To ask those of you with meat loving teens who also love veggie food for your veggie recipes and cookery books that will tempt carnivore teens

[Owlbabie5]

as my repertoire( veggie lasagna, chilli, tom pasta sauce and jackets) isn’t cutting it and I’m all but near giving up.

Want to give it one last push particularly for environmental reasons but also for health.

They will eat the above( with the odd comment) everything else is pushed to one side and moaned about( jackets nearly make this list).

I’m bored of the above, love veggie food and worried about how much they like meat.

There is a brand callled vivera and they do a range of meat subs . If you get the kebab one and put it in the fajita kits it's very convincing . My non vege dh eats it happily .
They also do a pulled pork one which is good in a fresh white roll with salad .
I personally like Linda McCartney normal sausages and the pies are good .

Here is a recipe for black bean soup, very easy to make! It’s not my recipe, I’m not affiliated with the site.

I spice mine up a bit more than the original recipe, with more garlic, more cumin, and medium red chipolte pepper; but if they don’t like spicy, the original should be good to them.

cookieandkate.com/spicy-vegan-black-bean-soup/

I make beef and bean burritos with my leftover chilli. Obviously yours will be bean burritos but the principal is the same

Thanks for those ideas. Any book recommendations or more recipes?

HFW's Veg everyday has a huge amount of nice recipes in it

Make good bolognese with quorn. Loads onions, red peppers, courgette, tin toms, passata, tom puree, garlic, herbs, and leave it to cook for long time just like normal bolognese - next day it's even nicer. Easy converted to chilli with tins kidney beans in chilli sauce and some cumin and other spices. You need to add a lots of herbs/spices for flavour.

Chickpea chilli - made for dh last week and he hates most vegtables. Recipe was from 800 fast recipe book. Also really filling

Falafel are lovely

Check out BOSH or HAPPY PEAR on social media

Pink pasta always goes over well here, loaded with broccoli, peppers, and cream cheese-y goodness

I like Jamie Oliver's new Veg book, we've cooked a couple of the recipes so far and the teenager has eaten the whole thing.

Good Food's website is always useful for new ideas that suit whatever you have in the cupboard, too.

Linda McCartney's veggie sausages and Aldi's veggie sausage rolls are fab, too.

@Owlbabie5 check out Charred by Genevieve Taylor. My hubby is a wholehearted carnivore and really detests vegetarian food. I purchased this as it was our book of the month at Cookbook Club and he has loved it. We've had about 15 recipes from the book so far (cooked in a normal oven rather than a BBQ) and he's wolfed them down. He's even cooked some of the recipes himself!

Spinach and ricotta or feta cannelloni

Own ravioli with diff cheese/veg filling

Soups maybe add pasta for minestrone

Biryani dishes with or without a chickpea or lentil curry

l'd recommend Sam Stern's Eat Vegetarian cookbook. Both of my stepsons loved it from being very young, and Sam was only young when he co-wrote it with his mother. Very easy recipes with lots of substitutions/options.

Thank you so much for these ideas. Just looked at that Bosh site. The Curried Shepherds Pie looks fab. Is the book any good? Working my way through the other suggestions.

I've heard stories about quorn and am never too sure about it - it seems rather 'processed' and has quite an (erm) effect on peoples digestion from what I've read on here.

I cook a Moroccan style chickpea stew thats normally wolfed down. Eat with couscous. Google for recipes...

Also nothing wrong with a mushroom and halloumi burger round here, either.

Cooked nice Waitrose recipe with green beans, rice and artichokes. I like their recipes...

But then I have a teen thats quite veg-friendly.

Anna Jones' first book is great - the chilli in particular is a hit here, I make it often when we have people over:

gasmarkfive.com/2015/04/01/proper-chilli/

The whole book is good though and very approachable. The Meera Sodha columns in the Guardian have fab ideas too, they are full vegan but in many you'd really not notice. Anna Jones has a column there too but I find it a bit hit and miss, the book is much better.

I would try and skip the fake meat options, they are not always healthy choices and some are downright nasty, letting vegetables be the main event does not have to be a hardship. There are a lot of Italian options too - if you are just reducing meat rather than going full on vegetarian you won't mind Parmesan and the odd anchovy.

I'm not vegetarian, but we've managed to get meat down to once a week, fish twice and the rest vegetable.

I make a curried rice dish which goes amazing well with poached/fried eggs, as well as any curry, even (veggie) sausages (Linda McCartney or Vegan Cumberland are our faves).
I make the rice with a frozen veg base mix from Tesco, so has loads of onion, carrot and celery in, plus I add peas and sweetcorn - lots of veg and the kids can’t see the onion/celery as it’s smaller than the rice! They even fight over the next day leftovers.

Some of these you already make but I thought I'd just list them all. Im trying to 'clean up' my diet at the moment so tend to use beans/lentils rather than meat replacements but you can make these with either (we do a 20 day rotation for week days with one from each 'cuisine type' and then eat out/choose a new recipe for the weekends).

Italian

• risotto
• lasagne
• spag bol
• gnocci
• pesto pasta

Mexican/South American

• fajitas
• chilli
• enchiladas
• tacos
• feijoada

Asian

• thai green curry
• katsu curry
• jalfrezi
• pad thai
• daal

British

• mushroom and ale pie and mash
• shepherds pie
• sausage casserole
• veggie haggis, neeps and tatties
• one tray mini roast

Elsewhere

• spanish rice with 'chorizo' whirls (from Waitrose)
• mixed mezze (falafel, olives, hummus etc)
• Jerk jackfruit (or marinaded No chick pieces from Iceland), rice and peas
• stuffed peppers
• Chickpea tajine

Also remember not all meat replacements are created equal - some I think are fab, others awful but generally Icelands vegan range are good and reasonable prices. In my opinion the best mince you can get is Naturli from Sainsbury's and their shroomdogs are my favourite sausages (Waitrose come a close second). Best burgers are the Beyond Burgers from Tesco, they are expensive (£5 for 2, but very meaty) and Oomph pulled 'meats' come with a favouring, the BBQ one is great to put over jackets or wedges with sour cream.

I react very badly to quorn, it's quite a common side effect.

I'm obsessed with lentils! They make so many delicious veggie dishes: Lentil bolognese, lentil chilli, Lentil shepherd's pie, Indian lentil dishes like Daal are really easy in a slowcooker. They taste really satisfying and filling, not the same as meat of course but they add heartiness to a dish.

"Oumph" vegetarian spiced kebab from the freezer section in Tesco and asda is delicious, we have it in flat breads or pitta with hummus, salad and tzatziki.

I make bean burgers from a tin of bean salad, a tin of kidney beans mashed with chopped spring onions and a couple of spoonfuls of spicy salsa with bread crumbs to bind then grilled and served in buns with guacamole

Sweet potato and cashew nut curry made with a Thai paste and tin of coconut milk is another regular

I second books by Anna Jones, Bazaar by Sabrina Ghayour and The Green Roasting Tin

The “Green Roasting Tin” is, without a doubt, the best cookbook that I’ve ever bought (and I have a bit of an addiction to buying them 😳). Everything I’ve tried from it so far has been delicious. It’s all vegan or vegetarian.

I also second the HFW “Veg” book. Really inspiring.

Cauliflower, chickpea and roasted sweet potato curry is a fave here.