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I'd like to cut down on meat and have at least 2 or 3 meat free days, but I am struggling to find enough variety in my veggie repertoire. It currently boils down to about 3 basic recipes - meals based on cheese sauce; meals based on tomato sauce (with or without lentils); and meals based on curry (vegetable, chickpea or lentil). Oh, and occasionally we do a spinach and feta pie, but that is quite an effort so not very often!

My kids are reasonably good eaters, but I do have to modify a bit (no bits of onion) to make things acceptable. We eat a fair amount of lentils and beans but most often with meat as well.

Any ideas? Surely people who are totally veggie manage with more than 3 basic flavours??

Risotto?
Jacket potatoes?
Falafel, houmous, salad/roast veg and pitta?

Homemade soup and bread?

We are now 75% veggie in our house and dp hardly eats meat at all when at home.

Things we like include -

Lentil soup
Thai veggie curry
Veggie chilli
Fajitas made with Quorn (I have mine without quorn, so just veggies)
Baked risotto - we usually have this with roasted asparagus and roasted tomatoes but it's nice just in a bowl too
Cheese and potato pie
Veggie sausage and mash
Veggie sausage casserole
Veggie hotpot
Pasta with homemade pesto
Veggie pasta bake
Puy lentils cooked in various ways
Baked sweet potatoes
Pitta bread pizzas
Chick pea tagine and cous cous
Stuffed peppers

stir fries are good: get one of those sweet and sour sachets (or make your own....) and chop up various veg and throw it in.

hard veg first and soft veg at the end.
serve with rice

Ah yes, I forgot risotto. But I'd be inclined to put a bit of bacon in it...
JANETTE...can you elaborate on your recipes for cheese and potato pie? And also puy lentils, veggie chilli and chickpea tagine?
I guess for a meat eater, the problem with a lot of recipes is they are basically meat free versions of things that really should have meat in them, so I would generally make them with meat...
Anyway thanks for the suggestions, keep them coming!
Another one is pancakes, but they are also quite labour intensive...

Have you tried doing shepherds pie or moussaka with Quorn mince and puy lentils? We have both of those in our house, DH is veggie but I'm not and it's a good compromise.

Favourite meals in our house are:

Veggie pie and mash (I have sausages!)
Risotto
Pasta with variety of sauces:
arrabiata sauce,
tomato & red pepper sauce,
tomato & aubergine sauce,
mushrooms, chilli, garlic & lemon
mushroom & spinach in cream & white wine sauce
Pizza
Chickpea and paneer / paneer & spinach curry
Stir fry with noodles & tofu

and current favourite is Thai green curry with tofu - Cauldron do really good ready-to-use tofu that's marinated and fried in chunks so you just chuck it in the pan.

On a night when we can't be bothered to cook properly we have veggie burgers or cheese & mushroom omelette & chips. Easy!

A favourite in the BIWI household is what has come to be know 'big salad'. It's basically a load of different veggie dishes, plus hot baguette (one of those part baked ones). I make some/all of:

Sliced peppers (1 red, 1 green and 1 yellow), fried in olive oil till soft and nicely charred, then add a bit of wine vinegar and leave to cool

Courgettes, sliced on the diagonal, and griddled, with thinly sliced onion and some chilli flakes, dressed with olive oil and lemon

Coleslaw - thinly sliced white cabbage, grated carrot, finely chopped onion and dressed with olive oil and white wine vinegar

Tomato and mozzarella salad

Green salad

Sometimes I also do chicken kebabs (sliced chicken breast, marinated in yoghurt, lemon and curry powder, then griddled)

DS1 is also very partial to stuffed hard boiled eggs - mix the yolks with yoghurt/mayonnaise, curry powder and mango chutney and re-fil the eggs with this

Sounds more of a faff than it is.

Whoops - of course you won't be interested in the chicken kebabs!

ooh biwi those eggs are fabulously Marguerite Patten, aren't they?
you've made me long for Coronation Chicken and melon and parma ham.

It's harder if you're not cooking in advance but doing from scratch at night, isn't it? these are quick-ish though.

mushrooms on toast w marsala and cream
mushroom risotto
roast apsaragus and broad bean risotto
omelette - spanish or frenchie
fresh tomato chilli and tapenade (and anchovy but you could leave out) pasta
Dahl and rice

I reckon it takes me half an hour to knock that lot up - not long really!

