It's been a long time

Well it's been 11 days since my last blog, Christmas does that to your schedule.  We had a great Christmas, the husband is home for two weeks, nice, but I am a not staying with my usual plans that I have for the week, re: meals, cleaning, errands, etc.  Hoping to get back on track today.  He has taken our son and two of his friends to Chuck E Cheese, good luck, glad it's him and not me, boys!

Over the holidays I attempted to make sushi, the california kind, cucumber, carrots, avocado.  I think for my first attempt it turned out not bad.  I didn't steam the carrots first, so they were very crunchy and I didn't have a bamboo mat to roll them with so they weren't tight enough.  Here are a few pictures:

I will be looking for a bamboo mat this week, I was hoping the picky son might like these, always looking for options for his lunchbox too, but sadly, NO.  I haven't done too much in the way of true veggie cooking this past holiday.  Meals have been slapped together at the last minutes, mostly pasta, pizza or noodles. 

So I wanted to write a bit today about where my protein comes from.  I have had a few people write telling me they would like to try more vegetarian meals but don't like tofu.  This too was my thought process when I was thinking of going vegetarian awhile ago, there is more to veggie meals then just tofu, I soon found out.  I love lentils and beans (a good source of protein) so this wasn't much of a new thing for me.  I found a great Lentil and Gouda soup that was to die for, I love black beans, navy beans, pretty much any kind of bean.  I do love tofu as well, I know not many people do, but if you do some research you can find all sorts of tofu recipes where tofu doesn't taste like tofu.   We also love nut butters, which are a great source of protein.  Almond butter is our favourite, even the picky son likes it.  I spread it on a wrap, roll it up and off they go. 

This is all I have for now, will write more later.  My mind just went blank, I hate that. 

Any comments, questions, suggestions please send me an email.

What's been going on

First off I need to tell you that I am a stay at home mom, trying to start a small at home business and raising two kids (three if you count the husband).  The last couple of days have been hectic as I have been working with a kids store in our area that I was hoping would carry my product.  And they now do, yyiiipppeeee.  I hand make personalize baby/child bracelets, teething necklaces and custom bracelets.   Here is the website,  http://www.bornbeads.com/.  As of today, you can now purchase teething necklaces and ready made bracelets for that last minute Christmas gift at Over the Rainbow here in Calgary.  Okay enough of my excitment, here is what I have for today.

Since this week has turned out to be so busy, I haven't really stuck to the menu I set out on Monday.  The last couple of nights have been slapped together meals, unfortunately one quite bad one last night.  Hopefully will be back on track tonight.  Here is what the daughter and I had yesterday for lunch:


We had edamome, marinated tofu with rice, yes that is white rice.  I had it in the fridge and didn't want to waste it.  We usually eat white rice at dinner (my husband in asian, he hates brown rice) but when it's the daughter and I, I usually make brown and enough to store in the fridge for the week.  I slathered the miso gravy on my dish and soon the daughter was screeching she wanted what mommy had too.  She ate it all up, have I mentioned the gravy is "TO DIE FOR".

For lunch today, we had some pasta noodles with a Vodka Tomato sauce, I added some hemp seeds to the sauce, they don't have a strong flavour so it blended in nicely.  The daughter kept looking at the little seeds but also kept on eating.  For tonight I am planning a pizza night, the son has drum lessons and by the time we eat dinner it's quite late and pizza is fast. 

Also the PCRM Physicians Committe for Responsible Medicine is launching their 21 day kick start program on January 1, 2010.  http://support.pcrm.org/site/PageServer?pagename=21day_vegan_kickstart.  There are meal plans, celebrity tips, community forum, daily messages to keep you motivated.  I signed up for this the last time around and it was very helpful and informative.

A few of my meals...

My version of the Dragon Rice Bowl from "Refresh" by Ruth Tal, that sauce on it is a Miso Gravy and I can tell you that it was super yummy.  There is rice under the veggies, seared tofu, seared zucchini and grilled tomatos.  The recipe called for cilantro, but I am not a fan, so I used green onions.  Here is a picture from the recipe book, well maybe not quite the same, but you get the idea.

