The cookbook I Dream of Dinner by Ali Slagle has lots of veg recipes if she/you are interested in incorporating more into your routine.

OP here - thank you for al the ideas so far! We did black bean quesadillas last night - she was more happy with them deconstructed but did have a decent amount of them prepared and absolutely chowed down on all the other parts. We’re going to try vegetarian sushi night - also fully expecting her to just try the finished product but be supper happy with all the ingredients. Will use all the leftover veggies for tacos tomorrow (she could
Eat her bodyweight in homemade tortillas) and soba bowls the next night.

I really appreciate everyone’s suggestions - some of this stuff looks amazing! I’ll try to respond to specific posts a little later, but I just wanted everyone to know I’m carefully following the thread and appreciate each post and suggestion. If anything, I’m finding tithing I may also like later - I had been a vegetarian for years and got off the wagon so to speak after relocating and having a family. These ideas and suggestions all look so delicious and I think this month is going to fly by. Mostly, DD is still super excited. She may be over it in a week, or a month, but I like that she’s willing to try it.

Another good idea is empanadas. We like mushroom empanadas or bean and cheese or roasted corn and cheese.

Costco has good spinach and cheese frozen ravioli that we eat with chopped grape tomatos and olive oil.

My kids also like fried rice. I use the precooked brown rice from TJ. I sautee chopped carrots and the white part of scallions in a mix of olive oil and sesame oil with a dive of frozen ginger and chopped garlic. When that’s cooked I add the rice. At the last minute I add a bunch of frozen peas. I make an egg omelette in a separate pan, slice that. Take off heat and mix in the omelette, chopped scallions. Serve at table with soy sauce, chopped peanuts, and sriracha sauce.

They also like mini quiche (use a silicon mini muffin pan to punch them out). I use pillsbury dough and a wine glass to cut it to save time.

If your daughter likes lentils. Another quick and easy meal is using Trader’s Joes premade lentils (generally found in the salad area near the premade beets). I use it as a base for a number of salads. Cut up last nights roasted veggies, add in small cubes of your favorite cheese, if they like avocado and whatever spices you like. My go to is some olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Sometimes, I just put it on toast and other veggies on the side.

I could easily be mostly vegetarian and make lots of meatless dishes. My 11 year old will eat most of them. I make a very bastardized version of mujadarrah - onions, canned lentils seasoned with cumin and garlic and salt, put on a quinoa/brown rice mix with chopped cucumber and tomato . She loves that one. I also make “ratatouille” which is what I call a big mix of chopped fresh veggies (zucchini, squash, okra, mushrooms, eggplant- whatever I have) with some stewed tomatoes that I serve warm over farro with a fried egg on top.

For an easy quick meal, my kids like the spinach tortellini fresh pasta from Trader Joe’s - they sprinkle shredded cheddar on it. I cut up a cute and carrots and some fruit and call it a dinner. They also drink milk.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids like honey sesame spaghetti, which I make with wheat pasta to add protein and fiber, and one will eat edamame tossed in.

Do you have a recipe?

My vegetarian kinda picky kid will eat edamame.

Here it is - adapt as works for your kid:

16 oz package spaghetti (I use whole wheat)
2 cups frozen shelled edamame
1/4 cup canola oil
1/3 c sesame oil
5 T honey
4 T reduced sodium soy sauce
2 T sesame seeds
2 scallions, optional
1/4-1/2 t crushed red pepper flakes, optional

Cook the pasta, add frozen edamame for last 5 minutes, then drain both.

Heat the oils with the red pepper flakes, if using, in microwave for about 1 min. Stir in honey and soy sauce, toss the mixture with the hot drained pasta/edamame.

Toss in sliced scallions and sesame seeds. Serve warm or chilled.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Restricting a child's diet in an unhealthy way. What could go wrong?

How is her diet being restricted in an unhealthy way? You realize that millions children all over the world are vegetarian for various reasons

Many children eat mud soup also. Unbalanced diet is unhealthy. It isn't hard to figure out.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Restricting a child's diet in an unhealthy way. What could go wrong?

Eating meat in unhealthy. Being vegetarian is totally healthy if you eat the right foods and nof just chips and chocolate milk.

Ok Jan.

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hot news item: being vegetarian is not unhealthy. In fact, it’s the opposite.

Stop with your meat obsession. Almost no culture ate as much meat as Americans do now, so the kid will survive a vegetarian month.

They also don't completely avoid it either with some exceptions.

Not PP, but do you know any other cultures other than white bread (bred) Americans. Yes, some (actually a huge number of people) completely avoid it.

China, Africa, India all eat meat. Vegatarianism is only realistic for moderately high living standards. To be blunt, if you are poor, you eat what you can get.

