VEGETARIANS: Please, Help a Newbie Out

This is suuuper dangerous. I suggest you read more about this lifestyle you have chosen; because it is a lifestyle, not a diet.
I've know many "vegetarians" and "vegans" (some being my friends) who have literally ate nothing but starchy breads, pastas, etc. because they didnt know where to get their protein (among other things). They didn't bother to do the footwork or proper research to go about it a healthy, beneficial way.

So again, read up and explore the many possibilities and options of being a vegetarian
If you like to cook and have time, I suggest making your own "mock" meats so you know exactly what goes in. You can find many recipes online and through various veggie blogs.

Also, joining a local vegetarian meet-up group(s) helps too!
Remember: just because it's vegetarian/vegan does NOT mean it's healthy \/better for you. Don't be fooled by the readily-available fake meats and cheeses; they are equally just as bad (some are, some aren't. again, do your research)

http://www.vegetariantimes.com/recipe/

http://www.vegkitchen.com/

http://vegweb.com/

There are millions of vegetarian recipes. Do some research, try some recipes, and figure out what your favourites are.

Are you a vegetarian or a Vegan?
Fish/milk/ or Tofu

wow how awesome! i became a vegetarian 4 years ago and a vegan one year ago. it was so natural for me since i rarely at meat anyways. there are many recipes online you can look up, and even if you don't cook very well, some easy protein substitutes for meat include tofu (soy), tempeh (cultured and fermented soy), beans of any kind, nuts, and quinoa. my only recommendation is to visit your doctor soon to let them know about the shift in your diet because they may be able to guide you as far as referring to a nutritionist and monitoring your weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, all that stuff. oh and remember it's easy to become a junk food vegan and/or vegetarian. focus on whole natural foods and less on processed foods (for example, cook a pot of bean chili with tofu and wild rice with some other vegetable on the side. good luck exploring!

Beans the fabulous wonderful world of legumes!!! Hummus, bean dips, bean soups, lentil soups, someone posted a lentil hummus on here and it looked so good.

Then start looking at primarily vegetarian cultures...lots of indian food, Mediterranean, asian, hispanic.

Hey there.

I have been vegetarian (off and on vegan) for nigh on 30+ years. It's not as hard as it was when I first started, but yes, the person who posted that it's wise to do some research is right on. I've also known many vegans who were literally starving to death. Ugh. Having said that, it does get easier over time, like most things. Plus, I rarely eat out, still. I soak and dry and soak things, almost every day. We are lucky that we have a co-op, in our tiny town. You can go there and get almost all your grains (even the most expensive co-ops usually have pretty good prices on bulk things) and many other things like Olive Oil, Honey, Nut milk, etc. etc.
Even if there's no co-op near you, a good dept. store (such as Hannaford's, here) might have a 'natural' section where you can usually score some pretty good deals.And the cookbooks that have come out in the last decade, are incredible. I can't get over the stevia movement. Grock.
Many of the cookbooks I've used over the years (and still do), are: The Self-Healing Cookbook, by Kristina Turner; Vegetarian Times (which I think has a web-site, still); Amazing Grains, by Joanne Saltzman, and A Vegetarians Ecstasy, by James Levin and Natalie Cederquist. Most of these you can get from Half.com, or Amazon, used and inexpensive.
Oh, yes, be prepared to be prepared, lol. When I had kids, I would spend most Sunday afternoons, cooking up a weeks supply of casseroles, munchies, desserts and such. That way, if my poor latch-key kids, got home before me, they could just zap away. We didn't know the bad things about microwaves and/or soy, in those days. I used to also make my own tofu, soy milk and miso, but now, you can buy organic versions of all that stuff, so at least that's gotten some easier. I also used a book called: Naturally Sweet Desserts, extensively. This doesn't use refined sugar, but I am having trouble finding it, so a search would probably pop it up for you!
Well, good luck and keep the faith. What's most important is that you just enjoy the process. It's at least challenging to convert, but also a lot of fun!

There are loads of great ideas above so I won't repeat those. I discovered this site - 101cookbooks.com - a little while ago and it's got lots of unusual and delicious recipes on it.