For today I plan to make the Spicy Tofu in Coconut Cream.  Although the hubby is a bit hung over today (department Christmas party), not sure if the cream will go over well.  Might have to make him some udon soup instead.  Hmmm, will look up a recipe for that.

I bought some hemp seeds this past grocery shopping trip and am going to be looking up some recipes to use them in.  I saw in one of Dreena Burton's cookbooks that she raved about the benefits of hemp seed, I did some searching on her site for some suggestions and this is what I found,  http://trueslant.com/dreenaburton/2009/08/17/super-foods-hemp-seeds/.  I also signed up with Manitoba Harvest, that is the brand of hemp seeds I bought and they have quite a few recipes on their website http://www.manitobaharvest.com/.  Again another attempt to get some good nutrients into the picky son.  I am going to start with muffins, see what happens, wish me luck

That is all I have for today, have a great one!

Should be cleaning...

Well I should be cleaning, the floor is a mess, the little girl is napping and I have about 1 1/2 hours to myself.  But here I am on the computer writing my blog, sigh!  I thought I would write today on some frustrations I have been having with this journey.

1. One of my big frustrations is the lack of vegetarian options that are reasonably priced.  Sure I can shop at Planet Organic (my favourite store by the way) but my grocery budget would be blown to bits.  So I try carefully to pick and choose what I eat organically and vegetarian.  Now I am contemplating going Vegan, but will need to find alternatives to cheese (I love cheese), milk (I have tried Soy milk with the picky son, he hated it) and a few other random dairy products.  So do I buy two separate products?  that would break my grocery budget again.  This I am working through at the moment.
2. My second frustration is a lack of vegetarian options in restaurants.  Sure we can go to specific vegetarian restaurants in Calgary, few and far between by the way, but there are none near us.  So we go to a few fast food restaurants, some sit down restaurants and no options.  Sure I can have a salad, but do I want to pay $15 for a salad at a sit down restaurant when I can make one at home for about $3.  My favourite fast food place is Taco del Mar, as they have a vegetarian burrito, which is huge and very good, but other then that any other fast food place (McDonald's, we have kids) I just order french fries.  I did a quick google search this morning and found 6 vegetarian restaurants in Calgary, 6, for a population of 1 million people.  That is sad!
3. My third is my cravings for some meat dishes.  At the moment it's fish, we ordered chinese food this past weekend and had a few dishes with scallops and shrimp in them.  I was very hungry, ate quickly and then felt a terrible guilt afterwards.  I had a slip, not sure if this happens to everyone converting, but guilty none the less.
4. My fourth is cooking at night for the family, with my husband and son still eating meat and having a picky eater it has making dinners quite a challenge.  I am fine during the day, the daughter and I have vegetarian for lunch, she loves everything and breakfasts are usually waffles, cereal, toast, etc.  I am trying to make dishes that I can make my veggie choice seperate without causing me to have alot of extra work and then my poor husband has been eating a lot more veggie stuff then I think he likes.  Still finding a balance there.

So any ideas from anyone for guidance, suggestions or motivation, please send along.

Have a great day out there.

Cookbooks, love them

Well Christmas is almost upon us and I have been thinking about what I am going to do for Christmas dinner. I will have a turkey and all the trimmings for the family but for myself I haven't quite decided on that.

One thing to know about me is I LOVE COOKBOOKS! All kinds, I actually just yesterday took about 25 that I never used to Value Village and promptly went to Chapters to look for a few new vegetarian ones. I was in there for over an hour, just in the vegetarian section alone. There are so many to choose from, here are the ones that have been helpful to me so far. I do love my "1000 Vegetarian Recipes", I find the recipes easy to make, most have a good number of ingredients (not too many that it's overwhelming) and everything has turned out fantastic. My second favourite is Vegetarian Times "Vegetarian Beginner's Guide", it was very helpful in helping me stock my pantry, and good and quick recipe ideas.

