vegetarian kids......

[maisystar]

just wondered if anyone elses kids were vegerarian and what you do at partys and when out for a meal if meat is on offer.

i am vegerarian and ds eats a mainly veggy diet. he does have fish cos unfortunately hates nuts seeds etc. if we are at a party or out for a meal i just let him have whatever cos i dont want to fully explain that basically you are eating an animal-hes only 3 and i think could be upset. he maybe has meat 1or2 times a month and never anything like a sausage roll or burger.

just wondered what others did.....?

We are all vege I always ask the mum if she can do something for dd that is similar to the others but without meat or offer to take our own , when out depending on where dd either has soem of ours or the vege option from childrens menu or chips and beans . SHe knows we do n t eat meat but I do not think she has grasped were it comes from yet (she is 3 as well)

I'm veggie, dh isn't. Ds is 6 months, and I haven't decided what do do, except that if he wants meat at home, Daddy will have to cook! I think really, he should have a bit of everything until he's old enough to decide for himself.

That's exactly how it works in our house, Ixel. DP is veggie & I'm not. I think it's quite important that ds has the protein from meat & fish when he's little, which dp doesn't have a problem with, but it's me who cooks it which is fair enough. He always has veggie sausages though, we don't let him have any 'junk' meat, it's mostly chicken & fish. It will of course, be entirely up to him to decide when he's older.

Yes our friends are in the sam esituation where one is and one is not , think it is easy then to combine both but protein can be obtain from alot of sources so it is not as much of a problem as some people think (FIL was not impressed)

no my mum is not impressed. think we were mainly brought up on diet of mince and shes always saying to ds 'would you like some nice chicken?'!!!! if they come to visit and i cook something like veg lasagne salad bread etc she thinks its a light meal cos doesnt contain meat!

yes I know where you are coming from. If we go to il's there is always a huge pantomime of how much trouble they went to ( Ie had to go to M&S and look for something with a V on it)oh and they always have a large steak

our dd is about to embark slowly on the food train.. she is 6 months old. Dh is vege and I was for 10 years but occasionally eat the flesh.

dd will not be getting meat for some time to come.. and not sure when and if it will arise.. probably when we go and visit the family in NZ.

My DH is veggie - I'm not but tend to eat mostly veggie (but I can't resist pork pies!). Both our DSs are being brought up veggie. It's not been a problem so far going out - mostly because DS1 (2y3m) eats very little anyway! My Mum and others who know us well always cater for us. We've just got back from lunch at a new friend's who offered him ham but he doesn't know what that is anyway! There was cheese there but he just ate bread (as usual!)Not sure what I'm going to do as he gets older and a bit more aware. Fortunately my DH is quite laid back about it and has even said that he would give DS1 meat if he thought it would help on the eating issue but we don't think it would.DS1 eats veggie sausages, cheese, hummous and...that's about it on the protein front I'm afraid but he does eat them every day. I'm trying to get him onto beans!

Im a veggy but my children arent, I thought I would let them decide, I turned vegy when I was 9 and realised OMG ive been eating cows and pigs all this time NOOOOOOOOO...I am sort of hoping my kids do the same.
DD1 is 6 and has a vegy friend who said your eating animals errr but my dd didnt even bat an eyelid, so whether shes too young to get the idea or just doesnt care I dont know.
I take my own food to peoples houses and let them know ill be doing that, like vegy sausages for a roast eyc.
If your ds is allowed to eat meat once or twice a month I wouldnt be worried abouyt partys etc unless he wants to be completely meatfree, then just let the parents know and it should be fine.
Egg beans and chips, or salad or baked potatoes on menus instead of the sausages or roasts.

I'm veggie and Dh isn't. My 5 yr old is knows that I don't eat meat, and also knows that chicken comes from a real live chicken, and pork form pigs etc ATM she is starting to go off red meat, but loves fish and chicken and processed meat like ham/burgers/sausages etc. It will be her choice as she grows up and if she doesn't want to eat meat - fine. I think I started to tell her that meat came from animals at about 3, and she only started to talk about it now. DD2 is 3 and becasue her older sister knows that meat comes from animals, she also knows it. For instance when we went to he zoo they saw the wolves being fed with rabbits (skin and all) and one of them asked me if we ate rabbits - I said some people do, and some people don't. They have also asked if we eat horses, again I said some do and some don't. I don't think it needs to be upsetting, I approached it very matter-of-factly and neither hild has a problem with eating animals - even though mummy doesn't!