Also - the veggie food pyramid above - I would recommend less fruit and starches than it has on it. Lots of veggies, pulses, tofu can be fab when it's done right (try baking it with a sweet chilli glaze - addictive!) cheese and dairy in moderation, and high quality whole foods like spelt, quinoa, brown rice etc. Don't forget to get a range of protein sources so that you have complete protein going in

I've been veggie for about 20 years (woah - I can't believe that!), though I started eating fish again a couple of years ago - but not a huge amount of it.

I'm reposting something I wrote a couple of months ago in response to a similar open-ended question about what to eat besides salads when becoming vegetarian (the thread was called "eating vegetarian" if you want to look at what other people had to say). Hope it helps. (BTW, I'm an ominivore, but most of my at-home meals are vegetarian or vegan, and a lot of my away-from-home meals are as well. You can add me if you want to look for ideas.)


Rather than specific dishes, I thought I might suggest a few general approaches to help you get thinking beyond salads. One is that just as you probably start with deciding what meat/poultry/fish you're going to have when you're not having a vegetarian meal, start by deciding on a legume (beans/lentils, tofu, hummus), whole grain (oatmeal, brown rice, whole grain pasta, whole-grain pizza crust, cooked whole grains), eggs, or cheese (the last two obviously pack a lot more fat and don't offer any fiber, and some people prefer to limit them for those and other reasons) to be the "backbone" or "center" of the meal, and surround or combine them with foods from the other categories, as well as veggies, spices, and/or dressing/sauces (these don't have to be high calorie, if that's an issue -- lemon or lime juice, balsamic vinegar, tomato sauces are all good options).

Another approach is to decide whether you're in the mood for soup, salad, a sandwich, a casserole, a stir-fry, a roast (generally made from nuts and grains, but some recipes call for legumes and dense veggies like sweet potatoes -- kind of like a giant veggie burger :-), an omelet, pasta, a burrito, or whatever other categories of dishes you like to eat ... Once you've made that decision (which might be influenced by the energy and time you have for prep, the weather, how hungry you are -- just as it probably is when planning a meat/poultry/fish-based meal), you can make any necessary veggie substitutions for whatever m/p/f-based meal you might ordinarily have when you're in the mood for soup, a sandwich, a casserole, a stir-fry, etc., or you could search on some of the sites other posters have mentioned, or you could just use a general search engine to look for vegetarian soup (or salad, sandwich, casserole, etc.) recipes, maybe adding one or two main ingredients you have on hand.

Another approach that drives a lot of my meal decisions is what looks good to me in the produce section, which often later in the week turns into "I bought too much produce because it looked so good -- what am I going to do with the eggplant before it goes soft or that kale before wilts?" and the eggplant turns into baba ganoush with pita and hummus, or stir-fried eggplant with garlic sauce or fake eggplant parmigian -- no breading, just broiled or pan fried with a little oil (you have to be careful because eggplant will pretty much soak up as much oil as you give it), covered in tomato sauce and little cheese, and back in the oven or under the broiler for a bit, or the kale gets cooked with white beans and garlic, or shredded into a soup -- it goes really well with oniony potato soups, especially ones that have a little sausage, like chorizo, or ham, but that doesn't help you with exploring meatless meals ;-) (Obviously, I'm not a vegetarian. On average I probably have some kind of meat or poultry once or twice a week, and I've been trying, pretty successfully, to have fish twice a week.)

Another approach is to explore (through websites, cookbooks, cooking shows, restaurants) various cuisines that don't rely as much on meat/fish/poultry as modern Western societies do, which could include Indian, Chinese, various Mediterranean cuisines -- truth be told, probably just about every culture, if you look at the food that ordinary (non-wealthy) people traditionally have eaten, because meat and poultry, at least, tend to be beyond the means of most people in most places and times. We have a thriving food-truck business in the area where I work, with trucks representing a wide range of ethnic cuisines, and I get ideas from there. A few weeks back I had for the first time an Egyptian dish called koshari or koshary, which included vermicelli, rice, lentils, chick peas, fried onions, and a somewhat spicy, thick tomato sauce, and I loved it so much I found some recipes online and have been trying them out. Once you've made the sauce (I started with canned pureed tomatoes, so it wasn't much work) and have some cooked lentils, cooked/canned chickpeas, and cooked rice on hand, it's not anymore work than pan-frying onions until they just start to carmelize, then throwing the uncooked pasta in the pan to toast it, add a little boiling water to finish cooking the pasta, add the lentils and rice when the pasta is nearly done to reheat them, then put it in a bowl with the chickpeas, tomato sauce, and onions on top ... Mmmm, I'm going to go make myself some now. (Here are the recipes I used to give myself an idea of how to do this, but I didn't follow either one exactly (http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/koshari-10000001924679/ and http://allrecipes.com/recipe/koshary/).

