Bushes Dont Moo!

Haha my 14 year old niece did that exact same thing to my brother, she is eating meat again, haha!

I would try to instruct her as to why meat is healthy and essential for good health.
Explain how humans were able to seperate themselves from the rest of animal pack by eating and cooking meat.

She's 14 so she is still young and impressionable and likely decided this based on little to no evidence. At least dig in to find out why she wants to be a vegan to see if there are valid concerns there.

As to what they eat? Well I know they eat fruits and vegetables.

Edit: also good point from Readytobff. Maybe trying to push her against the veganism would be a bad idea. Might stick with it just to spite you. I would still try to find out why she's wanting to do it though.

Have her make her own meals. Sounds cruel, my mom did it for me. If she wants to do this tell her to research what she can eat and make her own food. It'll either put an end to it or help grow as a vegan.

Also, be careful with soy, too much isn't good.

It probably won't last forever. My partner was a vegetarian from the age of 3 and became a vegan later on but I think most of my friends had a similar idea at some point while they were growing up.

I would let her go ahead and try it so see if it sticks. She'll probably out grow it but if you it's not impossible to live with. It's the dairy that is trickier to cut out than the meat.

My 17 year old was vegetarian for 2 months. During that time, she was quite a smug douche about it. I got to hear such gems as... "At least twinkies don't cry when you take their babies from them." I rolled my eyes so hard I think I saw my brain. She's eating meat again and much less annoying to be around. While she was vegetarian, we bought a lot of soy products. Some she really enjoyed, others not so much.

I would try to instruct her as to why meat is healthy and essential for good health.

Meat is not essential for good health that's a bunch of c**p. You just have to be smarter, the more restricted your diet is.

The bigger issues is that a 14 YO girl will seriously struggle to understand (or care about) exactly what to eat to fuel a growing body, especially with a severely restricted diet, and may struggle to get the required calorie intake. If she uses something like MFP to track nutrients like protein and iron in particular, she might be ok, but no 14 YO girl should be in that position to simply maintain their health and the ED potential implications exist too, once you get down that route. It's not a great time to cut out iron-rich products, just as puberty hits and anemia becomes a threat (speaking from personal experience).

Chances are she hasn't considered the social implications and that will break her. Going to McDonalds with her friends, eating haribo, marshmallows... has she even thought about that?

I became a vegan myself 3 weeks ago, it was all new to me since I've never even been a vegetarian before.

My iron intake is so much higher now that I've eliminated meat and am eating more beans which is great!

For my husband and I, I make the same dinner except he has chicken breast with his grilled vegetables and brown rice and I have one of my many bean creations whether it be in patty form or stir-fried together with spices. Black beans are the best, I can only eat red kidney beans if it's under pasta sause, they taste too bland.

I am vegetarian but my husband and kids are not. Breakfast and lunch everyone usually does their own thing anyway, for dinner I cook them a meal and if I can't find a way to partake in it myself, I fix myself something else. For example, when I make spaghetti without meat I can eat that too. Lately we've been on a meatball kick so I will measure out my portion of sauce and cook it with "meat" balls and cook the rest with their meatballs. Amy's makes some good frozen meals for those time you're in a pinch but she should be able to start throwing meals together from some basics - flatbread, whole wheat pasta, brown rice, tabouli - add beans and/or veggies and good to go. Some good cookbooks to check out - How it all Vegan, The Garden of Vegan, The Vegetarian Family Cookbook. I'd let her explore, if you are against it, she's likely to dig in her heels. I know, I am 42 but my mother made a snide comment about my eating and that's just made me all the more determined to stick with it (I am a recent convert.)

I'm a vegetarian, and I get lots of protein, but I eat eggs and milk. I know I would have some nutritional trouble if I didn't. Does she really mean vegan, or would just giving up "food with faces" do it? No faces on milk or eggs! Even vegetarians have to find an alternate source of B12 (not available in plant sources), and being a vegan is a lot harder. I actually do like the idea of her helping prepare her own meals though - it would help you gage if this is serious for her or a trend she wants to try.

B12 is absolutely available in plant sources! Mushrooms are a great source! I've been meat/dairy free for 16 years and my levels are always great and I refuse to use false supplements!

