Going veggie for a week (AKA Tell me awesome vegetarian stuff to try out!)

Fellow Duders!

I've been considering cutting meat from my eating habits and want to try out going vegetarian during the next week. After a week I'll see how it goes. I can't imagine not eating awesome steaks every once in a while for the rest of my life, the thought is mostly to reserve it for special occasions instead of almost every day.

I'm making this thread to ask the vegetarians among you for delicious recipes and general ideas that I can experiment with during this "trial week". Are there basic ingredients I should try to incorporate? Or avoid? So on and so forth..

Perhaps I should add that I currently don't have a lot of cash or time to try out more complicated stuff, so simple stuff would be the best.

Thanks!

PS: I won't go into the reasons for trying this out, since that's another whole discussion and not the point of the thread.

Check out this blog minimalistbaker.com! It is a rather popular vegan/vegetarian recipe blog. The recipes usually call for only a handful of ingredients, plus seasonings, so it would work with trying to keep it cheap.

I've made their alfredo sauce plenty of times to pour over pasta, and it is delicious. I also made their black bean enchiladas, and also chopped up some sweet potatoes to add inside, and those were delicious.

Don't do it!! Vegetarians are totally nuts. It's the lack of meat in there diet that makes them unstable. I should know I'm married to one!

Falafel is a really delicious substitute for meat in all sorts of dishes, and isn't too expensive to make. If you've got a food processor to make your own, I'd say try that out. There are all sorts of recipes and different ingredients too, so there's lots of room for experimentation.

I'm the kitchen manager at a predominantly vegetarian restaurant, so suppose I may be able to be of some help?

What kind of food are you into? Cuisines/ethnicities? How would you rate your skill level when it comes to cooking and experience in the kitchen? You have a ton of options available to you, but it's probably best to start with what you're at least somewhat familiar with so it doesn't become overwhelming. If you let me know, I'll do my best to hook you up with some basic suggestions/tips/recipes/whatever!

Stuffed peppers with rice, veggie cheese, and tomato sauce!

Cheese Pizza's pretty good.

It might be difficult to stick to a vegetarian diet if you're going to think of steak as reserved for special occasions. If you think of meat as something to look forward to, a reward of sorts, mentally you're going to have a harder time getting excited about (or sticking with) veggies. Not trying to influence you one way or the other (I've been vegetarian for a few years now), but you should think about why you want to be vegetarian in the first place and if that's enough of a justification for not eating steak anymore.

get into indian cuisine, because

a) it's the best

b) a lot of it is veggie

I've been vegetarian since february, once you get over the intial hump it's great! Make sure you find a replacement for your protein. Fruit smoothies with protein powder are good, I like blending some assorted fruit, juice, yogurt and stuff together. It always comes out good and you can experiment.

When I don't have time to properly cook, salads and wraps are good and you can fill them with whatever. If you really crave meat, that veggie meat stuff made out of soy or wheat can be a good replacement.

Also beans, lentils, chickpeas and stuff are good for protein. Lots of people also only get Vitamin B12 from meat, so maybe buy some tablets for that, and make sure you're eating enough iron as well.

Good luck!

One thing to keep in mind while using this week as a trial period is that your palette is significantly different than it would be if you had been vegetarian/vegan for months, or a year. You are adapted to high salt and high fat flavors, so your palette is less sensitive to them, meaning that food can (and likely will) not taste rich or salty enough. Your palette, should you decide to switch permanently, will adapt, and you won't need things to taste as strongly as you did before. Nutritional yeast and Bragg's liquid aminos are great sources of umami and saltiness, respectively. Tomatoes are also a great source of umami - here is a good little writeup about that: http://www.umamiinfo.com/2011/03/the-umami-of-vegetables.php

Another thing to keep in mind is that, when tasting vegetarian/vegan so-called 'substitutes', try not to compare them directly to what they are ostensibly replacing. Most of the time, the function of 'fake' meats, cheeses, and milks is not to simulate the specific taste of these things, but the texture. If you try to compare them directly to the real thing, they will disappoint. My favorites are Beyond Meat's chicken strips and Field Roast's sausages/meatloaf, Miyoko's cheeses for eating with crackers and Daiya cheese for melting (basically don't even bother with other fake cheeses, these can easily be the grossest vegan/vegetarian foodstuff), and Whole Foods' plain unsweetened almond milk is my favorite plant milk of all-time by a huge margin (almond milk is my favorite for taste and texture, and I don't like sweetened milks, though virtually all of them are sweetened by default).

