I don't want my kids to be vegetarian

[HowToTrainYourTeen]

DC (15 & 13) have decided they want to go vegetarian. I don't want to go vegetarian and neither does DH, so they'd have to have different meals. I/DH don't want to be wasting time making 2 different meals whenever we want meat or fish, and we don't really have space for 2 people to be cooking at once. WIBU to say no?

Ofcourse not providing your child with an adequate diet IS child abuse.

it's debatable if vegetarian or even vegan diets are adequate 🤷

There are enough public cases to show it's indeed an issue.

My flat mate was veggie, when I was younger. Three of us shared a house, two meat eaters and one veggie.

We didn't share the cooking all the time as we worked different hours but it's not that hard to come up with a veggie substitute. Roast dinner - nut roast or cheese and onion twist with veggie gravy. Fish and chips - veggie fingers and chips. Sausage and mash - cook some veggie sausages along with the meat ones. These are all no extra effort, I speak as a meat eater.

You could also get your daughters to cook one or two veggie family meals per week, for the whole family. Veggie curries and anything including pulses are usually nutritionally balanced.

@NoPainNoTartine

Ofcourse not providing your child with an adequate diet IS child abuse.

it's debatable if vegetarian or even vegan diets are adequate 🤷

There are enough public cases to show it's indeed an issue.

The NHS and the British Dietetic Association disagree with you.

Those 'public cases' were cases of child neglect and have nothing to do with the children being raised without meat. And let's not pretend meat eaters never abuse or neglect their children...

You still haven't answered what food group the OP's children will be removing from their diet.

@NoPainNoTartine

Ofcourse not providing your child with an adequate diet IS child abuse.

it's debatable if vegetarian or even vegan diets are adequate 🤷

There are enough public cases to show it's indeed an issue.

‘With good planning and an understanding of what makes up a healthy, balanced vegan diet, you can get all the nutrients your body needs.’- NHS UK

‘One of the UK’s longest-standing organisations that represents dietetics and nutrition, the British Dietetic Association, has affirmed that a well-planned vegan diet can “support healthy living in people of all ages” in an official document signed by its CEO.’- www.bda.uk.com/resource/british-dietetic-association-confirms-well-planned-vegan-diets-can-support-healthy-living-in-people-of-all-ages.html

I don’t see any debate here. Can you actually back up what you’re saying with a credible source?

And when I say credible source, I don’t mean the daily mail.

I would probably cook something veggie, take some out for them and then carried on putting meat in the leftovers for me and husband. Seems doable. No need to cook two meals.

It's amazing that despite the NHS and British Dietetic Association quite clearly stating that vegetarian and vegan diets are healthy and suitable for all life stage there are still people out there who insist that they aren't.

Just a though but if you're so convinced that you're right and the experts are wrong then perhaps you should get in contact with the experts to let them know they're wrong. After all, you wouldn't want such well regarded organisations promoting such an unhealthy lifestyle would you?

*stages
*thought

(eldest brings up Veganuary every year so this is a compromise - they absolutely will not be going vegan)
How do you know they won't? They may decide to continue after January?

Rose Veal is lovely, our local farm grows and sells it. You just have to buy ethically. Better to eat it, than for male calves to go to waste

Wtf? How are you so deluded? I would be embarrassed for you if I wasn't so disgusted.

@CodenameVillanelle

Lazy, disrespectful and dismissive. Don't be surprised if they start resenting you.

^^ this I hope you don’t have that attitude with regards to other aspects of their lives!

To be fair, male calves are essentially a by-product of the dairy industry. Either eat them or they will get made into some thing else, perhaps animal feed. They certainly won’t be raised to adulthood.

*Anyway, I'd go with sitting everyone down as a family and saying a) they arent dictating how the whole family eats and b) its not reasonable to double your work load by expecting a separate meal each night.

So by Friday each week, you'll do a meal plan, there will be one night each week with an easy adaption you'll do, like sausage and mash or burgers and chips, and as it is no extra work to put the veggie versions under the grill, you'll do that. Otherwise they can decide if they want to eat what you are having, or part of it (like the veggies and potatoes from a roast, with a mushroom parcel instead of the meat), or if they are going to make something separate. They have until Saturday lunchtime to decide what that something separate is and you'll buy the ingredients.

...... and soo on ...

^^ this.
I can empathise. Okay for them to switch but they have to accept they'll need to step up.*

@Anotherlovelybitofsquirrel

Rose Veal is lovely, our local farm grows and sells it. You just have to buy ethically. Better to eat it, than for male calves to go to waste

Wtf? How are you so deluded? I would be embarrassed for you if I wasn't so disgusted.

Really?

I hope you don’t have that attitude with regards to other aspects of their lives! hmm

😂 love the pearl clutching
but being a mother gives you thick skin enough not to worry about the ridiculous judgement of some random on MN passing the time by insulting people for fun
Judgements starts when you start showing your bump, parents are used to it, and to ignore it - and to ignore the competitive parenting too.

You don't have to eat anything, but it's ridiculous to make such a drama about veal but not cows, or lamb, or fawn... and to have a random scale of what you judge simply unappealing to frankly "disgusting".

You are confusing your preferences with actual facts.

@NoPainNoTartine

Ofcourse not providing your child with an adequate diet IS child abuse.

it's debatable if vegetarian or even vegan diets are adequate 🤷

There are enough public cases to show it's indeed an issue.

What's debatable about it? Adequate provision of nutrients in all food groups? You really need to talk to the NHS and a few other public bodies who have been dangerously saying for decades that sensible veggie diets are perfectly fine. I'm sure they will be interested to see your list of "many organisations agreeing that vegetarianism is NOT the healthy way" which you're strangely shy about sharing with us.