I'm veggie, dh isn't but when we were child free (if I can remember those days!) we ate veggie as dh isn't that bothered about having meat. With dd we have given her fish and chicken/turkey but she's only had 'proper' chicken and not processed; I don't cook her meat or fish at all, dh is quite fussy about what he buys. ds is only 8 months and we haven't given him meat or fish yet.

My mum is veggie, my dad isn't but they've never bothered about what we gave dd. If anything, when we all eat together (we live close by and that is about twice a week) it makes more sense for my dh & dad to have fish or chicken when there's more than one to cook for and so dd will often join in with them.

When I took dd for her 9 month check our sympathetic hv wrote 'no meat yet' across a page of her red book and was very cross with us for not giving her any meat or fish. Got ds's check in a fortnight with the same hv...

are their any good hv´s??
I am amazed at their blindness... I mean h for health - alot of meat out there these days ain´t healthy.

Perhaps you should enlighten her Clayhead...

probably won´t take kindly to a non-professional telling her/him about it though

We are all non-meat eaters in our house. We all eat fish. DS (4) eats what he likes when he goes to parties - he has tried normal cocktail sausages and usually takes a bite and leaves the rest. Same for ham sandwiches - usually that's all the meat that's on offer as many small children dislike meat anyway IME. I take the view that he eats what we cook at home and when he's at Grandmas house or somewhere else and there is meat on offer he can try it if he wants to. He never has wanted to so far. I too am very matter of fact - he's just become interested in where food comes from (prob due to the malign influence of dreaded Big Cook Little Cook - have noticed they've not visited an abbotoir yet strangely....)and so we have been talking about pork and beef etc. It doesn't upset him, but then he's also intereted in animals eating each other too at the mo so it probably makes some sense to him....

I've had nothing but support from HVs by the way - I think they are impressed by the range of food both my kids eat - many meat eating kids I know survive on processed ham and chicken nuggets.

I am veggie, DH is not, nor DD aged 3.
I cook meat for them if needs be!!
My main concern was protein, as DD is quite picky and whilst she eats fruit and veg, would not eat beans or pulses. Also I felt it should be her choice.
Our other concern was DH's other 2 kids who are veggie but eat no fruit but apples, no veg but cucumber and are even loath to have pasta. They would not eat pulses or beans ever!! We felt that this was reason enough to give DD meat and fish if she liked it.

maisystar, my ds has been vegetarian from birth (he's 6.5 now). I didn't let him have meat even if we were out or at a party. As he got older he'd ask whether something had meat in it if I wasn't there. I explained quite early on where meat comes from and he's always been fairly disgusted at the idea of eating it (used to ask me loudly in supermarkets 'what animal did that used to be?' ) so never has eaten meat or fish. He asked to try some fish the other day so I let him but he spat it out immediately. Clayhead, don't let the hv give you any crap about vegetarianism, she's out of date and wrong if she does. Go armed with the facts. The Vegetarian Society site might be useful.

I've been veggie since I was 16. DH isn't "officially", but we don't have meat in the house & once the children were old enough to notice that daddy was eating something different when we went out he has stuck to the veggie option.

DD caught on really quickly to what she could & couldn't eat while out, & would tell people in a very loud voice that she didn't eat meat. She also policed what the boys were doing, as they weren't bothered!!

They are now 18, 16, 14 & 12. The 14 yo sometimes drips that he wants to eat meat- we tell him that when he is buying food/cooking for himself he can do what he likes, but that in my house it's my rules. The other 3 are generally quite happy with the status quo (& the eldest 2 are carrying on with it even though they are now old enough to do their own thing).

We have had 18 years of problems with other people trying to sneak them meat (it's almost like a power struggle- as soon as you say no to something, they have to go out of their way to do it) & arguments with HV. Our GP is Asian & has never had any problem with it.

