the vegetarian thing

The vegetarian thing is going quite well. I decided to do it around the first of the year, but didn't do well in January. But in February I decided to quit futzing around and just stop eating any meat or fish -- and so far, so good. I think I needed to just jump in with both feet instead of easing into it. The first few weeks was the hardest as I had a tough time thinking of meatless dishes I wanted and there were times I really wanted a burger, or fried chicken, etc. But as I go past those first weeks the cravings subsided so they aren't so constant or strong. Plus a guy on a board I post on PM'd me several recipes which have been great. Thank you!

And I finally found a meat substitute (well, I've tried the chicken sub, and am going to try the ground beef sub soon) which I like fairly well. It's called Quorn and the taste and texture is very much like cooked white meat chicken. I used the tenders or chunks in a stir fry and it was pretty darned good. The only thing I have to watch out for with it is that it absorbs more sauce/flavouring than real chicken does, so I have to be careful not to over do it. I don't think I'll use it all that often because as I'm getting used to not eating meat, I'm finding I don't always need the substitutes either. Of course there are times when I'm sure I will really want them.

I got some veggie dogs too, but haven't tried them myself yet. I was never really big on hot dogs anyway, but figured these would be good for Diane as she does like them. My niece wanted a hot dog the other day, so I told her what I had and she still wanted it. She said they were ok and did eat it, even though I told her if she didn't like it she didn't need to eat it. So that was pretty good. :-)