Cheese and potato pie - dp makes this but I think it is: boil some onions until soft. Stir into mashed potato with some milk, lots of grated cheese and s&p. Top with more grated cheese and bake until brown and crispy. I suppose you could have sliced tomatoes on top but I don't like them. We serve is with 'spicy peas' which is onion, garlic and frozen peas, cooked in a bit of marigold vege stock with some chilli flakes.

Puy lentils - I dice onion and carrot, crush garlic, maybe celery, fry a bit, add puy lentils, glug of port or red wine and vege stock. Cook. Can add some passata.
Then I roast peppers, onions and stir them into the lentils - use this to make lasagne. Without the roast veggies, we have it with potatoes and savoy cabage, like a casserole.

veggie chilli - I use Nigella's recipe, when I bother with a recipe - otherwise I just chuck stuff in.

Tagine - I use a Madhur Jaffrey recipe where you layer veggies and spices then bake.

I have a great mixed bean and spinach lasagne recipe - it may fall into one of your previous categories - but I usually make it when people come round, even if they aren't vegetarian, and everyone seems to like it.

Also, you can do areally nice range of vegetarian tapas - we have spanish omelette and fried aubergine with mozzarella.

Also, my only risotto recipe book is vegtarian - butternut squash is a favourite, as is chestnut risotto.

sorry not sayint your list is sloow biwi - I mean, in general I find it harder to think of veggie meals that I can cook quickly. iyswim. gah.

Some of my most-used quickies (especially as work is even busier than ever and I'm useless by the time I get home) are:
- pasta and homemade pesto - ready in around 12 minutes;
- thai curry and rice (I buy mixed stir fry leaves from Sainsbos and a thai paste and cook the rice in my microwave steamer thing; I put either cashews or the tofu pieces that Snowtiger mentioned in it for protein) - ready in around 15 mins;
- pitta bread pizzas and salad - I use red pesto, cheese, olives, peppers, onions and serve with a bag of rocket, spinach and watercress with balsamic vinegar - about 15 mins;
- roasted new potatoes with egg and peas - stick the potatoes into hot olive oil with s&p and a bit of paprika - ignore for 40 mins or so; go and shake it; ignore again; fry eggs and mike some petit pois - serve with nice bread;
- Nigella's mattar paneer with miked rice - 20 to 25 mins from start to finish.

loads on here as well as ideas (and they are seasonal too, so cheaper and tastier) and I post more every week... organic box diary online

Roasted vegetable lasagne
Lentil 'shepherd's' pie
Chickpea tagine
Stuffed peppers

Wild rocket and chilli spaghetti.

Fry some chopped up achovy and dried chilli (you could leave the anchovy out but it is not strong in this recipe) in olive oil.

Add a couple handfulls of rocket and take of the heat so it just wilts down a bit.

Add a squirt of lemon.

Mix with cooked spaghetti.

Really yum.

I put olives in as well but anchovies and olives together might be a bit much for some.

Buy a beginers veg cook book.
Anything by Rose Elliot is worth having. Have a look at Vegetarian Express or Learning to Cook Vegertarian. I swear by those two.

Another great one is The Vegetarian Student Cookbook.
All these books will give you loads of ideas.

You could go on to Sainsbury's receipe ideas and put in what ingrediants you have and request vegetarian meals.

Very quick and easy one:

2 cups rice
3 cups boiling water
2 tins of tomatoes
2 onions, chopped
oil
salt and pepper
about 4oz grated cheese.

Fry onion in oil until soft. Stir in rice. Add tomatoes, water and seasoning. Bring to the boil, reduce heat to low and cover tightly. Cook until water is absorbed and rice is cooked, about 12 minutes for easy cook white and about 45 minutes for ordinary brown. Serve in bowls sprinkled with grated cheese. Nice with a bit of watercress on top and tortillas for scooping or wrapping. serves 4

Another very quick and easy one:

2 onions, chopped
oil
2 tins mixed veg, not drained
1 tin beans, (canellini or borlotti are nice) not drained
2 cups rice
3 cups hot veg stock
bunch fresh parsley or coriander or a couple of tablespoons dried
1 tspn chopped garlic
1tspn turmeric
6tablespoons dried milk powder or replace stock with 1 cups water, 2cups milk and 3 stock crumbly cubes.