I bought two new books and am super excited to try them out, the first one is "The Vegetarian Family Cookbook" by Nava Atlas. I love her cookbooks, I have taken a few out from the library and always find them easy to read, easy to make and delicious recipes. It has a great section on snacks, I think I mentioned how this family loves snacking, lunchbox ideas, easy breakfast ideas and great looking soups and entrees. I also liked the fact that she gave vegan options for the recipes.

The second one was "Refresh" by Ruth Tal, this cookbook is gorgeous, I am also a sucker for beautiful cookbooks, great pictures, the end product looks for yummy. I picked this cookbook as it has a section on rice bowls, noodle bowls and juicing. This is a vegan cookbook from a restaurant in Toronto called Fresh, from what I have read so far, she started out as a juice bar that had some food to three restaurants around Toronto. The first thing I am trying is the Buddha Rice Bowl, some of the ingredients are marinated tofu cubes, thai peanut sauce, cucumber, tomato and of course rice, yuuummmmmyyyyy.  This book also has a section on dressings, sauces and marinades, I am hoping to make big batches of sauces and marinades and freeze them for later use.

Here is what is on the menu for this week:

• Buddha Rice Bowl
• Seitan and broccoli stirfry
• Pizza night (I always throw one in each week for those lazy days you don't feel like cooking and we all have them) 
• Spicy tofu in coconut cream

Here are the links to the websites for the cookbooks I have mentioned above:

http://www.vegetariantimes.com/product/11  (Vegetarian Times "Vegetarian Beginner's Guide)

http://vegbookshop.com/  ("The Vegetarian Family Cookbook)

http://www.freshrestaurants.ca/  ("Refresh")

I found this great looking rice bowl, fits in your hand and dishwasher and microwave safe.  http://flavourdesign.com/product.php?ProdNo=202

Lots today

I have quite a list of comments for today.  First, a couple of weeks ago I talked about grocery shopping and price comparisons.  I specifically talked about vital wheat gluten, at the time I thought Superstore was the cheapest, until I was at Safeway.  Well last week I was in Planet Organic (one of my favourite natural food stores) and found it for $8.69 a full $2.30 cheaper then Superstore.  It was a shock to me, as I always thought specialty food stores would be more expensive.  So word to the wise, even though they advertise cheap food prices, when it comes to the natural food section, please shop around, as they are not the cheapest. 


We experimented with the juicer this weekend.  We tried pear juice and it was a hit with everyone.  I do have a older not very well made juicer and it left behind ALOT of pulp, this is why I wanted a newer one.  The new juicer did a fabulous job of juicing all the fruit, out of 6 pears I had maybe half a pear in pulp.  Fantastic!  When I did the grocery shopping this weekend, I stocked up on oranges, apples and a pineapple.  We will do a bit of testing this week, I am hoping to get a leaf or two of spinach into one test.  Will have to be something green that we are juicing so the picky son won't notice.  Hehehehe. 


And finally to let you know about the "vegetarian" dinner I was served at my husband's company christmas party.  The first course was a salad with a side of potato based something which clearly had bacon in it, pass, but the salad was good.  The second course was a mushroom soup in a broth base, I have never had a mushroom soup in anything but a cream base.  This was very, very good and I am going to be doing some searching on the internet for a recipe today.  Then we had a sorbet to cleanse the palate.  Our main course was a baby carrot and two asparagus spears on top of mashed potatoes and then some sort of eggplant thingy in a pastry shell.  Absolutely no taste, no spice, no herbs, no flavour whatsoever.  It was very disappointing, I tried three bites to see if it got better, but no such luck!  I was hoping for a risotto, pasta, lasagna, something with flavour, sadly no.



