Exactly What to Eat to Be Healthy and Plant-Based: Mayim Bialik’s Food Diary

Mayim Bialik is a life-long vegan, has a vegan cookbook, a vegan restaurant in Downtown LA, and a knack for getting other people to eat healthy vegan food. We loved her in the '90s TV show Blossom, and in the long-running The Big Bang Theory, and now we love her for her enthusiasm for getting people on board with her plant-based approach to meals. Here she shares her day of healthy vegan eating with The Beet, so you can emulate her best off-screen habits as well.

For more great ideas from Bialik, check out her Banana Bread recipe, a favorite from Mayim's Vegan Table, her popular cookbook full of easy and delicious meals. Mayim is our vegan idol since if we could eat like this every day, sans junk food and unhealthy oils, we would definitely be our healthiest, happiest plant-based selves.

1. What do you eat for breakfast?

MB: Oats with ground flax seeds and chia seeds. I add berries if I have been to the market.

2. What do you eat for lunch?

MB: Usually, I try to do a salad of some sort, with fun stuff on top like a Chinese chicken salad, no chicken.

3. What do you eat for snacks?

MB: Carrots are my go-to, any fruit really: grapes and berries are easiest. A handful of nuts. And air-popped popcorn! And Boba non-dairy milk tea.

4. What do you eat for dinner?

MB: It varies so much. My kids and I love Chinese food and it's so easy to eat vegan at Chinese places. We love string beans and veggie dumplings and fried tofu with any fun sauce! My younger son could live off of avocado sushi so even though I detest "Asian fusion" restaurants it comes in handy when the older one and I want Chinese and he wants sushi.

5. What is your favorite treat to eat?

MB: Peanut butter cups. Caramels. I make PB cups using Alicia Silverstone's recipe from The Kind Diet.

6. What's your favorite restaurant (including city) and your favorite meal to eat there?

MB: Crossroads in Los Angeles. Gluten-free pasta Bolognese, Impossible cigars, Caesar salad, and fried squash blossoms.

7. What's your favorite hack for dinner parties?

MB: Fresh Brothers Impossible pizzas and bread rolls were amazing the last time I hosted for nerd game night!

8. What is your favorite meal to cook at home?

MB: My son says my lasagna is the best food he has ever eaten! I make cashew ricotta from scratch and use Miyoko mozzarella and a little Daiya on top to make it look "real," as they say. I sneak vegetables in, and if I chop them small enough he doesn't pick them out.

9. What vegan food do you serve guests?

MB: My vegan lasagne is a safe bet, as is my vegan chili and ziti (both recipes in my book!) I love to bake so my cheesecake is usually the most requested item from friends year-round.