Soften onion in oil. Add everything else, bring to the boil, reduce heat to low, cover tightly and simmer until liquid is absorbed.

lemon pasta:

bag pasta
1 tub phily type cheese, (black pepper one is nice)
1 small carton double cream
juice and zest of 2 lemons
2 tins peas.

Cook pasta acording to packet. Drain. Pour lemon juice into a large bowl and dump cooked pasta into it. Mix it around and leave it to the side.

Put the cream, philly and zest into a pan. Heat gently, stirring, until cheese is melted and cream is piping hot. Stir in pasta and peas. Mix well and heat through.

Lentil and rice tacos

1 cup green lentils
1 cup brown rice
5 cups hot veg stoc
1 chopped onion
taco seasoning

tacos or tortilla wraps
chopped tomatoes and onions
grated cheese
lettuce
other taco type stuff

Put the lentils, rice, onions, taco seasoning and stock in a pan. Bring back to the boil, cover, reduce heat and cook on low for about 45minutes, until liquid is absorbed and rice is cooked. Use mix to fill tacos or tortillas and top with your favourite toppings.

You can use the basic lentils, rice, stock and onion thing, without seasoning as a substitute for mince in a lot of things. AS above, you can add a tin of kidney beans and a tin of tomatoes and use it to make tortilla pie. Pour the lentils and rice mix into a pie dish. Cut a packet of tortillas into little bits (maybe about an inch square.) scatter these over the lentils and mix them through. Scatter the top with grated cheese and bake at 180 for between 20 and 30 minutes, until crispy on top.

Mushroom pasta

cooked pasta
1 tin condensed mushroom soup
1 tin chopped mushrooms
1 tin corn
1/2 soup tin milk.

Mix everything together and heat through.

Other things you could try are things like:

lentil burgers
potato and spinach curry
different soups
nut loaf
mushroom and chestnut pie
dried beans, soaked, cooked with onions, garlic and black pepper and served with chunks of homemade cornbread or soda bread
baked polenta
bean chilli
Noodles cooked in veg stock and coconut milk with stir fry veg and tofu.
Savoury sauage rolls made with wholemeal onion bread dough and veggie sausages.

chick pea salad rolls ( a bit like egg mayo)

Mash a couple of tins of drained chick peas, but not too smoothly. Add a bunch of chopped spring onions, a couple of chopped dill pickled cucumbers, a couple of chopped peppadew peppers, some of the pickle vinegar and enough mayonnaise to bind it all together. Season to taste and adjust vinegar to taste. Serve in crusty rolls with salad.

Chick pea burgers
veggie sausage crumble
root veg and barley stew spiced with cumin and black pepper
barley rissotto
leek, mushroom and potato pie or jacket potatoes topped with creamy leek and mushrooms.

There are lots of different things that you can make. I haven't bought a veggie cook book for a long time, but I used to have one that had some interesting recipes in it called 365 plus 1 vegetarian meals, or something similar. It had a different main meal for every day of the year. A lot of them were really good and very easy. Also the Vegetarian Society has a great website with tons of good recipes.

im a veggie and cook seperate for the hubby, me and another lot for the kids!! must be mad !!
for me i love to chuck a load of pasta on, cut up brocolli, courgettes, sweetcorn, mushrooms any veg really and chuck in some quorn pieces, with cheese sauce on top! yummy x {

This is a Vegetarian Hotpot I found on mydish there are lots of other great veggie recipes on there as well x

Ingredients:

2 lbs. potatoes
1 lb. onions
4 oz. butter
few mushrooms (optional)
1 tbsp. ketchup (optional)
pepper
salt
2 red pepper
2 carrot
200g peas

Method:

1. Cut potatoes, onions and all the veg into small pieces, place in deep hot-pot dish, adding butter in pieces, sprinkle with pepper and salt, pour over boiling water (with or without stock cube)to nearly cover potatoes. You can add any vegetable you want or have left in the fridge and want to use up.

2. Cover over with a lid and bake slowly for 3 hours. Put on a thick crust of pastry and bake brown. Serve in same dish.

You can sprinkle cheese on the top, before you add the pastry.