For the last week of April, Kenton and I decided to try eating a vegetarian diet. Why? Maybe because it’s the Great Lock Down and we have nothing better to do than experiment with our diet. Maybe also because we watched a documentary on the benefits of a plant-based diet. Maybe it’s been something we’ve been meaning to try for a while. Regardless, we tried it. It was tasty. We had a good time.
Now to put things in perspective, Kenton loves meat. Rarely does a season go by without him commenting “I don’t think I am getting enough protein. We should eat more meat.” So when he suggested we try this, I had no resistance to the idea of having a break from dealing with raw meat.
I had a few recipes I already knew I wanted to try, and easily found a few more. And let me tell you, we ate some good food that week. We had bean tacos and burritos, stir fry, curry, soup, and egg burritos. The meals were simple, tasty, all made on the stove top and as mentioned earlier, did not require the handling of raw meat - win!
So what did we take away from this experiment?
1) Vegetarian meals can be very tasty! I was happy that I was able to make some of my favourite foods and they tasted amazing, even without meat. We were not left wanting at the end of any meals.
2) Beans are cheap, filling and a great source of protein and fiber. We ate a lot of beans. At every lunch and dinner to be exact. Obviously, I could have tried a bit harder to add more variety, but I was pretty set on the recipes I wanted to make and they happened to all have beans/ chickpeas in them.
3) It seems beneficial to experiment. How will you know what you prefer or what works best for you (in your diet and in your life) unless you try new things? Plus, it’s good to push yourself outside your comfort zone sometimes. Who knows, you might just find yourself an awesome bean burrito recipe.
4) Meat tasted so good after that week. I’m just being honest. We had BBQ pork chops for our first meal after that challenge and they were heavenly. But then again, so were the bean burritos so who’s to say what’s better?
Don’t worry friends and family who feed us and like to be fed by us, we aren’t going vegetarian. We still think there is a place in a healthy, frugal diet for meat. But we might try to incorporate a few more vegetarian meals into our diet.
Maybe there is a challenge of some sort that you’ve been meaning to try. Here’s your encouragement to just go for it! In our experience of trying random challenges with both food and money, it’s usually not as hard as you think it will be and you usually gain something useful out of it.