One vegetarian in the household - how do you manage meals?

[BeanAround]

One of my DC has decided to be vegetarian. The other DC is a veg-refusing fussy eater, who likes things like plain chicken breasts, sausages etc.

i’ve tried making a list of meals I think both will eat and have ended up with: beans on toast, egg on toast, pizza and sausage and chips (and the last one still requires two different kinds of sausages). So far so uninspiring.

Please hit me with your tips for managing a veggie diet alongside a meat-eating one without having to spend twice as long in the kitchen making different meals!

Apposite typo frankly!

We all eat vegetarian a few times a week and the other days make meals that are easy to do a meat and veg version

eg. Spaghetti bolognaise for the meat eaters and spaghetti with a tomato sauce for the veggie.

Of the processed meat substitutes I found Quorn the least pleasant and soya chunks the best. Also mix with lentils and add far more herbs/spices than you need for meat.

List what you normally make, OP.

I'd probably make sauce based vegetarian meals for everyone and something else for the fussy child, so if you are all having chilli, fussy child gets rice and chicken.

If you are all having potatoes and meat, veggie child gets fried eggs/a basic omelette.

Get a small pan if you don't have one already so diced chicken or two eggs can be cooked quickly when everything else is ready.

Lots of falafel available in the supermarkets that are easy to warm up and not as processed as some vegetarian stuff.

We have a household with one veggie too, been that way for over 12 years now so its normal to us- but my freezer is my friend here as while they love dinners like chillies, bol style sauces, cottage pies, made with lots of veg, beans, lentils or occasionally a mince substitute, ( unfortunately all wet meals) , i find it's easier to make a full sized pot when doing prep and then freeze it in portions, same for currys,dahl, hearty soups, I also keep a supply of veggie sausages ( our preference is Linda Mc Carthney), ikea frozen veggie balls- loves with mash and gravy , and homemade smooth blended pasta sauce in freezer - i find the problems you have could be more with the fussy eater than the veggie- we have one too.
Three of us would all eat a veggie meal at least once or twice a week, like stir fry with noodles, egg fried rice, pasta with haloumi, stuffed peppers ( we also have a fussy eater who won't eat pasta, rice, grains, sweet potatoes and most veg so that night he is the odd one out usually i plan it so he has leftovers from night before or have his favourite- omelet).

Sometimes when we are having a meat based dinner like chicken breasts, the veggie has egg as substitute.When first went veggie would not eat mushrooms now loves them.

Is it just you and the two DC? If the new veggie eats widely (or is keen to) and you do too, I’d be tempted to switch it around and provide separately for the fussy eater when necessary.

Veggie and plain base and add your own toppings. For example I make up a big bowl of egg fried rice and then put out separate chicken, stir fried veg, spring rolls etc. Pasta with a basic sauce and people can add meat or veggie sausage. Or pizza where everyone can pick their toppings. That sort of thing.

Tofu I just coat in cornflour and fry it up or bake in the oven

i do cauliflower steaks for breaded chicken (and steak if we ever have it which is rare)

halloumi you just grill to serve

that said mine is now a vegan and the other is so fussy the veganism doesn’t really impact on the need to serve two meals!

Cook all veg stuff common in both dishes together in one big pan.

Cook animal parts in tiny separate pan.

Split veg pan contents between plates.

Add animal bits from tiny pan onto non-veg child's plate.

Encourage veganism and disown non-veg child.

Your plan sounds good.
Eggs are a good, quick source of protein, so you could swap those in for the meat when everyone else is having meat and two veg. So eg carrots, potatoes, peas and fried or scrambled eggs instead of chicken breast.
Get both the kids involved in suggesting meals that would work for everyone and that they would like on their days when they are eating different from the rest of the family.
If you post a list of what you usually eat now, people can suggest veggie subs.

DH too but he’s equally happy eating veggie most of the time.

So it’s true that the “problem” is really the fussy child not the veggie one. Though I am keen for the fussy one to be eating the same or similar meals to others as much as possible because I think that “modelling” is important (or so I all the literature about restrictive eating tells me!).

Someone mentioned snacks above and I think I’m going to work on our supply of healthy snacks and look at their diet in the round rather than fixating on trying to balance individual meals.

