Hi My DH's 12 year old niece is visiting for a few days and I have been advised she is now vegetarian. I had my dinner menu sorted for everyone but it included meat/fish and so I need to find something I can do to adjust a serving for her. So dinner 1 is fish burgers. I think I will just make her egg burgers instead - so it will be bun, egg, cheese, lettuce, tomato, cucumber, salad dressings. The rest of us would have the same but have fish fingers instead of the egg. Dinner 2 - roast chicken with roast potatoes, carrots and either peas or a salad. I am a bit stumped on what to give her instead of the chicken. Dinner 3 - tuna pasta bake - I will put her pasta and the white sauce in an indvidual dish before I add the tuna to the main dish and then all get grated cheese over the top.
I have not catered for a vegetarian before and this is for next weekend so I have got myself in a frazzle as I only found out last night about her and I have already done most of the graocery shopping based on the meat dishes. Am I on the right track - does anyone have any suggestions on what I could do differently and what to do for dinner 2 above! Thanks so much everyone
nauru,
Jan 13, 7:42pm
There are quite a few vegetarian alternatives to meat available at the supermarket. You could do a selection of roast veges to go with the chicken and salad and then she can help herself to that. Also look in the vegetarian thread, will bump for you.
raewyn64,
Jan 13, 7:44pm
Thanks Nauru. The concern I have with buying vegetarian alternatives is that I don't think she gets them at home and so probably hasn't had them and might turn her nose up at them. I guess I could get a small amount and see but if she doesn't like it then what do I serve her!
toadfish,
Jan 13, 8:08pm
Just call the family. ask what protein she has in her pasta bakes.What they would serve her with roast vegies.I think alot of children go through that phase, i know one of mine did.I said happy for her choice but she needed to be responsible for her meals when they differed and she had to make sure she had protein at main meals.Phase soon died out. My thoughts were lets see how genuine it is. or if it is just a phase.
lx4000,
Jan 13, 8:36pm
Cook foods which are not cooked with the meat when it comes to serving a veggie! I have roasts and gravy and I'm veggie. I just cook the meat by its self. I have veggie gravy which everyone loves. Does she eat eggs! Make sure the cheese uses veggie rennet (rolling meadow uses veggie rennet) Salads with dried fruits and nuts and seeds are good too.
whitehead.,
Jan 13, 10:53pm
fry half an onion finely chopped till brown,2 large tomatoes skinned and chopped add 1 green pepper cut into chunks fry and then add a slice of brown bread crumbed and a hand full of good cheese . salt and fresh ground pepper top with a chopped spring onion and serve . i made this for last nights tea there is enough left over for lunch and its yummy . if you have to use tinned tomatoes add about half a tea spoon of sugar
raewyn64,
Jan 13, 11:04pm
Thanks everyone for the suggestions and tips. I think this is a "phase-thing" - and I am not saying that it is a bad thing or anything like that. I think she has decided she doesn't want to eat meat and fish, but she is ok with cheese and eggs. So she has probably decided she just doesn't want to eat animals, but doesn't know the ins and outs of things like the rennet in cheese etc. I am not planning on enlightening her or putting her down for what she chooses - I am just concerned that she gets enough food while she is here. Her mother sprung it on me last night and sort of gave a flipant comment of she can just have a bread roll or a bowl of cooked pasta instead. Now I am NOT serving anyone in my house a bread roll for dinner (except when we are having burgers) or a bowl of cooked pasta with a tomato and bit of cheese on it. So I think I will make some sort of patties that she can have instead of the fish in the burgers. Plus she can have an egg on her burger. The tuna bake sauce I use has a spinach base so for that I will cook the pasta and mix in the same sauce we are having, just leaving out the tuna from hers and maybe add some more fresh spinach or silverbeet to hers and cheese on top and under the grill. The roast chicken one is still stumping me a bit but I might look and see if there are some rissoles or something that I can cook instead for her and then we all have the roast veges etc.lx4000 thank you for the reminder of cooking them apart. I usually do my chickens in roasting bags and the veges in another roasting dish so that should be fine. Thanks again everyone
elliehen,
Jan 14, 12:12am
raewyn64, you are a very conscientious aunt.I would not be worrying at all about just a few days ;)If she eats cheese and eggs, it will be a breeze.
seaspray1,
Jan 14, 12:20am
Corn fritters are a good standby for young vego's.Could even go in a burger as a pattie.
lyingnun,
Jan 14, 12:33am
I would not be too worried. She will enjoy whatever you serve and I am sure she will just let you know what she prefers to not have on her plate. Your slight tweaks of your menu should cause minimal extra work. The roast meal is probably the most challenging. She may be happy just to make herself a nice salad sandwich or filled roll with a pot of yoghurt and some fresh fruit. Pancakes are also a nice option. I am guessing she is not vegan.
