I o is you said you already do this but I would just focus on more vegetarian cooking.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just buy it in bulk.

Do you know where I can bulk-buy pasture raised chicken in NoVa?

38212 Long Ln, Lovettsville, VA 20180

https://longstonefarmva.com/offerings

Anonymous wrote:And I suppose letting your husband (who suggested this change) take the lead is out of the question?

I am the cook in our house. He has other talents.

And I suppose letting your husband (who suggested this change) take the lead is out of the question?

Anonymous wrote:We eat meat every day but how is your meal mostly meat? Are you not doing a traditional meat, starch, veggie? If not, try that. Meat is always a part of our meals but is about 1/4 of the volume. Your plate should be half veggie, 1/4 starch, 1/4 meat.

OP. That’s more or less how I eat, maybe I’m thinking more of my kids! If I serve the NYT chicken shawarma and pita bread and a tomato-cucumber salad (say), they will eat mostly chicken and a little bit of salad (or mostly bread and a little bit of chicken and salad, for one kid). Which is fine for some meals! But I think of it as “okay I’m making pot roast and also a starch and a vegetable” when I cook meat, and I think the first step is rejiggering my thinking.

Anonymous wrote:Just buy it in bulk.

Do you know where I can bulk-buy pasture raised chicken in NoVa?

Rice bowl
Chili with beans or pasta or rice or any combination
Omelette or quiche
Chef salad or the like

Just buy it in bulk.

Stir fry
Soups
Or just serve less meat and then have more sides including other foods with protein.

We eat meat every day but how is your meal mostly meat? Are you not doing a traditional meat, starch, veggie? If not, try that. Meat is always a part of our meals but is about 1/4 of the volume. Your plate should be half veggie, 1/4 starch, 1/4 meat.

OP. I should add: I do a lot of vegetarian and even vegan cooking! But when I do meat, it tends to be mostly meat, and I think I’d rather shift the proportions within a meal than shift the proportions with a week, if that makes sense.

Stir fries are excellent to be vegetable forward and you can add as littler or much meat as you want. Same with noodle or rice/ grain bowls.

Things like wraps, savoury crepes, tacos, salads where again - you can add small amount of meat

You can easily add lentils to replace some of the meat in most ground beef recipes

Soups and stews

Look at adding some actual vegetarian meals so you can enjoy the meat based ones.

Start by adjusting the proportions of whatever you make already. You can still make, I dunno, tacos/ nachos/ burritos, but everyone gets a couple tablespoons of meat, and fills up with rice and beans and guac and tomatoes, rather than half meat and half other stuff. Instead of 8 ounces of fish, everyone gets 3-4 ounces and a bigger serving of veg/ starch.

I grew up and learned to cook in the midwest where meat was the main event and everything else was a "side". I started shifting gradually a few years ago. Over time we've added more vegetarian meals to the rotation, but mostly it was reducing meat and increasing the other stuff. With less meat, I got more creative with the "sides" and some of them have become their own meal. Like PP said, lentils. Throw lentils (I like red) in a pot with diced onions and garlic and S&P. Halfway through cooking, add a few cups of chopped cauliflower, a can of chick peas, any other veg that make you happy, a tablespoon of garam masala or curry powder. Serve with naan and a yogurt cucumber salad. It ain't pretty, but it's super popular at my house, and super low effort.

Add lentils.

DH wants to shift to eating more humanely-raised meat. That’s fine with me, but since it tends to be more expensive I would like to try to add more meals where meat is the flavor rather than the main attraction so our grocery budget stays manageable. Besides “a pot of beans with some meat” what would you suggest?