Really though, just try and forego vegetarian-specific stuff. You won't be relying on it when you are vegetarian/vegan, if you do decide to switch - it's the most expensive stuff and it has the most distinct flavors, so they are easy to get sick of. Italian food and Indian food are both cultures from which you can easily draw many natively-vegetarian dishes. I personally love making and eating pasta with tomatoes, mushrooms, leafy greens, onions, garlic...You'll probably be surprised how easy it is to eat vegetarian when you realize that it's not really a restriction, given that most meals are mostly not meat anyway.

Also, I love this dish around the holidays, and 'even meat eaters love it!!!!!!!'

"neat loaf"

• 1/2 sweet onion chopped
• 2 garlic cloves
• 4 eggs (egg replace)
• 1 envelope onion soup mix
• 5 oz. of ricotta cheese (soft tofu)
• 1/3 block extra firm tofu
• 1/4c. canola oil
• 2T. basil chopped
• 2T. oregano chopped
• 1/4t. fresh rosemary
• 3 1/2c. unsweetened corn flakes
• Sauce:
• 1/3c. ketchup
• 2T. mustard
• 2t. apple cider vinegar
• salt & pepper to taste
• 2T. molasses

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees. In a small pan saute onions & garlic until softened. Let cool. In a large bowl, beat eggs, add all ingredients except cereal and mix well. Add cereal and mix to combine.
2. Spray loaf pan with cooking spray and pour mixture into pan. Bake for 55 minutes. While it is baking, mix all the ingredients for the sauce.
3. Remove from oven, poke holes in the loaf with a skewer and pour the sauce over the top. Bake for another 10-15 minutes.
4. ***I added walnuts and nutritional yeast to jazz mine up a bit.

@welshcleats: Hey, man, thanks! WellI'm a brazilian dude (so I love rice and beans) living in Germany (potatoes...?). I adore italian cuisine and already eat of noodles with vegetarian sauces every once in a while. I'm not sure how I would describe my skill, I know a lot more than Dan Ryckert but I'm not sure if I would call myself really proficient. My usual recipes involve rice or noodles + something else, but I'll make risottos, bruschettas, soups and so on if I'm feeling like it. Low to intermediate skill I guess? I really like to cook though and it is an area of my life I'm constantly trying to improve on. My drawback is that I live in a really small apartment with no oven (just one of those small ones you can bake bread with).

Following @mellotronrules tip, maybe indian would be something nice to try?

@zaapp1: Maybe I expressed myself wrongly, I meant, for example, that I would like to remain open to try awesome dishes on travels, even if they include meat. If all goes well, I wouldn't keep meat as a prize or something to look forward.But hell, there's no way to know how I will feel about it after a while.

Anything Asian is still pretty good if you just leave meat out. Do a stir fry and just leave out the meat, do a curry and just leave out the meat etc etc. I'm not a veggie but every time I've had anything like that it's been just as good. And if you do need something meat like, fake chicken ain't half bad, and it's much cheaper than real chicken, even branded stuff like Quorn (if that's a thing outside of England).

do it! here's a recipe to get you started- chana masala (curried chickpeas)

if you're looking for general ingredient suggestions (for any dish)- i'm a zealot for the pan-asian holy trinity- ginger, garlic, and onion.

and sweet potatoes generally kick ass (cheap and very nutritious).

edit: here's another recipe i've been digging on lately if you like soup, peanuts, and sweet potato with a little kick!

http://www.menshealth.co.uk/food-nutrition/jmes-clean-eating-vegan-leon-gobi1

Not just veggie, but Vegan. It's great. I'm a recent member of the Vgang after being a vegetarian since I was like 14, and so far it's great.

This. Indian food is the only way I could ever be vegetarian.

1. Fry half an onion with plenty of chopped garlic. Add black or red lentils and water, and season with plenty of cumin, coriander, cinnamon, cardamom, ground ginger, chili powder, black pepper and some salt. Simmer for 20-25 minutes and eat with boiled rice.