Yesterday I was able to carve out a bit of time to do some cooking for the week.  I found two soup recipes in my "1000 Vegetarian Recipes" by Carol Gelles.  One was a Lentil Cauliflower Soup and then a Creamy French Lentil Soup, both sounded yummy.  When I cook, I sort of follow a recipe, so this time I did a combination of the two.  The combo soup turned out great and I was able to freeze two meals worth.  The second thing I tried to make was seitan, I got the recipe from http://www.theppk.com/recipes/dbrecipes/index.php?RecipeID=112.  It looked very easy, so away I went.  This was my first time making seitan and I had never tasted it before, so I am not sure how I did.  My version didn't quite look like the pictures I had seen, as for the flavour, it was good.  I fried a couple of pieces for dinner that night and had it with mushroom gravy, rice and carrots. 


So far this week I have planned:

• Roasted Vegetable Lasagna
• Pizza night
• Soup/Stew night with some good french bread (it's cold outside, good hearty soup)
• Seitan and mushroom Stroganoff

Again, not in any particular order.  Have a great day, stay warm and safe.

The juicer is here.....

The juicer is here, the juicer is here.  As you can tell I am very excited and so is our son.  He was the first one to have it out of the box, unfortunately I had no fruit in the house to juice, so off to the grocery store I go.


Now it's unpacked, washed and waiting to be used.  The juicer came with a disc of e-booklet's, they are funny.  First off there is four booklets, three are almost identical and then one on beauty treatments.  The pictures are from the 70's and the juicing recipes are almost all the same. 


So now starts the job of making sure that our picky eating son gets some good nutrients into him.  Not sure if you can survive on bread, butter, plain pasta, pizza and apples.  I bought him chocolate flavoured Ensure, to help him put on some weight and some added nutrients, he said it tasted yucky.  Tasted like chocolate milk to me, sigh!  Hopefully all my efforts and money, will be rewarded, probably not, being a mom is sometimes frustrating.


I am going to start out plain, apple juice, maybe try carrot, watermelon and grape.  I might need to get a second job to supply us with all the fruits and vegetables I will need to buy.


A recap on dinners this week, the Green Curry Deep fried tofu was a bomb.  I had never used green curry before and when I added it to the coconut milk it didn't turn any shade of green.  So I added another spoonful and then another.  Yikes, it was so hot we couldn't eat it, we had to throw it out.  Bless my husband who made a good effort at it.  I made french bread to go with the Guoda and Lentil soup and it was a big hit.  Well, except for the son of course, who just ate the bread. 


It's the company christmas party tonight, so will let you know what "vegetarian" dish I get served.  I will be trying the Sesame crepes with mushroom cream sauce tomorrow night.  Also Christmas decorating will be taking place over the weekend.


Have an excellent weekend everyone.  (my two followers)

Holiday meals

My blog today is about food served at holiday parties.  This past weekend we were at the Zoo for my husband's company Children's Christmas party.  Granted it was for kids and probably a huge majority of them weren't vegetarians, but there was no vegetarian options.  Oh, sorry, there was a veggie platter, BORING.  So try as I might to fill up on carrots, broccoli and cauliflower, I had to resort to the dessert tray to feel full.  Which was not good for my waistline and I don't have a sweet tooth.

 I know I live in a very meat oriented city, "Cowtown", but I am sure there are a few different vegetarian options other then a veggie tray.  How about vegetarian spring rolls, pita wraps stuffed with falafel's and tahini sauce, veggie quesadillas, there are numerous options.  Hey, maybe I should start a vegetarian catering company?  No, but I will be serving a few vegetarian options when company comes over during the holidays.  I will not have a veggie tray.


My husband's company Christmas party is on Friday, he has requested a vegetarian dinner for me and I am quite curious as to what I am going to get served.  I will keep you posted.


My menu for the upcoming week is this:

• Green curry deep fried tofu with zucchini (adapted from "Quick and Easy Thai" by Nanci McDermott, she used chicken)
• Gouda and Lentil Soup (from a "All you need is cheese" flyer that I got in the mail)
• Sesame crepes with Portobello Mushrooms in cream sauce (my new cookbook "3 Bowls: Vegetarian Recipes from an American Zen Buddhist Monastery")

In no particular order, as I am not sure what I feel like making on any given day. 


