Help! need some ideas for meals for teen
Posted by kennylisa on Jun 20, 2007 · Member since Jun 2007 · 2 posts
Hi I am new to this site and the overall vegitarian/vegan experiance . My daughter is and has been vegitarian while heading in the full vegan mode, she uses no animal items besides milk she hasn't quite finished the process. I am very proud of her for her decision but am stumped at what she can or will eat ... Are there any good starter foods ? We are spending alot of money on meat crumbles or tofurky or fake cold cuts. She now tells me she really wants some food. I am looking for any help I feel terrible for not being able to give her a balanced meal . Thank you
Either a company says it's produced in a facility that processes eggs, milk and so on. Or either they say the equipment is shared that processes eggs , milk and the product in hand. Is that the same thing though?
I mean can people with allergies get sick by just the whiff of the eggs, milk, wheat, soy in a product bringing us back to the facility statement? (I'm not familiar with allergies).
Do you know what I'm getting at? Is it the same statement (the facility part) as saying it's the same equipment?
Yep, I understand what you're asking and I have no clue what the answer is.
A quick way to learn to love tofu is to learn 3 basic things: 1) Tofu needs to stand with its flavouring agent (a marinade, sauce, spices, whatever) for minimum 20 min to absorb flavours. On its own, yeah--it's pretty dull. 2) For cooking like stirfries etc--go with firm or extra firm tofu and press it and/or freeze it. To press, place it in a cake pan (to catch the water) wrap it in a clean cotton teatowel (smooth, not terry), place a plate over it, and weight the plate with something heavy like large cans or a castiron pan. Let it sit for about 20 min. A lot of the water will press out and the texture is better. 3) Try to find smoked and pressed tofu, or the flavoured kinds if they're available where you are. You can find smoked tofu (tofu gan) in Asian markets. Flavoured (fines herbes etc) are available in healthy markets or healthfood stores--but are more expensive.
I don't agree that it takes "a long time" to learn to cook with tofu, it only takes a little experimenting with flavours etc. Soft or silken tofu is a good replacement for ricotta cheese in things like lasagne, stuffed shells, etc.
There are tonnes of good recipes on this site and the people are so positive and helpful!!
Welcome to Vegetaria!!
One thing you might want to look into for her is the use of nutritional yeast flakes in a variety of recipes. They allow you to make things taste like real cheese. Search this site's recipes and you'll find some wonderful concoctions for cheese sauces and such. I recently made a lasagna using tofu "ricotta" flavored with yeast and if I hadn't known better I would have thought it was really cheese in there (and I'm Italian!). I brought some of it to work with me and gave it to one of the guys that works for me. He's from Naples and a former chef and he said he couldn't tell the difference either.
3 meals which we love and have every week:
General Tao's Tofu http://vegweb.com/index.php?topic=8769.0 we skip the lengthy tofu process, and freeze and bake the tofu instead. The sauce is yummy. Like I said in my earlier post, if you don't like tho sauce use something else; there are many commercial accidentally vegan stir-fry sauces.
Delicious Pakistani Dahl http://vegweb.com/index.php?topic=4917 this is so easy to make and it really is delicious. I never liked dahl before trying this recipe. You don't need to watch it carefully at all. I walk away and come back to do the onions and tomatoes, then walk away again. I serve this with steamed or sautéed broccoli. It's good with a mixture of sautéed veggies.
Bean nachos. I couldn't find a similar recipe here. Fry diced onion in a large saucepan. When clear and soft add some cumin, turmeric and maybe ground coriander seeds. Mix in with the onions and fry for only 30 - 60 seconds. Drain and rinse two cans of kidney beans and add to onion/spice mix. Fry for 1 -2 minutes. Add two cans of chopped tomatoes. We like moracon tomatoes but any will do. Put lid on and simmer for 5 - 30 minutes. You can eat it as soon as it's warm, but the longer you leave it, the tastier it is. Serve with corn chips. I like this with avocado, you could grate some good vegan cheese on top.
Other popular dishes in our house:
Pita pizzas are a good fun meal. Everyone makes their own, and they enjoy eating it more because they created it. Refried beans are good for this, as are mushrooms, red onions, spinach, capers, olives etc. Treat it like you would a regular pizza base, or just make a pizza pizza (rather than pita pizza).
Macaroni and cheese. I don't like any of the nutritional yeast mac and cheese recipes so we make it the old fashioned way. Make a white sauce, add grated vegan cheese, add cooked macaroni. Great with broccoli on the side. Vegan cheese is expensive where I live, so this is a definite once-in-a-while.
Roast veges. Potatos, Kumara (Sweet Potato), Pumpkin, Carrot, Capsicum, Onion, Garlic, Zucchini, even broccoli and cauliflower. Toss in olive oil, so every veggie is coated. You don't need a lot of oil if you toss the veggies well. Bake at 190 - 220 (375 - 425 F) until done. Serve with a salad and gravy made from unbeef stock.
In response to your issue with egg replacer making brownies oily and flat, I recommend using black beans. Replace the egg and oil with 1 cup of black beans pureed with enough water to make them a smoothie like consistency. Add the beans to the brownie mix with the amount of water listed on the box. Bake as directed. As long as you fully blend the beans you will never know they are there, I promise. While not exactly healthy, the beans add fiber and protein. I feed these to my omni wife and 2 kids (12 & 16) and they never last long!
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