2. Fry half an onion along with plenty of garlic. Dice a fresh tomato and chop up some sun-dried ones, and put that in the pan along with maybe half a can of crushed tomatoes and a little bit of water. Add salt, pepper, sage, thyme, cayenne pepper, chili powder, a small pinch of sugar, and a big spoonful of sambal oelek. Chop some green olives and add that, too. Boil for a couple of minutes and eat with fusilli.

Also don't give up meat.

I'm to understand that salads are pretty good.

I could not go without meat. I commend your bravery.

I'm going to agree that vegetarian curries are worth trying to get into. There's like a million types of curries in the world (don't limit yourself to Indian!), and most of them are great without meat. Not to mention they're relatively easy to cook once you have the recipes in hand.

That's exactly how to handle it as far as I'm concerned! I personally wouldn't go without at least the occasional dish including high quality fish. Especially if you're planning to continue to lead an active life without impairing your cognitive capabilities or spending a lot on obscure food.

I'll second the falafel recommendation. Chickpeas in general are fucking amazing when it comes to nutritional value and taste. I haven't taken the plunge and included them in my regular basic cooking because I'm lazy but then again I have the enormous priviledge of a few small affordable, yet high quality Lebanese restaurants that offer Hummus and various falafel dishes.

If you're willing to go for a respectable collection of good spices Indian food is a great place to start as well like people already said.

There seems to be some good stuff in this thread, I've been thinking of going vegetarian too (or at least less-grease heavy/more natural) for a while now to aid in losing some weight, and my biggest problem was not really knowing where to start. I'll try some of the suggestions here, too. Good thing I like Indian food!

Salads are rad! Also thanks, but I'll only take your praise if/once I actually manage to do this ;)


Thanks for the suggestions, everyone! Keep 'em coming.

I cook more vegetarian than not. It's really not than challenging, and definitely does not have to be more expensive. Some of the main dishes I often stick to when making vegetarian dishes are pastas, wraps, curries and salads. You can put so much in there that isn't meat, you really won't miss it. The below guidelines are all for quick recipes (15-20 min) as I don't have much time to cook.

Pasta - sauces (such as tomato or cream based) are easy to make yourself, just look up some recipes. Or buy a jar of the stuff, but fry it a little in some oil to add some flavour. Then chuck in some of your veggies of choice, for instance chopped bell pepper. Fried mushrooms with chopped leeks and some squeezed lemon work well with cream sauce.

What,s also great is a pesto sauce with chopped cherry tomatoes. Add pesto and some in a frying pan pan, add some cayenne pepper and gently fry. Add the chopped tomatoes and let it simmer a bit. Great with penne or tagliatelle.

Wraps - mushrooms function really well to provide some meaty structure. Look up a nice spice blend (or buy a bag) and use when frying the mushrooms. You can add all sorts of veggies in a wrap, such as tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce, beans, corn, whatever. Warm up the wraps, put everything in, add cheese and sauces to taste.

Curry - depending on your taste, buy or make some curry paste, fry, add coconut milk. Then add whatever. Mushrooms, bell pepper, sugar snaps, broccoli, it all works.

Salad - again, fried mushrooms with some chopped garlic and salt are king. Fry some sliced cherrie tomatoes, corn. Boil and chop some potatoes. Chop cucumber and avocado, and take a lettuce of choice, and add everything together. Some chopped mozzarrella or grated parmezan on top, and finally a good ceasar dressing.

All super easy and pretty healthy. Other nice but slightly more time consuming options are lasagne, pizza, risotto, enchiladas. And there's so much to find online, just search for 'quick vegetarian dishes' or something.

Final tip: if you want to eat less meat but still want to have some of the flavour, many of the above dishes are awesome to flavour with a few slices of bacon. Then you'll have 50 grammes of meat instead of the regular 150-250.

Vegan duder here. One thing you should definitely try to get is a bag of Nutritional Yeast. It's yellow flakes that have a great cheesy flavour. Throw some of that onto some hot popcorn, add a dash of hot sauce, and you are in for a treat.

I'm in Melbourne, and there are a lot of vegetarian/vegan restaurants here. I would just say don't be silly about it and just eat 100% salad, or go the other way and only eat 100% packaged processed veggie burgers etc. Just be sensible and you'll be fine.

In terms of working out how to make vegetarian versions of your favourite foods, check out Post Punk Kitchen online. She's really great at making vegan versions of everything from Omlettetes to Turkey roasts.