I would try to instruct her as to why meat is healthy and essential for good health.
Explain how humans were able to seperate themselves from the rest of animal pack by eating and cooking meat.

She's 14 so she is still young and impressionable and likely decided this based on little to no evidence. At least dig in to find out why she wants to be a vegan to see if there are valid concerns there.

DISAGREE with the first part, I am hitting my macronutrients sooooo much better being a vegan. Soy milk has 1/4 the carbs of cows milk so that's been a great help and I'm getting 95%+ DRI of iron when eating meat I never made it past 70%. My protein intake is lower, about 60g a day rather than 90g but only 50g is recommended and I'm doing well nutritionally and just like recycling, the earth is benefiting from my behaviour, one little bit at a time.

AGREE with the second part. Keep in mind that many teens and pre-teens pronounce themselves vegan not to save the planet but because they want to lose weight and are slowly developing an eating disorder. If there are so many things they “can't” eat b/c they claim to be a vegan then they will just eat less and not get ridiculed by friends and family for starving themselves or not needing to be on a diet. I noticed this myself on Facebook, I had so much support on becoming a vegan but when I talked about nutrition or dieting I received ridicule and discouragement – it was funny to see.

Have her make her own meals. Sounds cruel, my mom did it for me. If she wants to do this tell her to research what she can eat and make her own food. It'll either put an end to it or help grow as a vegan.

Also, be careful with soy, too much isn't good.

mine too. except, i also had to 'buy' my own share of the groceries ($50 a month). i had to go out get a paper route. lol.

A well-planned vegan diet is healthy.

There are some good books out there that discuss how we eat and the impact it has on all species, the environment, health care, etc. I would suggest reading "Eating Animals" (www.eatinganimals.com) by Jonathan Safran Foer. I just finished reading a great resource called "The Ultimate Vegan Guide" by Erik Marcus (this book was only 99 cents for the Kindle a few days ago and may still be - you can get a Kindle app free for your computer as well as on your Smartphone - you don't have to buy the actual Kindle device).

There are countless websites to look into as well... I recommend checking out Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (www.pcrm.org) as they have a lot of research articles and such. Vegan.com is Erik Marcus' website that has a lot of great resources. Just doing a search for "vegan blog" or "vegan recipes" or "vegan" whatever will yield you tons of info.

If you are more into watching movies, then I would recommend Earthlings. You can watch this for free at www.earthlings.com. Warning: This documentary is very graphic, depicting animal cruelty, slaughter, death, etc. I could only watch the first 34 minutes before I had to stop and watch the rest at a later time. There is another documentary coming out called Forks Over Knives which I haven't seen yet that is supposed to be very enlightening.

I have been eating vegan for over 2 years now. My husband went from not accepting it to trying vegan foods and is liking my vegan cooking more and more (I'm getting better!). He willingly orders veggie burgers when we dine out at restaurants and because he hears me talk about the information I find has limited his meat and dairy consumption a lot. Just last night I mentioned that a recipe called for cheese but I left it out. He said, "It didn't really need cheese anyway."

As for products...

Boca (www.bocaburger.com) makes really good vegan burgers, meatless ground crumbles that can be replaced for ground beef in your recipes, and a chick'n patty. Gardein (www.gardein.com) has really good 7-Grain Crispy Tenders, Orange Mandarin Chik'n, and Chick'n Marsala. These can all be found in the freezer section. So Delicious (www.turtlemountain.com) makes great "ice cream" products using coconut milk instead of cow's milk. If you have a Costco you might be able to find Don Lee Farm's (www.donleefarms.com) Veggie Patties which are SUPER good pan fried in a little bit of oil.

I encourage everyone to include more plant-based foods into their diet! Hope this helps.

Have her make her own meals. Sounds cruel, my mom did it for me. If she wants to do this tell her to research what she can eat and make her own food. It'll either put an end to it or help grow as a vegan.

Also, be careful with soy, too much isn't good.

mine too. except, i also had to 'buy' my own share of the groceries ($50 a month). i had to go out get a paper route. lol.

DITTO! Well, if I wanted fake meat I had to pay for it. Our moms would be besties.