to tell dd harbibo contain gelatin when she has decided to be vegetarian?

[ditavonteesed]

DD is 8 and has decided to be vegie, she has given me very good arguments and has thought about it a lot, she is willing to give up her favourite hot pork sandwiches etc. So all is fine but then she noticed somme haribo and I told her that they contain gelatin and told her what gelatin is, I said I will look into what sweets she can have today and get some in. I just think if she is doing this for all the right reasons it would be wrong to let her eat them not knowing. On the other hand I cpud easily have not told her and she would be none the wiser but I am not out to try and trick her into eating something that she has made a valid moral decision not to. So WIBU?

DD has been a vegetarian since 8, now 14. I didn't think about cheese for ages, with her agreement we don't worry about it as it makes family life easier. Although I haven't actually looked at which is/isn't if I'm honest.

When we discussed it at 8, she agreed to try a side variety of foods, nuts, pulses etc. She also knew that if I ever saw her eating meat at a party etc that was it.

Posted too soon. She misses marshmallows for toasting round the campfire. Discovered this summer toasting Starburst, they go hard on the outside and soft in the middle. Yum

DS1 has never eaten meat (I'm vegetarian, DH is not, so both options have always been on the table, so to speak) but didn't decide to give up eating gelatine until he was about 7.
www.sweetexpectations.co.uk/ is a 100% vegetarian sweet shop, approved by The Vegetarian Society. Have a look at what they stock for ideas about what your DD can eat if she chooses to give up eating gelatine.

tell her. She's old enough to learn that if you make decisions, you need to be fully informed. She's also old enough to start learning about menu planning and food groups, all info that will stand her in good stead.

TBH not eating over-priced cartoon-covered sweets is a bonus anyway.

as someone else mentioned; to avoid pork gelatin, go kosher or halal.

YANBU is this for a birthday party or do you have sweets as a normal thing at home?

dont have sweets often, but had bought some haribo yesterday as a treat.

Hmm, I had a reason for asking I'm sure , but I can't for the life of me remember what it was!! I plead baby-brain!!

RaspberryLemonPavlova
She also knew that if I ever saw her eating meat at a party etc that was it.

So if you she were to fall off the vegetarian wagon, you would no longer be supportive of her diet? What a harsh attitude. Would you take the same approach with someone close to you trying to lose weight (one mistake and no more support)?

You can buy vegetarian marshmallows online and in some health food shops.

You can also get Neal's Yard vegetarian (and vegan) cola bottles, mini bears and fruit jellies in Holland and Barrett. The jelly beans in that range are vegetarian too (but not vegan because of shellac and beeswax).
The Goody Good range that someone mentioned above are great too.

And Haribo have six vegetarian options on their website:

www.haribo.com/enGB/products/haribo.html

Icelollycraving I know some cheese contains rennet which isn't suitable for vegetarians but I thought in the UK at least that most cheese was suitable for vegetarians, at least the normal every day cheese like cheddar, mozzarella, etc. It's only really when you get to the specialty cheese that it becomes a problem.

I went veggie when I was 8, and am still veggie now at 30. Few pointers:

• Good on you, OP, for supporting your daughter - my parents didn't and my diet suffered massively as a result

• YES to telling her when something has animal products in it - my mother used to trick me into eating meat and I never trusted her again when it came to her cooking. Even at such a young age, I felt really disrespected.

• Watch out with the amount of cheese you give your DD - I ended up having quite a lot in place of meat etc. and I ended up getting massive migraines - I couldn't have cheese or dairy for years afterwards.

• I've heard from a few people that veggie Haribo can give you the runs, so maybe one to watch out for as well

Good luck to you and your DD - she's lucky to have such a thoughtful mum x

Muller yoghurts have gelatin so avoid them.

Yes she needs to know, then she can choose how far she wants to take it.

My parents chose to "trick" me when I decided to be vegetarian at the age of 7, telling me things were vegetarian when they weren't. My mum still has the same lack of respect for me as an adult, no wonder we have such a crap relationship...

But my 7yo ds has just decided he wants to eat meat for the first time. Of course he can, once he understands where it comes from and what the arguments are. he is definitely not too young to make that choice, if he can understand the arguments for and against - and it's hardly an irreversible choice - people can cdecide to eat meat again or be vegetarian again any time they choose, so I don't understand why anyone would stop a child of this age from deciding one way or the other.

You're doing absolutely the right thing telling her about Haribo, OP.

Don't forget that Mr Kipling Manor House cake has beef gelatine in it, and strawberry flavoured things generally have some extract of pork in them.
I went vegetarian for the first time at eight, but my mum "smoked me out" by telling the school to only give me salad for lunch, which I couldn't stomach (still can't do fresh tomato and cucumber, waah, the texture). At eleven I tried again and she regularly gave me meat and told me it was Quorn when it clearly wasn't she's adamant that vegetarianism is the reason I stopped growing at 5'4", as opposed to genetics.
I still don't eat meat, but I'd have loved my mum to have been more supportive of my choice! Tell her so that she can make her own mind up about what she's comfortable eating. Deliberately hiding things like that cause resentment.

Marshmallow fluff is gelatine free.
Does anyone know whether carte dor ice cream is veggie. The Etonian mess ice cream contains shellac. What is that??

Shellac is a by-product so it's vegetarian but not vegan.

I've been vegetarian for about a century since my early teens and I'm still finding things I can or can't eat.

I don't eat meat or fish, or gelatine, or animal-derived things like shellac.

At the moment I'm having some problems with dairy(I only eat vegetarian cheese anyway) and I don't drink milk anyway, so am considering going dairy free.

IF you're on facebook there are a number of groups for vegetarian/vegan supermarket finds, which is useful. I have noticed that the Co-Op have started labelling their products really well now so you can easily spot what's vegetarian.

If you're after cruely-free products that are not expensive, then most of Superdrug's stuff is vegetarian acceptable.

And finally - you can get vegetarian marshmallows and nougat online. In the supermarkets 'goody good stuff' do jelly sweets that are vegetarian.

Shellac is a secretion from a tropical beetle.

The resin is scraped from trees and refined. Used to French polish furniture, coat sweets and surf boards.

Ah ok, thanks :)
I googled it but gots lots about shellac for nails.
So similar to cochineal and carmine?

Oh except isnt cochineal the whole beetle...

I don't know what I would do for that one. DH was brought up vegetarian. But he eats gelatin and normal cheese (with rennet). He will also eat anchovies and shrimp paste and oyster sauce. In fact he laughs at those suitable for vegetarian labels. Obviously he uses animal products too like leather. In fact, he is more against highly processed food like quorn than a small amount of animal products in food. It would be a hard one for us.

I mean he won't eat quorn at all.

YANBU at all. She's thought about it and made an informed decision, she would likely be angry or upset in later years if she discovers you let her eat things knowing they contain animal products and didn't tell her.

My MIL doesn't tell veggie SIL that her vitamins are coated in an animal product, in fact she lies about it but then SIL isn't an 8yr old.

Um just reading more posts on this thread. I thought cheese is definitely not ok for strict octo-lavo-vegetarians. You need to tell her it has rennet. I'm fairly sure it's like gelatine which is an animal product. This is not an issue of dairy. If you take a stance with gelatine surely you need to take a stance with rennet?