Vegetarian Meals for Kids
In May, I wrote about Laurel encouraging us to start up vegetarian week every month. Since that time, she's increasingly gone off meat and this summer decided to become a vegetarian. We're not a huge meat eating family to start with, but I know that being a vegetarian has challenged her at times, particularly when she's thought about tuna melts, moussaka, and my chicken tenders. And it's not quite as simple as just putting a salad in front of her, because even though Laurel consumes a lot more veggies than she used to, veggies are more of an accompaniment than the main attraction for her. And some easy options -- such as falafel and hummus -- haven't been received favorably.
We've told Laurel not to be hard on herself; that if she wants to be vegetarian, that's great, but that if she adjusts her plan and eats meat once a week (or whatever) she's still doing something amazing. But she's holding fast. So we're trying to support her and come up with new food ideas. At the moment, here are her favorites:
And that's pretty much it. So I turned to the fine folks on Twitter and Facebook this week and there were so many great responses -- thank you! I was going to reorder and categorize the feedback, but there was a lot of overlap in the respones and I wanted to credit appropriately, so I just left responses intact. I did sort the responses into three broad categories:
Recipe Inspiration
Incorporating Instant/Pre-Made Products
Other Vegetarian Meal/Snack Ideas:
Thanks so much everyone! I'm making my grocery list now! Meanwhile, if you have additional ideas to share, feel free to do so in the comments below.
Image credit: Michelle Meiklejohn / FreeDigitalPhotos.net