Dd2 has been veggie forn10 years. I just make her a veggie version of what we are having. So sausages we cook veggie sausages for her. Spaghetti bol we cook a lentil version for her. Same with chilli. ( we use split lentis a lot) chicken.kievs there are some great.veggie versions . We eat 1 -2 veggie meals a week. Curry is mega easy making vegetarian.

I honestly do not find this hard. A slight bit more washing but not hard. For stuff like.nuggets a large sainsbury is good.

My view has always been there is vegetables with a meal so we don't tend to eat stuff without. Never difficult to add a veggie version of what we eat. Apart from if we have mussels we tend to do that when dd is not home.

So maybe everyone eats nice veggie food except the picky meat-eater who eats the limited selection of things they will actually eat, rather than restricting the rest?

That makes sense, but in practice wouldn’t you just be modelling that it’s fine to eat so restrictively - so fine that everyone else will adapt to suit the restrictions.

We're also a one veggie household. Well actually DS1 is pescetarian, not veggie and has been since he was about 8 (now 20)

But in our house DS1 is the fussy one. Meat eating DS2 and I will happily eat lentil cottage pie, or Dahl. DS1 hates lentils. He also hates onions, peppers, mushrooms, anything hotter than korma. There are meat substitutes for most things, although too much quorn can apparently cause a hormone imbalance in boys. So if we're having breaded chicken for example, DS1 can have breaded quorn or fish.

DS2 doesn't really like fake meat, but tofu is really nice. I make tofu korma quite often.

Other things that worked well were
Fajitas. Put a variety of fillings out and everyone makes their own.
Jacket potatoes with a variety of toppings.
Cheesy pasta.
Pasta pesto.

Ultimately I made sure there was something quick and easy that DS1 could eat that I could make alongside whatever I was cooking. He loves tuna pasta (not veggie though) or the fresh, filled pasta with spinach and ricotta in. He's also happy to cook for himself fairly often, although wasn't doing that at 8.

But leaving out meat and fish is massively restricting the diet of the rest?
Much as I am happy to eat meat free a couple of times a week I think for the family to become vegetarian on the whim of an 8 year old is a bit much.

Buy a vegetarian cookbook. They do exist. They contain 100s of recipie ideas, far more than boring pasta, beanns on toast or pizza
Lentil, pulses, grains make fabulous stews, lentil loaf, etc. quorn stuff is ok in small portions.
The child needs a balanced diet, nor processed lazy alternatives

Agreed but when you make a spag bol do it with lentils etc

What else do you normally put on the plate for your DC who doesn't eat veg?

Remember that you don't have to serve meat at every meal for the non-vegetarians. I'd do veggie meals for the whole family for 4 or 5 days of the week so you're not having to cook different things on those days.

^ this

grew up in a family where half were veggie, half ate meat. Now my DP eats meat and I am a vegetarian

We have some veggie meals and many where we share sides but the main or meat element comes in a veggie and meat version (eg bean chilli vs meat, veggie sausages and meat sausages etc)

An air fryer really helps loads, esp a 2 drawer one

I would try to see if the rest of the family like any veggie meals or veggie subs (like sausages, burgers etc) to save you time & money

We also eat a lot of egg based meals, pasta dishes etc which are veggie by default

If i make a veggie dinner, I will make sure we have meat in for breakfast (bacon) or lunch (ham etc) so I am not forcing rest of the household to be veggie to suit me

When I had this we mostly all ate vegetarian. It was easier that way. I used to roast a chicken and keep it in the fridge so that meat eating child could have some chicken warmed in gravy with some of whatever the vegetarian meal was when he fancied it.

Could you make your own bean ' meat' then freeze, I used to do this when veggie at home. I made a batch of bean type burger/ lentil mix shaped into patties put between sheets of greaseproof and frozen, then could have these as protein source like meat and two veg, with the rest of the family. I bought some veggie gravy granules to have with my dinners from Holland and Barrett. Go to your local Holland and Barrett if you can they are a good source of info, the staff are really helpful.

I’m very happy to eat a largely veggie diet as is DH so it’s no huge hardship. We eat more meat than we otherwise would because fussy DS will eat it.