Help a beginner out! I'm trying to lose weight and keep as much muscle as possible

Context: I'm turning 30 this month and incredibly weak from the past two years, which have been filled with on and off keto, fasting, and binge eating. I can't stand for more than an hour without terrible back pain due tight hips, weak hams/glutes, and overactive quads. I'm 6' tall, F, and my lowest weight during my rollercoaster eating was 155. I'm now sitting at about 220.

I used to be an active biker. I want to get back into that. I want to get strong enough to do bodyweight skills, like a back walkover, a handstand pushup, or a planche. It's clear to me that I won't be able to do any of those things without losing this weight.

So a rough estimate of my TDEE puts me at about 2,200 cals, which means I'm aiming for 1,700/day. How much protein do I really need?? At 100kg, I've read estimates of anywhere from 40g/day, to, no lie, 300g of protein a day in order to give my body the best chance at losing as little muscle as possible with this weight. The average seems to be around .5-.7g per pound of weight.

Going off of the average, that puts me at trying to eat 120-154g of protein a day. Now when you're a 220lb dude with 15% body fat and 3,500 cals a day is a walk in the park, 120g of protein sounds easy. But I'm having a hard time figuring this out in the confines of a 1,700 cal diet.

The issue I'm running up against is volume. I don't eat breakfast, and for lunch I keep the fixings for a PB&J sandwich at my office (I know this probably has to change). The other night I got home and was tasked with cramming as many g of protein possible (given that I had only had 16 up to that point) into a 1,200 cal meal. So I came up with a plan for modified tabbouleh. 1c Bulgur + 1 can chickpeas + 2tbps hulled hemp seeds. I could have crammed more of those things but had already prepped a bunch of chopped parsley, mint, and kale along with half a tomato and half a red onion. The meal was delicious but it took me the better part of an hour to eat and I had to choke down the last few bites. To round out my calories I ate a few coconut date rolls, since that huge bowl was only 850 cals according to my tracker.

Anyway that's an extreme example but this protein stuff is hard! Is it just a given that I should be eating seitan and protein powder every day? Yesterday I switched it up and went out for lunch. I had a chili bowl with avocado, pinto beans, black beans, bean chips, rice, vegan cheese, spinach, and tomatoes. Had to eat it in two parts. Had a shiitake jerky as a snack. Came home to leftover bulgur, kale, red onion, and tomato, so I mixed those together with some chorizo seitan. Coated everything with nutritional yeast and golden flax seeds. Once again, choked down the last few bites. I didn't count any macros yesterday but I still don't think I came close to 120g of protein, and I think I was still easily within my calorie deficit.

You get the idea. Basically I could really use some guidance from people who are good at hitting vegan macros. What kinds of meals do you put together? I've considered just eating intuitively and sticking to whole foods, but it's really important for me to not continue this really long streak of being too weak to enjoy the outdoors. I need to be able to maximize my potential to get stronger than I am now.

@algren Some tips if you're looking for some easy protein at the cost of less calories would be powdered peanut butter, It definitely adds up and makes a good snack I usually have a rice cake with the PB and some no sugar added jam if I get hungry before lunch. Seitan will definitely be the best once you get the hang of making it it's not so bad. Also TVP is very cheap and easy to prepare with the right stock or spices. Protein powder will help for sure and there's a lot of decent options out there now. Last tip is if you can get your hands on silken tofu it makes great sauces I blend it with a lemon and garlic and some spices etc to make a pasta sauce, or even a quick mayo / sour cream.

@jessicareckhardt Ok now this is why I wrote this post, these are all great tips! Thank you

@algren No Problem Good luck !

I'm almost positive 300g of protein a day is way too high for you also.

One last thing I just remembered it's not exactly low calorie but protein pasta's like red lentil penne for example are high in protein and than if you add any other kind of protein source in there you its ridiculous.

@algren You sound very knowledgeable already which is great!! As someone who gets about 120-140g of protein per day on 1500-1700 calories on a cut, I feel I might be able to offer some good advice. I believe someone else mentioned this earlier but protein powder, powdered peanut butter is definitely helpful. In my experience it’s really difficult to hit these macros without using plant based “meats”, not that it’s impossible on a whole food diet. For every meal I usually have 1-2 servings of whatever plant based meat and then add in a ton of veggies and not much else. I try to look at nutrition facts and find foods that have a high protein-to-calorie ratio. For example, one serving of tofu has something like 11.5g protein with 111 calories, about 1:10. I also stay away from really fatty foods because 1g of fat is ~9 cals, whereas carbs and protein is ~4 cals per gram. Because of this I avoid cooking with oil or using sauces with too many grams of fat because I know my calories could be out to better use. Since I’m currently cutting and not trying to build muscle right now I also stay away from carb heavy foods like bread, rice, and potatoes, since I could be getting protein from those calories instead. I also made this computer program that basically finds foods to hit certain macros on a caloric limit, if you want me to run your info on the program shoot me a PM. Anyway hope this helped!!