I’m looking for some tips and ideas from vegetarians who eat and live with those who eat meat.
First let me say I’m no stranger to vegetarianism; I was one for about 10 years. Back then it was easy; I had only me to cook for, plus kid-food for preschoolers. Times have changed and today, my normal routine is to cook for five: myself, my husband, and three children. Until this week, when I decided to go back on the veg wagon, I made one meal for all (with the exception of the youngest; he’s still in kid-food mode).
So … I have a few tricks up my sleeve: making skillet dishes which I can easily remove my portion before the meat is added in, making sneaky meatless dishes that they don’t mind eating are two.
I am prepared for this to be more work for me, but I would like to minimize it as much as possible. I’m a full-time working woman, and full-time mom when I get home, so any shortcuts, tips and ideas are totally welcome.
If your family resists the best way is to use less meat at each sitting. For instance, don’t serve meat as a whole, but part of a dish. If you make meatloaf, use slightly less meat and replace it with soy or cornflakes or something, then little by little use less meat. Spaghetti and meatballs. Use more pasta and less meatballs. Then switch to maybe ravioli and stuff them with half meat and half cheese. Well you get the idea.
I found this works great for salt too, which we all eat too much off. Start by using 3/4 of the amount of salt in your recipes and then work back. Usually you have to use some salt or it won’t taste right, but you’ll find you can cut back little by little and it works.
If all else fails take your kids to a petting zoo and let them pet the lambs. Or let them see someone ring a chicken’s neck. I still can’t believe we were on a farm and the ladies were discussing what to eat and they said chicken. So my mother causually strolled out to the hen house, where I had already named all the chickens, and wrung ones necks.
I didn’t eat my friends. But that’s a last resort and only works on kids
I’m not a vegetarian, but my gf is, and I do most of the cooking.
I’m sure it’s occurred to you that pasta is easy to make without meat. A quick ragu with lots of diced vegetables, well seasoned, makes a good meal that may not even register as non-meat with your family. Also, quiches or omelets (assuming you’re not going vegan) and home-made pizza (which you can also selectively dress according to the preferences of vegetarians and non-).
I also do a lot of parallel meat and non-meat dishes, such as Shepherd’s Pie (well, Cottage Pie, really), as I usually made more than one dish for freezing anyway. (TVP mixed with tomato sauce and a bit of water makes a great alternative to ground beef for this dish; just make sure to get the consistency thin enough or the pie will be very dry after it bakes.)
Except for the egg dishes, these can all be made in advance and refrigerated/frozen as well. When I was working 80+ hours a week, I used to cook a lot on weekends and just cook things like pasta to go with the re-heated meals.
Good ideas. I haven’t used TVP in a long time; I like the idea of two parallel dishes.
Mark, I’m not really trying to get the family to go vegetarian, except for making it easier on me occasionally by getting them to eat a non-offensive vegetarian dish or two (they like ratatouille, much to my surprise; who would think pre-teens would like eggplant??). I mostly would like tips on cooking which would make it easier on me, labor-wise, to make something meatless for me while at the same time satisfying the bloody carnivores.
My main idea until I get all this going is to whip myself up a big batch of something and eat on it for several meals. Fortunately, I can eat the same thing a lot of days in a row without going insane (which seems to be the case with a lot of people for some reason).
Things like stir-fry can be done as a group, then chicken added to one part and tofu to another. Burgers/hot dogs/sausage/sloppy joe can of course be done with two versions each.
Maybe this goes without saying, but there are plenty of meatless dishes that don’t come across as “Gross Vegetarian Tofu-Walnut Abomination”. Nobody can really complain about cuban black bean soup, miso soup with tofu, cheese lasagna, burritos, Indian chick-peas (or other Indian recipes), or falafel.
You certainly can make a roast or whatever once in a while and let them eat it while you eat yesterday’s leftover lasagna or whatever.
But, at the risk of upsetting all kinds of domestic applecarts, if you’re working full-time, why can’t anyone else in the family make meals, too?
Growing up, we were a ravenous bunch of omnivores. However, we did truck farm, so veggies were always a big part of our diets. During the produce season, supper featured a meatless main dish frequently. One of my favorites was deep fried zucchini. If you buy or grow one of the big, baseball bat sized ones, slice it in rounds, do an egg/milk dip then one in cracker meal, cornmeal or flour and pop it in the deep fryer, you can make zucchini parmesan, sandwiches, eat it with the sauce of your choice (I like marinara) or with cottage cheese (surprisingly, they go well together). The rounds are also good pan fried, baked or grilled.
Other veggies (and one fungi) that you can do this or something similar to are eggplant, green tomatoes and portabello mushrooms. These can also be cut into chunks and deep fried, much like chicken nuggets (with a little something to dip them in, I garantee that this will be a hit with the little ones).
