Our family has been using e-mealz to help with our meal planning. It’s helped free me up a lot to cook for us at home (something I have NEVER consistently been good at it) while not having to stress out about what to prepare and what to buy. It has taught me a lot in the kitchen simply because I’ve been cooking consistently. Consistent practice is so important when developing new skills/disciplines. I’ve learned to be creative in the kitchen with leftover ingredients. And for once in my life I can say cooking at home is a more natural instinct than eating out. That’s huge progress for me!
However, this post is about my newest adventure with e-mealz which is cooking vegetarian style.
Tony has said for awhile that I have permission to take as much meat out of our diet as I can. This is because of budget as well as health concerns. So I decided to switch us to the vegetarian plan of e-mealz for a few months. Last week was our first week.
After the first night’s meal, prepared with tofu, which I did not prepare very well, I jokingly told Tony that we might look back on this time in our life as “the one week we went vegetarian.” I had this sinking feeling in my stomach that I was going to end up throwing away a week’s worth of groceries because the recipes were all going to be horrible. I could feel all those negative thoughts flooding into my head. “You can’t cook. What made you think you had changed?”
I am all for trying new things, but I think we have to prep ourselves with the realization that we are going to make mistakes and the transition to something new is not going to be flawless. The exhilaration comes from pushing through anyway.
So I pushed through, and at the end of the week walked away with a few good vegetarian recipes in my back pocket. My family did not starve. I learned a lot of new things, and I have this new found confidence and excitement because I conquered one of my unknowns in the kitchen (there are many).
I want to continue to push on the walls of my box in other areas of my life as well. Why not learn to cook vegetarian? Why not take a dance class? Why not read books outside of my general area of interest or expertise? Why not ____? You fill in the blank for your own life.
We grow every time we branch out.
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we have evolved to eating veggie almost all the time at home — it does take a bit of getting used to, and there are some things that are just better w meat (pizza, for example, w mushroom and SAUSAGE.. yum. and bacon. sometimes you just need bacon..) – but i encourage you to keep trying. the spices and veggies and textures begin to define your food instead of the meat being the defining part. it can be fun AND tasty – i promise. and tofu is hard for me too. i almost never use it.
My family is vegetarian. My husband was raised vegetarian and I was raised by a vegetarian (my father.) I must say that tofu is not something we make very often. I grew up cooking vegetarian meals. I don’t miss meat.
That meal looks great! And a great lesson in “why not?”
If you’re interested, check out the Asian diet pyramid- it’s roughly what we do, not because we try at it (I think I’m like you with the cooking consistently but have also been doing better lately!), but because it just naturally suits our tastes and lifestyle. It’s great if you like the occasional poultry/fish. Check it out! Glad you all had a great vaca!
That’s great you are incorporating veggie meals! Check out the cookbook Love Soup, I absolutely love it, and it is all vegetarian. It is by the author of the vegetarian epicure (which I love also!). The two year old was eating turnips and rutabagas this week the way I was preparing them from the book! Last night he said, “more chard please!” The more veggies the better.
Why not sing karaoke in public while wearing a wig?
Sounds like a fun adventure, trying something new. And I love to cook, so it would be fun to trade recipes. I like most vegetarian dishes, while my hubby, on the other hand, would stage a revolt if I removed meat from our daily meals.
You must try this recipe for tacos. It costs about .75 cents and we use it in place of beef in our tacos.
3/4 Cups lentils
1/2 Cup brown rice
1 pkg taco seasoning
3 Cups water (a little scant on the 3rd cup)
Mix in covered casserole dish. Cover. Bake for 100 mins at 300 degrees. Use just as you would regular tacos.
It’s so cool to hear that many of you are eating vegetarian as well. It always seemed so foreign a concept to me. I love it that it’s feeling more natural now. Now we have meat a few times a week instead of every night.
Karen – I put Love Soup on reserve at the library. Thanks for the suggestion. Yea for a toddler eating veggies!
Abbi – Yes, you know all about putting the “why not” into action. And Tony used to be a strictly meat and potatoes guy, but that’s changing.
Amber – Thanks for the suggestion about the Asian diet pyramid.
Mandi – I am so excited you gave me this recipe. Just a couple days ago someone was telling me I had to try lentil tacos, and I just bought lentils tonight for another recipe. I’m going to try these next week!
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