We did start eating fish when DS1 was 5 because he was underweight/not tall enough & we thought it might help. It actually made no difference at all, but was easier for the children in the long run because it means that at parties etc they've got the option of the fish shapes/fingers instead of having just chips (so many children's menus in restaurants & parties feature just burger/sausage/fish & nothing else). They all like tuna, but it's too much like meat for me, so I don't.

I have been vegetarian for 20 years. DH is not but both ds's (2 yrs and 4 yrs)eat no meat but do have loads of fish. I made it clear when I was pregnant that I believe a balanced vege diet is healthier than one containing meat and also for ethical reasons I would bring my children up as vege. DH has no problem with that (PIL are another matter but sod them - non of their business) I decided that if they decide they want to eat meat after they start school I shall of course let them.
4 year old DS knows Daddys bacon comes from pigs etc and thinks that is not nice. He proudly informs people he is vegetarian telling them he doesn't like to eat animals. All that may change, but as long as I have given them what I consider the best start in life then Ihave done my best.

They are healthy, happy children but HV's and doctors etc do seem to do a double take when, for whatever reason, I mention their meat free diet. One young femaale doctor once told me I should make an appt to see the dietician. I then listed all the foods they eat (so many pulses, array of steamed veggies, basically many things children of their age would not eat, and she looked humbled realising I wasn't feeding them 3 meals of veggie burgers a day.
PIL think a meal isn't a proper meal if it doesn't contain meat.
The ignorance surrounding vegetarianism does irk me - hence bit of a rant!

hi starry, can i ask...does your ds inform other kids(at pre school etc) what they are eating?! this is something that concerns me about fully explaining where meat comes from to my ds (hes 3 1/2). what age did you explain to your ds/s.

Starry, I agree, irks me too!

If your veggie children are going to a party, and you don't want them to eat meat, do you inform the party host beforehand?

Where we used to live we knew loads of veggies, and I would usually exclude meat from a party menu as a result. When we moved here (SW Cumbria) I did an "Are you vegetarian" tick box on the reply slip for our first party here, and everyone thought we were stark staring bonkers ...! Have subsequently discovered that there seem to be VERY few vegetarians here, and I don't know of any veggie kids.

Maisystar - My 4 year old knows meat comes from the particular animal but I haven't gone into detail about slaughter or anything! TBH at the moment I would answer any questions he asked but would not give him too much info as he's quite a sensitive boy. He has told me in the past when 'Thomas' or 'Lucy' has had ham in their sandwich and then said to me 'We don't eat pigs do we Mummy, we are vegetarian.'
It's difficult because obviously I wouldn't want him upsetting some friend at nursery by telling them horror stories about what they are eating.
The other day when he had fresh cod for dinner ha said to me 'Mummy, cod is a fish isn't it but not a real fish because i don't want to eat a real fish'(?!) He has seen his father catch mackel on holiday and knows that is what Daddy is eating on the BBQ but got upset last year when Uncle G had a big live crab in a bucket that was due to go on the BBQ!
Basically he knows being veggie means we don't eat meat but I don't think he has really made the connection that an animal is killed in order for someone to eat it.
When ds goes to a party I mention it casually but as he has peanut allergy I stay anyway so keep an eye on what he eats. I wouldn't freak out if he accidently ate a sausage or anything (not sure he'd even like the taste TBH)He's very good so if I say 'you can't have any of that or this sweetie' pointing out the chicken nuggets or soething he will just say 'Why, is that meat Mummy?' and then is happy to eat the other things.
I the TBH the whole issue of veggie children is still a bit of a minefield. I know I would have a proble on my hands if we were at PIL and ds's picked up some meat item that came of the BBQ and if I were to say no to them FIL would have a field day arguing and trying to get me into a corner as to why I can't let them have it. That really P's me off. They brought their children up accordig to how they saw best, I am doing the same - just ave different views, beliefs and opinions.

starry, we were also referred to a dietician (DS1 was below 3rd centile for height/weight) after a paediatrician had a go at me for subjecting my kids to a "faddy" diet.

When we saw the dietician she was very impressed with the range & variety of food they were eating & said she didn't know why we'd been referred because she couldn't tell us anything!