Before you tell me India are vegetarians, https://www.dataforindia.com/meat-consumption/

Historically meat was a luxury item. The daily consumption of meat was limited to the ultra wealthy. That's how ordinary Americans are getting the diseases of the historically rich, like gout.

I'm not even a vegetarian but the constant need to eat meat is extremely weird.

Gout is a genetic issue, not really a diet one. If one has a genetic predisposition for it, then they have to adjust their diet, similar as how diabetics have to adjust their intake of carbs.

American Indians (the plains tribes such as the Sioux, Arapaho, etc.) all ate around 3-5lbs of meat a day, and became the healthiest and tallest people in the world in the 1700s-late 1800s, until smallpox and the US government killed them off.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hot news item: being vegetarian is not unhealthy. In fact, it’s the opposite.

Stop with your meat obsession. Almost no culture ate as much meat as Americans do now, so the kid will survive a vegetarian month.

They also do workn't completely avoid it either with some exceptions.

Not PP, but do you know any other cultures other than white bread (bred) Americans. Yes, some (actually a huge number of people) completely avoid it.

China, Africa, India all eat meat. Vegatarianism is only realistic for moderately high living standards. To be blunt, if you are poor, you eat what you can get.

Before you tell me India are vegetarians, https://www.dataforindia.com/meat-consumption/

Historically meat was a luxury item. The daily consumption of meat was limited to the ultra wealthy. That's how ordinary Americans are getting the diseases of the historically rich, like gout.

I'm not even a vegetarian but the constant need to eat meat is extremely weird.

Good meat is a luxury item. Meat is energy dense and excellent source of protein. It makes no sense to starve workers.

https://neutralhistory.com/the-surprisingly-good-diet-of-medieval-peasants-breakfast-lunch-dinner/

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many chemicals in fake meat!

So many chemicals in car exhaust, cleaning chemicals, and modern life!! Have you seen the breakdown of chemicals in an apple?! Do you know what goes into making your clothes, the paint in your house, any medication? Or hey, since we’re after it, regular meat? Or the waste waters from making that meat? Or pesticides on the vegetables…. Or…

My kid has a liver and kidneys. She’ll survive a month if I add in some fake meat that she enjoys. Kinda wondering what your point is as I can. Read and it’s not what I asked.

Nobody is eating car fumes and cleaning chemicals Janice. Also why would you clean with chemicals? Or buy beef that’s not local and grass fed without any growth hormones and antibiotics? Maybe the problem here is you don’t know how to shop. Stop feeding your children garbage! Learn to clean too!

As a chemistry major I would love to know how you manage to clean without "chemicals", given water is a "chemical".

All chemistry majors take everything literal or you just autistic?

Nope, just pointing out pearl clutching about things containing "chemicals" makes you sound like an idiot. Like that "clean food" blogger who freaked out about nitrogen in the air on airplanes.

Only on the cheaper airlines.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many chemicals in fake meat!

So many chemicals in car exhaust, cleaning chemicals, and modern life!! Have you seen the breakdown of chemicals in an apple?! Do you know what goes into making your clothes, the paint in your house, any medication? Or hey, since we’re after it, regular meat? Or the waste waters from making that meat? Or pesticides on the vegetables…. Or…

My kid has a liver and kidneys. She’ll survive a month if I add in some fake meat that she enjoys. Kinda wondering what your point is as I can. Read and it’s not what I asked.

Nobody is eating car fumes and cleaning chemicals Janice. Also why would you clean with chemicals? Or buy beef that’s not local and grass fed without any growth hormones and antibiotics? Maybe the problem here is you don’t know how to shop. Stop feeding your children garbage! Learn to clean too!

As a chemistry major I would love to know how you manage to clean without "chemicals", given water is a "chemical".

Thank you for getting my point, PP. I trust people would be horrified by the SDS of an apple if there was one. Ascorbic acid? Malic acid?! Let’s not forget fructose and sucrose!! The horrors!

Anonymous wrote:Make sure she understands that eating candy and sweets and white bagels and sugar yogurt are worse for her health than fish or chicken, by a lot.

Ok? Where did I say that she eats any of those things? And who said fish and chicken are bad for health?

Good grief, can many of be a moderate human being even sometimes? She is concerned with animal health. She has friends who are vegetarian due to culture. She knows I was vegan for a long time. She’s curious and there is absolutely no reason not to.

It’s a month. I’m not giving her fentanyl every day for the next month - we are simply abstaining from meat, which is a wholly healthy diet even by dieticians and nutritionists the world over.

Stay trolly, DCUM creepers. You never fail to confuse and impress with the depths of your darkness.