Well that is it for today.  My brain is tired today, life with a toddler.  Hope everyone has a great day.

Snack Time

The daughter and I just had a snack before her nap time, guacamole and chips, I love avocado.  Such a good for you food, a bit on the fatty side, but in moderation, yum.  We are big snackers in this house, I always have crackers of varying kind, cheeses, dips, popcorn, almonds, etc.  Costco sells these great Tamari flavoured almonds that we love, even our very picky son.  We also love almond butter, cashew butter and regular old peanut butter, as long as you don't buy the sugar filled crap, they are all good for you.


Other options for snacks I make sure to I have on hand is fruits.  I always have apples, bananas, pears, strawberries and blueberries.  The latter I have to wait until they are in season or they are very expensive.  I do buy frozen strawberries and blueberries for smoothies and freeze bananas that are about to turn bad.  I need to work on getting more vegetables into our family diet, for some reason that always seems to be a challenge.


Also, my mushroom risotto turned out fantastic, I think my husband even liked it.  I paired that with roasted root vegetables, sweet potatoes and carrots (all that was in the fridge).  Last night we had pasta with a cream sauce (I'm a sucker for cream sauces, much to my husband's dismay).  Tonight it's pizza night, I have some roasted red peppers, veggie salami, mushrooms, veggie chicken strips and cheese.  Load 'er up!


Here is a quick list of what we like to snack on:

• Almonds, regular and Tamari flavoured
• chips and dip (usually guacamole)
• cheese and crackers
• popcorn
• fruit
• sometimes veggies, I'm going to get on increasing that
• almond, cashew and peanut butter on crackers, apples, pears, wraps rolled up

Not too exciting, but if anyone has any suggestions for different, quick and easy snacks, please send them along.


Have a great day!

What's up for this week...maybe

Well here we are, another week. Time is going by so fast and it's almost Christmas. I wanted to write today about grocery shopping. I hate grocery shopping; we are a one income family now, so I have had to really pay attention to what I buy, how much and if we really eat it. I have done a lot of trimming in that department and now that I am vegetarian our meat purchases are significantly down. I do serve vegetarian dishes to the family about 3 times a week, and then the husband complains that he needs his meat.

I try to comparison shop, but sometimes going to one grocery store is more convenient then going to three to get a deal on bananas, but it must be done. A couple of things I have noticed is that Superstore, which everyone thinks is quite cheap, is not always the case. I add vital wheat gluten to my bread, at Superstore, Bob's Red Mill Vital Wheat Gluten is $10.99, Safeway $9.99. Yes a $1.00, but when on a budget that makes a difference. I also don't mind spending more on my produce if I know it's going to last. I have found that Superstore produce does not last. Safeway and Sobey's produce lasts longer and is better quality. Numerous times I have bought produce at Superstore (the last thing grapes) only to have them go bad in a couple of days, maybe, maybe last a week. I also find their dairy even with an expiry date, doesn't always last as long.

One thing Superstore does have is a great natural food section and vegetarian choices. I have found numerous great vegetarian foods with their Blue Label product. They carry great tofu choices and I always buy their Blue Label Teriyaki Marinated Tofu, as well as it's the only place I can find deep fried tofu.


On the menu so far this week is, in no particular order as some nights when I plan on having one thing, if it's been a busy day I'll make something else that is quick and easy.

Mushroom Risotto with roasted vegetables

Pizza, this will probably be on Wednesday night as it's just the kids and I


Vegetable Lasagna, my new favourite dish, there are so many varieties.


I am also experimenting with some different home made breads. Will keep you updated on how they turn out. And waiting impatiently for my juicer.


Have a great day, any comments, suggestions or questions, fire away.

A few bits about getting all my vitamins

Good morning everyone, thank goodness it's Friday. Our 18 month old daughter is going through a phase of clingy, whininess and night waking, it's exhausting, so I need to make sure that I get proper nutrition. This was one of my concerns when turning vegetarian. Chatting with a friend while picking up our son yesterday, she mentioned that a good friend of hers was debating becoming a vegetarian but was always anemic. There are lots of ways I have learned to make sure you get your iron, especially for us women, while being a vegetarian.


