Last year we had got to a place where I was only cooking a meat meal about twice a week. However, after going on the GAPS diet to heal Nathan's gut as part of my quest in dealing with his auto-immune conditions it meant that we were eating A LOT of meat again - every day and often included in lunches as well as dinner. It wasn't always a lump of meat we were eating, but often was in the form of meat stock cooked into every meal that I could to provide the minerals and gelatin. The diet included no grains in any form (and as for legume type alternatives - from memory it was limited to navy/haricot beans, lentils and split peas) as well as no potatoes. I found with not being able to serve those types of vegetarian dishes with rice etc, made those legumes tricky to incorporate consistently (and often I would have cooked them in a meat broth anyway) so we mostly remained with the meat dishes. Danielle really went off soup this year for a while, so that was one meal that there was little point serving them up. While the diet healed as anticipated, I was keen to cut back on the meat as soon as I could.
So, in the last month as I've been slowly bringing in more grains I have been dropping the meat! I do find when I do a meat-less meal that I tend to go all the way and do vegan. I love the feeling of eating vegan...but do like meat.
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So, what are some of these vegan meals? I must confess that although we remain mostly vegetarian (haven't bought any meat for months but am still using up some dropped off by a friend just before she left the country), I do tend to use eggs or cheese in most meals! So I'm keen for some ideas - you make it sound good to have an animal-protein-free meal.
Fire, so far it's mostly meals like vegetarian curries (ie saag aloo - yum!), or rice and vegetables, beans and rice etc. Of course, because we do eat cheese and eggs several times a week I am not so much concerned about getting those vegan meals completely balanced. I think I will be checking out Chile's food blog for ideas!
Chile, you are completely right, I would never call myself a vegan who eats meat sometimes (even though I wrote it like that up above I was more pondering things over) - but I was wondering if it would be offensive to also say I eat vegan meals when I am not Vegan? Probably not so much an issue because it's not something I'm likely to get into conversation about so much anyway. Thanks! I think it is that "light" feeling that I really love and notice.
We use "flexitarian", being occasional meat-eaters. I think I first read the term in a Michael Pollan book.
I had this problem recently when completing an online survey on women who exercise - I was asked whether I was vegetarian and I ticked yes, after much careful thought, because for the purpose of the survey I felt that was the closest answer - they weren't interested in my ethics, just my type of energy intake. I guess the nearest answer for me that isn't several paragraphs long is "almost vegetarian". But then people assume I eat fish, which I totally don't.
This morning my daughter asked for quite a detailed/graphic description of how exactly they kill cows and cut them up so we can eat them. I was expecting some sort of revulsion from her but on the contrary, she was perfectly happy with that and wants to keep eating meat. I guess I'll need to wait till she's old enough to understand carbon footprints!
Thanks for the recipe ideas. As usual, it is just a case of getting organised!
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