I hope one or more of those approaches works for you. You really can have just as much variety when you're not eating meat/poultry/fish as you when you are eating them, if not more.

just look at this blog: garden-of-vegan.tumblr.com

EAT ALL THE CARBOHYDRATES
AND BY CARBOHYDRATES I MEAN FRUITS AND VEGETABLES
AND PASTA
because your cells THRIVE on carbs!
everyone goFRUITyourselves!

I've been vegetarian for 4 years and vegan for about 2. For me the easiest way to eat healthy at restaurants is to order sides as my meal, like sauteed veggies and brown rice or quinoa. Maybe a little bit of bread just to satisfy my carb cravings Once you figure out how to incorporate more fruits and veggies and not just rely on fake meat it's easy. Keep going! And don't be afraid of carbs from fruit! Good luck

This is suuuper dangerous. I suggest you read more about this lifestyle you have chosen; because it is a lifestyle, not a diet.
I've know many "vegetarians" and "vegans" (some being my friends) who have literally ate nothing but starchy breads, pastas, etc. because they didnt know where to get their protein (among other things). They didn't bother to do the footwork or proper research to go about it a healthy, beneficial way.

So again, read up and explore the many possibilities and options of being a vegetarian
If you like to cook and have time, I suggest making your own "mock" meats so you know exactly what goes in. You can find many recipes online and through various veggie blogs.

Also, joining a local vegetarian meet-up group(s) helps too!
Remember: just because it's vegetarian/vegan does NOT mean it's healthy \/better for you. Don't be fooled by the readily-available fake meats and cheeses; they are equally just as bad (some are, some aren't. again, do your research)

I have been vegetarian all my life and was fat. But that is because I made the wrong food choices, not because I don't eat meat. Now my diet consists of mostly fruits, veggies, and healthy grains instead of starchy carbs and sugar. There is nothing more "dangerous" about being vegetarian then there is being omnivorous.

just look at this blog: garden-of-vegan.tumblr.com

This is fantastic!

I recently went vegetarian - a bold move since I never considered myself a veggie lover. But, after being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, I had to change my evil ways. I would recommend you include some fish in your diet for a while for the protein. Also, keyword search "vegetarian" and "vegan" cookbooks at amazon.com ... many of them let you get a look at some of the recipes and if you google the cookbook authors, you can usually find their sites which have the recipes for free. Also, I bought and use The Mediterranean Diet Cookbook for Dummies - not so much a diet as just good, whole-foods type meals with nutrition info. Also Giada has a new healthy lifestyle cookbook out with easy to follow recipes with nutrition info. One other thing I did was buy a Lekue silicone microwave steamer at Sur La Table ... it came with a cookbook with recipes that serve one or two people. I hesitated on the purchase a long time, but I am very glad I got it ... extremely easy to cook with and clean up. Good luck!

There are some really great veggie/vegan cookbooks out there - two of my faves are Vegenomicon and Appetite for Reduction both by Isa Chandra Moskowitz. Or you could check out her website http://www.theppk.com/ for some inspiration.

Good tip on looking to cultures/cuisines with a strong vegetarian focus. Indian, middle eastern, mediterranean.

Another vote for ppk.com and fatfreevegan.com and vegan dad.

I'm not vegetarian or vegan, but my search for recipes flavored with something other than 10lbs of cheese, bacon & cream sauce has led me to explore a lot of vegan recipes. All the recipes I've tried from those 3 sites have been delicious. And make your own faux meat. It's cool, it's kind of fun, and costs like 65 cents a pound. Don't do this if you have gluten issues though.