@Airyfairymarybeary

YABU! Why not support your children and do it as a family?

Lol no

OP Please excuse me if this has been said before, but there are many vegetarian dishes that can be cooked in about 10 mins by most teenagers (or perhaps by you while waiting for your meat to be ready), and eaten with whatever green veg/other veg the rest of you are eating. Plus carbs of choice.

• Omelette

-Piperade -Egg pasta with peas and/or leeks and/or mushrooms plus soft cheese stirred in (there are many more possibilities)

• Stir fries - eg greens, red pepper plus cashews, flaked almonds or tofu (but again many, many possibilities)
• Welsh rarebit
• Pitta bread filled with felafel (bought), hummus or tahini, salad...
• Bruschetta with mediterranean veg (peppers in jars and similar tinned/bottled veg are excellent for this)
• Grilled or fried halloumi served with french beans and salad
• Griddled/sauted (can't do accents) veg (eg courgettes, broccoli, sliced tomatoes etc) with feta
• Baking potatoes microwaved until just cooked, halved, brushed with olive oil and grilled until golden. Serve with coleslaw, salad, grated cheese or even, from time to time, baked beans
• Savoury pancakes - Korean recipes are good for this; some use chick-pea flour which is very nutritious. Potato pancakes also good.
• Sweetcorn or courgette fritters

• Those 'ready to steam' packs of veg served with tahini/sesame/garlic dressing and tofu or a soft-boiled egg if liked
• Endame beans or broad beans (cooked from frozen) with soy sauce and ginger dressing and sunflower seeds and cooked greens
• Cauliflower or broccoli or similar stir fried with garlic and chilli. When almost cooked, stir in some peanut butter and enough water to make a thick sauce, plus soy sauce to taste.

And a whole world of other possibilities if you are prepared to use those pre-cooked packs of rice, lentils, fancy grains, etc etc. Serve with a variety of different dressings (based on olive oil, sour cream, yoghurt, tahini etc) with lots of steamed or stir-fried veg. Nuts and seeds sprinked on top add extra nutrients

• In the summer, dips made with (tinned) butter beans, chickpeas, canelloni beans etc etc, or three bean salad, served with crudites and green salad.

If 20 -30 mins are allowed then even more possibilities - roast veg of all kinds and combinations served with plain yoghurt or grated cheese, frittata, and, if teens can learn how to make simple pastry or scone dough - or use ready rolled pastry - quiche, veg tarts, pizza sorts of things

And soups in 20 mins if you have a simple stick blender - pea, carrot, leek and potato, mushroom, tinned lentil/bean/chickpea/tomato etc etc served with seedy bread and a piece of nice cheese.

Personally, I really dislike Quorn and all the other meat substitutes; to me they taste like cheap processed meals. IMHO, fresh food is nicer if possible. But some people must like them, because they seem to be everywhere.

My ds 14 decided to go vegan. A few of his friends watched something on Netflix and all decided to go for it. It was for health reasons rather than moral reasons. It’s a pretty healthy way to live and ds is very sensible and level headed so I embraced it. I bought some vegan cookbooks and loads of suitable food and said that ds had to help out with the cooking (which he dutifully did). Ds lasted a week. I enjoyed it so much that we now eat vegan a couple of times a week. If I wasn't such a lazy chef who relies heavily on HelloFresh it would be more!!!

Kids are fickle, but sometimes they push you out of your comfort zone and make you try new things. Give it a go, you might like it.

@Empressofthemundane

To be fair, male calves are essentially a by-product of the dairy industry. Either eat them or they will get made into some thing else, perhaps animal feed. They certainly won’t be raised to adulthood.

Very few agricultural animals are raised until adulthood. For example, piglets are typically six months old when slaughtered. They naturally live 10-15 years.

You’re right about calves being a byproduct of diary. That’s one of the reasons I don’t consume dairy. Even diary produced to the highest ethical standard still requires a calf to be separated from its mother.

It’s a similar story with eggs. Baby male chicks are also a byproduct but they are useless to the industry do they are deposed of. Common methods of disposal include grinding them up into animal feed or fertiliser. They are not stunned. They are alive and fully conscious when this happens.

You’re wasting your time @generallynot. She doesn’t even know what a food group is so her dietary advice can be safely ignored.

VinylDetective I am not on MN to educate you, do your own research.

I am in no way trying to convince you to start eating meat! I couldn't care less if you do. I am just defending my right to make my own choices in my own house for my own family. That's basically the main difference between you and me...

At 13 & 15 they should be learning to cook anyway

• meat and fish are usually the expensive components of the diet. A bit of menu planning - should be easy to identify days when you are cooking a vegetarian meal anyway, or days they need to fend for themselves - if they use the kitchen directly after school, they should be out of your way. Guidance/bit of an eye on them first to ensure they don't have a 100% pizza diet and let them get on with it.

@NoPainNoTartine

VinylDetective I am not on MN to educate you, do your own research.

I am in no way trying to convince you to start eating meat! I couldn't care less if you do. I am just defending my right to make my own choices in my own house for my own family. That's basically the main difference between you and me...

We have done our research. That's how we know you're talking bollocks .

@NoPainNoTartine

VinylDetective I am not on MN to educate you, do your own research.

I am in no way trying to convince you to start eating meat! I couldn't care less if you do. I am just defending my right to make my own choices in my own house for my own family. That's basically the main difference between you and me...

Out of curiosity Do you see your home as also your children’s home? Or do they live in your home and have no right to a dietary preference?