don’t feel clean! I like a gel or something that’s a little soapy feeling, without being stripping.”

“It was a no-brainer to align with Juice,” she tells me. “I never had to be like, Are you sure you want to use the shea butter?! You don’t have to worry about the ingredients when it’s all fruit juice and avocado.” As for how the partnership worked, she says, “They’d send me 10 different moisturizer textures and I’d send them notes on each.” Alicia admits she was super picky about scents, but her particular taste has paid off. “I promise this is the best-smelling cleanser out there!”

As for the moisturizer, she says she wanted something super light. “Nothing sticky and filmy—I wanted something that penetrated the skin but that was super nourishing.”

Here’s our take: The lipstick and powder are great, but not for every skin tone (stunning on her, and anyone in that color range). The highlighter is universal and produces dewy awesomeness. And the cleanser? She’s not lying: It smells incredible. Overall we’re pretty thrilled that Alicia and Juice have created something that’s at once so clean but that will also appeal to a more mainstream market. Juice has always had a knack for that.

Our time is limited, so before letting her go, I make sure to ask Alicia one of our favorite questions (which we’ll be asking you guys, too!):

When do you feel most beautiful?

Her response: “When I eat well, I feel so grounded and so connected—when I changed the way I eat my heart opened. I feel beautiful because of that.”

I tell her that we always post about Meatless Monday on the site, and that I’ll remind readers about her vegan cookbook The Kind Diet—who’s read it?—and she laughs.

“I wish it was meat-only Mondays.” The way her skin glows, she has me considering it.

So, what do you think about Alicia for Juice? Have you tried the line? Will you?

P.S. For more from Alicia, you can always visit her blog The Kind Life, where she regularly posts recipes. Happy MM!

Oh man, Kari! Not only is this gal a vegan but she’s also a personal trainer who packs in swimming, metabolic training, and Muay Thai kickboxing in one day. How’s that for some Monday morning inspiration? Her menu sounds both super healthy and super delicious—especially that shake (and the chocolate covered coconut). Anyone else make a great morning shake they want to share?

Name: Kari

Hometown: Mystic, CT

My dietary leanings: I’ve been vegan for about 4 and a half years

My favorite vegetable: Sweet potatoes!

This morning I ate…

The usual for me – a shake with half water, half rice milk, a frozen banana, a spoonful each of peanut butter, milled flaxseeds, wheat germ, and cacao nibs,  a generous sprinkle of cinnamon, and a scoop of SunWarrior WarriorBlend chocolate protein powder (so smooth and tasty – if you’re hunting for a delicious, non-chalky plant protein powder, I highly recommend it!). I’m a personal trainer and am on the go quite a bit, so I like to load up with protein and carbs in the morning. I was ravenous after my morning metabolic training session and swimming session, so I had some walnuts, a pear, and a slice of sprouted 7-grain bread (yup, plain – just wanted some carbs!).

Then for lunch it was…

A spinach salad with pineapple chunks, red pepper slices, curried maple cashews,  and balsamic vinegar (recipe from For the Love of Salad cookbook), followed by a baked sweet potato with a bit of Earth Balance, salt, and pepper.

Finally for dinner I had…

An apple and a handful of brazil and pili nuts before heading out for muay thai kickboxing. After that, I didn’t feel much like cooking, so I made a sunflower-butter open-faced sandwich with strawberry-rhubarb jam made by my grandma.

Last but not least, dessert…

I had a few pieces (okay, maybe more like 8 to 10) of dark-chocolate-covered coconut that just came in the mail from nuts.com.

Pretty heirloom sweet potatoes via