The Vegan Solution: Why The Vegan Diet Often Fails and How to Fix It Paperback – April 10, 2013

Personally, I think a plant based diet is healthier, for a variety of reasons. But, a lot of people still have health issues on it. Most noticeably, tendency towards extreme thinness/emaciation, feeling exceptionally cold all of the time, and looking pale and sallow.I have read Eat for Heat and Diet Recovery 2 before. This book is extremely similar to those, except it’s targeted towards vegans, or those on a plant based diet. Same concepts, but spun a different way.This book Gave me a few meal plan insights that I had never considered before. My first meal was oatmeal cooked in salted coconut milk and bunch of raisins thrown in. Net result = warming and grounding. Oatmeal has always had a tendency towards making me cold and sleepy. This suggestion alone was worth getting the book.One of the sections I enjoyed was written by Chris Randall, was that mega health consicous people tend to think if they’re feeling weak or cold, that they should go on a cleanse to feel more “pure”. I’ve done this so many times, I had to chuckle. What you’re really doing is making matters worse. Further depleting your sodium levels and throwing yourself further out of balance.Lastly, I took off one star because of Matt’s childish comments about vegans and constantly poking fun at eating this way. It’s weird that a morbidly obese guy such as Matt Stone would poke fun at ANYONE. Guy is a “health guru” who got so fat that he stopped making YouTube videos. Reminds me of Thor Bazler (Stephen Arlin) who used to preach a high fat raw food diet for building muscle, then got over 300 lbs, went bald, and stopped posting videos or pics of himself, because he'd be exposed.I don’t want to end this review on a negative note, because it’s a solid book overall with advice that can really help a lot of plant based diet folks feel even better. My problem has always been, I feel amazing on a plant based diet, but I’m cold all the time. I moved to the tropics like a lot of vegans do, to escape the feeling cold issue. This needn’t be the case. Just don’t overdo your water intake and fluids. That’s the key message here.“8-10 glasses of water a day” has DESTROYED our health as a society. Don’t fall into the trap.

Two stars for a few (possibly) helpful ideas and a writing style that is mildly entertaining, but not worth the $4.99 I spent on the Kindle version. This is a 99-cent e-book at best.I really wasted my time reading this I'm really confused about how/why these two authors teamed up. From what I can gather online, Matt Stone is from the "Eat the Food" (don't necessarily restrict, but work on a healthy relationship with food) camp of nutrition folk and Chris Randall is from the 80-10-10 (eat tons of raw food/fruits, restrict all sorts of things) camp. At times, I can't tell when Chris is writing and when things switch back to Matt.Sorting through Chris's YouTube videos, you will find that he's likeable and less rambling than others in his camp. However, he's still just a kid making bold statements on nutrition without evidence or real research to back it up. He shows some real audacity reviewing Joel Fuhrman's book (with its massive notes section on published studies) as if he's on the same level. Not that Fuhrman is right and Chris is automatically wrong, but references, please! "The Vegan Solution" boosts similar ego, with matter-of-fact statements that are completely un-referenced.Beyond the writing style's small annoyances and the odd combination of authors, the fact that there are little-to-no references provided for the book's ideas and guidelines makes it just another one of those food-fad books making pseudo-scientific claims. It's entirely possible the authors' statements are accurate, but who knows? They're not even trying to back themselves except for an occasional generality.It's too easy to write "numerous studies have shown" or "a recent study noted" but then not provide an actual reference. If an author doesn't provide references, you can't read the study yourself. This is a major shortcoming of this book and of the nutrition-fad industry in general; there's no way of knowing whether information is presented out of context. One example of this was Stone's reference to Masai tribesmen's lack of heart attacks until a western diet is introduced. He fails to note that the Masai have extremely low calorie diets and they actually do in fact consume a great deal of saturated fat (they mix cow blood with cow milk, and eat also consume a great deal of beef on occasions). Another example is in his reference to the high rates of heart disease among Aboriginals whose diagnostic markers don't correlate with disease. This idea that cholesterol numbers don't matter is misleading. If he's going to go there, he needs to talk about homocysteine levels affected by lack of B12, leading to heart disease when cholesterol levels are normal. But if he mentions that then he'd have to back up and talk about the fact that micronutrients are a little more important than he let on. It's easier to oversimplify and let your readers believe that correlation (or a lack thereof) implies causation (or a lack thereof).With all of this being said, I do believe that both authors have good intentions to encourage readers to eat enough calories, get enough rest, and take in some exercise. And if the guidelines in this little book actually work in boosting metabolism without causing side effects, then that's great.

I think I first heard of Broda Barnes from reading Matt Stone's 180 Degree Health blog. Dr. Barnes had (to me) a surprising perspective on heart disease that is sadly ignored by most of the medical community. It is easy to see how Broda Barnes has influenced Matt's very intriguing approach to a vegan diet. Matt also derives a healthy dose of inspiration from Ray Peat which I find satisfying.Matt is competent in English and the book is well edited. It was fun to read and funny. Well, I found it funny but I'm a bit of a nerd who actually notices competent English and editing. So be advised.Chris Randall gives this book some vegan credibility. I actually discovered this book from a Youtube video Chris made. I've been checking out Real Raw Results videos for several months, so it was a surprise to me to see a collaboration between Matt Stone and Chris Randall. It's like discovering two old friends I knew from completely different schools had somehow met and made a baby together.The result is weird...yet somehow kinda cool. Like Wolfgang Van Halen.This is not a vegan propaganda book so don't expect a lot of coddling of vegan philosophy. It is about boosting your metabolism on a vegan diet. Some of the suggestions are surprising and interesting. I like surprising and interesting stuff when I read a book.The bottom line is there was enough surprising and interesting stuff to justify the paltry $4.99 + tax. I got enough out of it to attempt some of the suggestions and see how they work for me. It is a different direction than what I was trying so I am curious as to how it will affect me. Familiar stuff to the 180 Degree Health crowd, but it might be a bit of a culture shock for many vegans.

Matt tells it like it is again... & he is speaking from experience..

Enfin un livre sur le métabolisme qui ne dénigre pas l'alimentation végétalienne.Les conseils, très simples, vont à contre courant de certaines croyances (sur le sel et l'eau) . Je les mets en pratique depuis 2 à 3 semaines et je commence à sentir la différence.je le recommande à tous les végétaliens qui souhaite booster leur métabolisme et ne plus être gelés à longueur de journée.

Great info. Makes sense.

Well, I am not a vegan, but read the book anyway, because Matt's concept of raising metabolism worked for me, so why shouldn't it work on a vegan diet as well? Like all his books it's easy to read.

Seemed like a scam.