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second week of Vegan...We need help!!
Started
by Denise Lane
on November 8, 2009
This is our second week of Vegan my daughter and I are loving it but my 16 year old is really having a hard time with it. She has always been a very picky eater and loves SAD foods esp. McDonalds. So I am on the lookout for a variety of recipes and hoping that she will start enjoying some new foods and great tastes.
Thanks everyone
Hi Denise,
The kid issue is very challenging! The rest of the world is begging them to eat Big Macs, Dortios, and Slurpees. I have young kids (2 and 4), and here's what I do:
- always turn to the baking/desserts sections of the cookbooks first. My kids may not want to eat baked eggplant, but they are always up for muffins, granola, baked friuts, etc.
- try to have a salad, a bean, and a grain in the fridge ready to eat at all times. For example, this morning I made a beat salad (delicious!), steamed some lentils, and cooked some brown rice. It took all of 15 minutes. Then throughout the day I offer it to them when they are hungry.
- once a week we go to the prepared food section at the local heathly supermarket, and I let them "pig out". The stuff is super expensive. But the cooks do a much better job than I do and there is lots to choose from.
Hope this helps!
Vegasaurus (cute name!!)
Thank you for your post! Your children are so lucky that you have introduced a healthy way of eating at an early age. I have a few strikes against me in that area.
I am a preschool teacher and should no better!! We have always been SAD eaters. My youngest is 16 and has gotten used to the grab and go lifestyle, I think some foods are an aquired taste, so 16 years of bad food choices have made the change to vegan difficult. Your suggestion of the baking/desserts section is right on, esp. for her since bread/ceral is her favorite food group! Another problem for us is that we do not have a local healthy supermarket I have to drive 2 hours to reach the nearest one :( so I am struggling to find good foods and ingredients that are available at Wal-mart.
Yikes, it is hard to find heathly ingredients at Walmart I may actually mail order some things because I can't find them.
I was thinking about your situation some more today and thought of something else... I will often try to make vegan foods that LOOK or even taste like other foods my kids are used to (or they get from dad). Today I threw together some trail mix with raw nuts, dried fruit, and carob chips. They inhaled that. Spaghetti or soups fall into that category. They are eating vegan and don't even know it. This doesn't always work, though. I made vegan wraps the other day and my 4 year old said "hey, where's the chicken??" It was pretty funny.
Vegasaurus: I'm pretty sure Quorn brand products are vegan, you could try that. It looks just like chicken and even has a scarily similar texture.
Excellent. Will try. It would be great to have something chicken-like in a stir fry. The kids don't like tofu unless it's super-marinated in soy sauce.
Vegasaurus..
The trail mix is a great idea, I will certainly be making that.
I also made granola from a recipe that was posted.
Thank goodness for pastas! I found organic sauce and even made Faux Alfredo from white beans that my daughter liked.... I can just imagine your 4 year old asking about the chicken!! so cute....
Where I live we have one grocery store and a wal-mart, so I spend a lot of time reading labels and trying to come up with food ideas...I am going to make a trip to the Whole Foods store this weekend and stock up on some things I have been wanting to try. The closest store is a 2 hour drive for me, but I am anxious and excited about going!!!
Jessy...
GREAT.. Thanks a million...I honestly do not think My family could do this without this web site and the wonderful people here!
Amy , I have found that with other products as well...really got to read the labels
Wow, all those websites to explore. Good stuff.
The label reading is so tricky. The only food I miss at all is cheese, and it seems like the veg cheeses (in our local store, anyway) all have casein. Why is that?
There are "cheese" recipes around that are made from nutritional yeast. Maybe that should be next on the list of things to try.
Here's another kid friendly recipe that I just tried with great success:
Breakfast sushi: a banana with peanutbutter and jelly rolled in a whole grain tortilla. My little ones ate this as fast as I could roll it.
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