raewyn64,
Jan 14, 1:25am
Thanks once again everyone. i think it is just a bit of a panic when I get told someone is vegetarian and I don't know very much about it. elliehen I think you are right that as long as she has eggs and cheese then she will get her proteins plus if I add some silverbeet to the pasta then that will give her some iron as well. It is only a few days after all but I don't want to be seen as some old meanie who dishes up bread and water for those that don't eat what I eat :) lol. lyingnun - no she is not a vegan - I think it is just that she doesn't want to eat animals at this stage in her life and so that is fine - but probably hasn't considered the issue of products that come from animals such as dairy and eggs etc - so I won't tell her :) seaspray1 - good idea about the corn fritters for the burgers -thanks for that.
painterman,
Jan 14, 1:33am
grab a can of chickpeas or some tofu - just fry it up in butter / or roast(maybe some soy sauce) and serve it like meat. easy
ruby19,
Jan 14, 3:15am
What about a field mushroom, in the burger, as she may not eat eggs. Regards the roast dinner roast veggiesand salad is fine, also the pasta bake will be great. I am sure she will appreciate it all.
raewyn64,
Jan 14, 3:19am
thanks ruby - I have been told she will eat eggs but mushrooms in addition wouldn't hurt and everyone can have some if they want some :)
I guess I just want to do something a bit special for her - she is the middle sister of 3, has decided black is her favourite colour - clothing, makeup, hair etc and so I think she gets a bit of flack about it all and then the vegetarian on top of it all probably she isn't getting a lot of positive reinforcement - more of an inconvenience. So I would like to do a little bit special to acknowledge her being brave enough in this world to be a little bit different - espcially for a 12 year old girl :)
elliehen,
Jan 14, 3:31am
ruby19, now you've got me craving a field mushroom burger!
duckmoon,
Jan 14, 3:36am
Find out how strict she is.
We had a billet for a choir trip. The teacher in charged ask if we could have a child with allegerys (knowing that we were able go cater for that) and then we got a 'vegan' so I did all the research, checked there was hidden animal products in things etc etc.
When we got her home, i feed all the kids afternoon tea ( fruit, cookies and milk) with soy or rice milk for the child. And she said ' oh, I think cows milk.
I think her family was Hindi, and her parents didn't want her eating beef, so they registered her as vegan.
Anyway, check if your 12 year old is eating fish. She might not be a strict vegetarian
duckmoon,
Jan 14, 3:38am
When I was catering for a vegetarian for two nights, purchased a vegetarian lasgane, which had perhaps four servings in it.
I wouldn't normally serve the same dish to my guest two nights in a row, but nor would I normally cook two different meals.
See if you can get something like that from the supermarket, and serve it with the other stuff you are preparing
And your first night is an egg burger
duckmoon,
Jan 14, 3:40am
If you are serving roast veges, you could turn hers into a roast vege salad. Mix with some cashew nut dip ( one of the common brands of dips at the supermarket has it, it has a reddy colour) and some feta cheese. ( or just one of these options) and it is a balanced meal for a vege
duckmoon,
Jan 14, 3:45am
Also,faithful aunt, you might have an chance to talk her about being vegetarian and the commitment it is.
I worry about teenage girls who decide that they ' don't do animals any more', but don't do anything about their iron in take (as one xample), she may (or may not ) have herperiod, but when she does, she needs to make sure she has enough iron, since she will be loosing it each month
She might hear this better from her aunt than her mother
There is absolutely no need to worry about iron intake in vegetarians, more meat eaters are anaemic than vegetarians.Likewise protein, the problem with most diets come from too much protein.Statistics in meat and dairy eating countries such as ours are the worst in the world when it comes to disease.
buzzy110,
Jan 14, 5:56am
Can you provide a link proving that healthy people (those without a problem connected to iron stores) who eat red meat are more prone to anaemia than vegetarians who don't have sufficient amounts of vit b12 and folic acid in their diet please!
Can you also conclusively prove that meat and dairy is the cause of the high disease rate you mention! Can you conclusively prove that the disease rates are not caused by some other agent - grains, sugar, chemical food additives, highly processed and refined oils, for example!
I agree about the milk, but only because our milk is mishandled by processing plants and because our milk is mostly A1 milk from Fresian and Holstein breeds.
elliehen,
Jan 14, 6:11am
'Conclusively' and 'prove' cannot co-exist in discussions on the inexact science that is nutrition.
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