The one thing I learned is that when you are eating a food with iron, always have it with something with Vitamin C, it increases the absorption. Spinach salad (tons of iron) with a citrus dressing, oatmeal with orange juice, etc. For me, I also take an extra iron supplement during a certain time of the month. Although I don't always keep up on my iron, I can always tell when I am lacking, when I have good sleep but still feel very tired and no energy, that is when I take some extra iron supplements.


Another vitamin I was concerned about was B12; I do take a B12 supplement, but have also discovered Nutritional Yeast. Full of B vitamins and a complete protein, I try to add this to one of my meals a day (it has a cheesy flavour).  I usually add it to my pasta, pizza, anything that would taste good with a cheese flavour.  


Here is a great looking broccoli and cheese soup that uses nutritional yeast, again from Vegetarian Times...

Of course, I am not an expert and you should read up on all the nutrients and where to get them yourself if considering becoming a vegetarian.  Also talk to your doctor or a nutritionist, hopefully I have offered some insight into what you need.  I always consult the vegetarian food pyramid for my daily food choices.

Too little sleep

Good morning everyone, well I didn't do very well on dinner again last night.  After having a very sleepless night, thanks to our 18 month old, I was not in the mood to fiddle with polenta lasagna.  Instead we had pizza, I love my breadmaker as I can make pizza dough in it.  Last week I made about 4 batches and froze them, very convinient, espically last night.  The daughter and I had Meatless Chicken strips, sundried tomatoes and cheese, the boys had their usual meat laddened pizza.  Fast, good and home made, what more could you ask for. 


Today I am going to attempt to make seitan!  A bit nervous, I have found a few different recipes on the internet, I have picked one and am going to give it a try.  Although it's going to be a busy day, I hope to fit that in somewhere.  Does anyone know, can I freeze seitan?  And how about some good recipes?  Pass them along.


I also have a home based business, so for the next couple of days I am going to be getting ready for a fund raiser and a craft show.  So the posted might be a bit scattered.


Also, very excited about the juicer I have ordered.  I am hoping to get some extra vitamins into the kids, our son espically, we love smoothies and hope this will be another avenue for good nutrition.  I ordered the Jack La Lanne's Power Juicer Pro, did some reading up on it and it seems to be pretty good.  Comes with a recipe book and has recipes on what to do with the pulp, so no waste.  How great is that.  Will keep you posted on juicer and our juicing experience.

Well I have to run, hope everyone has a great day!

How I've done so far and what's coming up

Well a quick review of how yesterday's dinner went, my Spicy Tofu Bento Bowl didn't quite go as planned.  First, I couldn't find a ripe avocado for the life of me, second, I forgot to cook the rice for the dish and then I noticed I had no yoghurt.  So my dish ended up being a spicy tofu salad and it turned out pretty good.  For lunch yesterday, Leya and I had President's Choice Meatless Chicken Strips in a quesadilla. All in all, the meatless chicken strips were not bad, so far the best I have tasted.  And we had carrot sticks with Ranch dip, I am looking for a vegan Ranch dip if anyone has any suggestions, please pass along.  So today I am going to make some home made bread, and the polenta lasagna.  Might be a little more work then I would like, but I am anticipating that it will be pretty good. 

Nov. 19th, is pizza night, I make home made pizza dough and freeze it.  A whole bunch of veggies for me and the daughter and salami and cheese for the son.  Dad is at a meeting that night.

Nov. 20th is curry night, I LOVE CURRY!  This to me is a no brainer vegetarian dish.  You can add what ever you want.  We love Deep Fried Tofu, which I can only find at Superstore and some great rice.  Unfortunately my husband only likes white rice.  I am going to start making brown rice and freezing it for myself.

