The Moosewood Cookbook is a classic, and the newest edition is a lot less heavy on the cheese and eggs, which I like.
Consider focusing on cuisines that have a strong vegetarian tradition–Indian, Thai, Chinese, etc.–rather than trying to adapt meat-based dishes to your new diet. If you susbtitue tempeh or soysage for ground beef, the recipe will simply not taste the same. However, if you make a veggie-based recipe–say, a vegetable curry or stir-fry–the dish won’t taste like it’s missing anything.
I am a vegetarian who is 80% vegan (I only eat dairy and eggs when I go out). I recommend spending some time at your local big grocery store, in the natural foods section if they have one, or at the health food store.
I have used many of the cookbooks mentioned already with good success. I also recommend you check out the food Usenet groups on Deja, esp. if you’re looking for a specific recipe.
The meat substitute field has grown quite a bit. I like Yves veggie cold cuts and hot dogs. Smart Ground makes a ground beef substitute that’s great for chili, tacos, or sloppy joes. Morningstar Farms makes nice breakfast meats, and Boca makes excellent burgers and sausages. Quorn does the chicken substitutes well (but they have egg whites). You will not have to give up meat-like foods if you don’t want to. Veat makes a cutlet which, when sliced thin and eaten with duck sauce, tastes a lot like pork.
Also, get into legumes. I like black bean chili with corn and salsa. Try eating peanut or almond butter with banana for breakfast. Tofu can be used in almost anything, as it has virtually no flavor of it’s own. If you slice in into 1" slabs, press it on a plate with a weight on it, and then freeze it, it becomes dry and crumbly and and be slipped in anywhere. I also like soy milk and soy creamer.
When eating out, Italian, Chinene, Indian, Thai, and Mexican are good bets. Even Greek and Japanese can work.
OK on the subject of tofu. How do you keep it from falling apart? Everytime I try I get this mess that looks like cottage cheese. Tastes fine but looks bad. What am I doing wrong?
Restaurants generally deep-fry it, or else they simmer it. If you stir-fry tofu without deep-frying it, it’ll crumble.
I actually don’t like the Vegeatrian Times cookbook very much. The author is just a little too smug for my tastes – I’m not sure I can explain why, but I always feel that they’re hiding a smirk at me because i eat fish. Mooswood’s line of cookbooks are great, as is one called Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. This latter is my new favorite cookbook: everything I’ve made from it has been exciting and delicious.
You may find that you need to use more spices and condiments than when you were cooking meat. I’ve never been much of a meat-cooker, since i turned vegetarian when I was 15, but I’ve heard that from a lot of folks. Be prepared to use lots more herbs, spices, vinegars, and flavored oils.
How old are your kids? Can you get them into the kitchen with you? If you can get them cooking as well, it could be fantastic. It might also help them adjust to the change in diet: food that you make yourself just tastes better.
Having read through this thread and a couple of others about Vegetarian food/lifestyle I’ve decided to start cutting meat out of my diet (and leechboys).
Being 5 months pregnant I want to make sure I still get the full range of vitamins and stuff that I need. To start with I’m just going to cut out red meat totally and only have chicken or fish twice a week. I’m already on iron tablets so I’m not to worried about my iron levels dropping.
Vitamin B-12 is the most difficult necessity for a veggie to get, (not protien) but just about everything you need (including more than enough B-12) you will get from a good multi-vitamin like Mega-Foods One Daily. You can get your protiens from Soy products or foods like Beans & Rice. Make sure you get complete protien. That’s why it’s important to eat Beans AND Rice.
