How does one turn a house of four omnivores into a vegetarian family?

[libdem4life]

13. For me, it was shifting meal planning from a dominant meat to a grain or legume with some meat.

in the beginning...paradigm shift.

Baked vegetables in foil or roasted (incredible flavor) ... potatoes, beets, sweet potatoes ... Add a topping for extra flavor. Soups...spit pea with ham, vegetable beef, cutting down on the meat a bit at a time. Cheese and butter are good fill in sometimes. Eggs...from quiche to a quick scramble with a bit of bacon or sausage or egg salad. Wraps are quick and easy and highly flavorful...dressings help. Salads with nuts and raisins or craisins or seeds. Home made dressings are quick and easy and cheap and store in the refrigerator for a long time.

Steaks or meatloaf as entres become secondary as small meatballs or some beef chopped up in a stew. Snacks as fresh fruits, peanut butter balls rolled in coconut, granola bars...homemade is fun it you have the time. If you have a good blender, fruit smoothies fresh or frozen in ice cube trays. Bagels and cream cheese with strawberry jam bites. Pita chips with hummus, too. Shred cheese on a rice tortilla, microwave, roll it up and eat.

A good food processor or a chopping device which can be picked up for $20...one of the few things As Seen On TV that I've had for years. It's often the drudgery of chopping and slicing up the vegetables that put off some...takes time. But with one of these, you can have onions and potatoes diced for hash, or a couple of chopped sweet potatoes for boiling and mashing, in a very short time.

Maybe task the kids with finding recipes online for the family. There are some good websites upthread and lots of fun cookbooks at the library. The fun part is to get everyone's participation in some way...whether recipe hunting, shopping or chopping for food prep...but with kids, if you can make it a game or a challenge and fun it stands a better chance of success.

Good luck ... it's definitely worth it.