For your younger children, making something that is visually familiar can entice them to give stuff a shot that they might turn up their nose at otherwise.
We’re both omnivores, but meat-free and low-meat meals aren’t exactly unheard-of around here. For most omnivores, unapologetically meat-free is way better than any sort of meat analog. I don’t care how much the packaging says nobody will notice the difference, it’s always very obvious that someone has used tofu crumbles instead of ground beef. Really.
Grilled cheese and pesto sandwiches are awfully good and very quick. Alone, with some chips or fries, some fruit salad, a veggie salad, some soup, whatever.
Red beans and rice is entirely veggie until the last half-hour or so, so it would be incredibly easy to split up. And you can make it in the crockpot easily enough. Throw it all in in the morning, then when you come home take out part of it, throw in the sausage, and put on the rice.
Canned black beans with some cumin and lime juice mash up to make a very nommy and hearty burrito filling. A little sour cream, a little cheese, there you go.
Or some pasta stir fry. Cook some linguine. Stir fry some garlic, onion, zucchini, a couple tomatoes, some basil and oregano. Then put the linguine in and heat it through, and grate some cheese on top. We usually grill a little chicken to have with it, but you wouldn’t have to.
Oh they can. I like to cook. Clean-up duties are assigned to my minions.
This all sounds wonderful. We already eat meatless tacos and burritos (the one holdover they have from my earlier vegetarian days). I’ve never made a grilled cheese and pesto sandwich though — do you just spread the pesto on, add cheese and grill?
I love all these ideas. I doubt I’ll be deep-frying vegetables, though; despite living in the South(ish) all my life, I really have to talk myself into frying anything. Ugh, the work, the grease. Blergh. I might roast them, though. There are other good ideas in the tomato-less pasta thread.
Last night it was just three of us and we had vegetables over rice / quinoa and I grilled up a few chicken tenderloin pieces for my husband to eat over his.
Basically, yes. You butter your bread on the outsides so it will brown, spread pesto on the inside of one piece (or both, if you really want, I guess), stack on the cheese and other bread, and throw it in a skillet for a few minutes on each side. Or I’ve made them on those little ciabatta rolls before–split the roll, put on your pesto and cheese, and throw them in the toaster oven.
I am an omnivore and my wife is a vegetarian and I thin that makes me an expert on vegetarian substitutes that omnivores will accept. Here are some:
Good:
Quorn Chicken
Mornigstar breakfast sausage
Tofutti sour cream (vegan)
Most Veggie sausages, such as italian sausage, bratwurst
Smart Ground beef for tacos and such
NOT good:
Morningstar Bacon
Almost all veggie cheeses
Veggie hot dogs/corn dogs
I make little. . . pita things. I don’t know what they’d be called honestly, but here’s what I do:
Sauté up some onions, then some garlic-- the amount is entirely up to you, but I like TONS. Oh, I do it in a bit of olive oil and, sometimes, a tiny pad of butter to make it extra tasty. Add in sliced or diced bell peppers- I do a mix of colors so it looks pretty and has a variation of flavors, but you can use whatever.
At this point, in a separate dish, you can sauté up some chicken. I do mine in chunks or strips, add on tons of pepper, some kosher salt, cumin, and a whatever is handy and sounds good.
Once everything is all cooked, take your pita bread (I get the whole wheat kind so I feel a little less guilty), throw in your mix with or without meat. I add in some romaine lettuce, feta, tomatoes, and I’m good to go. An ex bf likes to put a little Italian dressing on his, but that’s entirely up to you.
They must have VASTLY improved those in the last 12 years or so since my brother divorced his first wife. My folks used to fix those whenever they were coming over for breakfast, and there is just NO excuse for something to be that nasty and still get labeled as food. NONE. Between the taste and the texture, I rather suspected someone had minced up one of those nasty hamburger patties they serve in the school cafeteria, mixed it with about 5 pounds of sawdust, and formed the result into little logs that crumbled the second they thawed out.
I can forgive the woman for destroying my brother’s credit, sleeping around on him, and in general being bitchy psychotic hose beast. But I can’t forgive her for those damn sausages.
There is one of the meatless burgers I like but I don’t remember the brand. It doesn’t try to imitate meat; it’s lots of vegetables stuck together somehow. This is much better than imitating meat in my opinion. Vegetarian hot dogs are hideous.
Diosa your pita thingie sounds yummy. I’m a terrible vegetarian when it comes to peppers, though. My delicate digestion (which in most cases, isn’t) won’t tolerate them, for some reason. They taste great, but not enough to urp for the next seven hours.
Oooh, like a spicy caponata. Nom. We put up a lot of caponata in the summer when the eggplant come in. I’ve never tried it with cheese, but it makes a killer addition to mashed taters.