One of my favourite cookbooks for Asian cooking is Wok It.  It was a $4.99 discount special at Chapters and I use it all the time.  I constantly substitute deep fried tofu for the meat in most of the recipes.  It has a wonderful vegetarian spring roll recipe that I have tried and my husband (Chinese) says it's not too bad.  A great compliment coming from him. 

Well that's what I got for today, any comments would be great, any recipes as well.  Have a great day!

A little history of the why

Well today I am going to start with a little history of why I decided to become a vegetarian. I was always raise a meat and potatoes girl, my family had to have meat, potatoes and some sort of boiled to bits vegetable for dinner. For about the last two years the thought of cooking meat has made me sick, I remember opening a package of ground beef and being grossed out by the blood that was at the bottom of the tray. Then I started getting mental images of the cow it came from and that was that for beef, but I still ate chicken. Then one day I was making some sort of dish with chicken thighs and when I bit into it I hit a small piece of bone, gross, again. So that was it for chicken. Now all I had left was seafood, then I got a bad bit of shrimp and there goes the seafood. I still eat some dairy, real cream for my coffee, the odd bit of cheese, mostly Goat Cheese and some Brie. I don't eat eggs as well and that stems from cracking open an egg to find blood and other bits inside and I thought I was going to throw up right there and then. That is when I decided on being a veggie, I read alot of books as I knew this was going to be a major change to my life and families as well. We have a very picky 6 year old and if he doesn't eat meat he would get no protein, so for now I am keeping him a meat eater. My husband, doesn't like alot of meat, but occasionally likes his double cheese burgers or meatloaf, I actually make a pretty good meatloaf (which I will now have to show him how to make).
My favourite book is "Becoming Vegetarian by Vesanto Melina and Brenda Davis", the bible for me. I wanted to make sure I was going to get all my correct nutrients, protein, calcium, etc. and this book had it all. Then I started, I went to the grocery store, stocked up on what I thought I would eat and away I went. It has been a bit difficult in the sense that the rest of the family still eats meat, so I try to make dishes that I can substitute tofu for the meat or I'm cooking two separate meals. Not always fun. Also I am a mother of a 6 year old and a 18 month old, so I need fast and easy recipes, nothing fancy here. I have a few good cook books, but rely on the Internet for alot of recipes as well. But I am finding it difficult to find fast, easy and inexpensive recipes. So, here starts my journey of blogging what I eat, hopefully I can help others out there that need some meal plans.

Here is what I have going to have for dinner for the next couple of days, I thought I would start with dinners mostly, as breakfasts for me are pretty simple, I need to get a 6 year old off to school. I eat mostly cereal, oatmeal, waffles, fruit that sort of thing, so nothing special in the vegetarian world there.

Nov. 17, I am going to have the Spicy Tofu Bento Bowl that is in this month's Vegetarian Times, it looks super yummy and if my version looks half as good as the picture, it's going to be great.

Nov. 18 I have planned a Polenta and mushroom lasagna, another Vegetarian Times recipes.

http://www.vegetariantimes.com/recipes/10175?section this is the recipe for the Spicy Tofu Bento Bowl, tell me that doesn't look yummy.

http://www.vegetariantimes.com/recipes/9770?section= here is the polenta lasagna, yum.

My journey to Vegetarianism

First, I wanted to blog about my journey to vegetarianism, am I new at this journey, pretty sure I'm not. The rest of my family is not converting, well maybe our 18 month old daughter, I do the cooking, so she doesn't have a choice, LOL. Also my written English is going to be bad, just to let you know off the bat, so don't email me with corrections. I'm going to post what my menu plan is for the week, probably all three meals and some snacks, if I'm feeling ambitious. If there is a recipe involved I shall post that as well. Since I am a visual person, I need a map to make this conversion and creating a meal plan for me was that map. I couldn't find anything on the Internet that catered to this option. So I hope you enjoy my blog, if you have suggestions, I would love to hear them, if you just want to criticize my choice of being a veggie, I don't want to hear from you. Thanks and will post tomorrow my week of meals.