Meatless Monday: Or getting inspired by my friends to try different foods

A good friend of mine from high school is a vegan chef (check out Katie's fantastic website with recipes and videos here: http://www.plantbasedhealth.com/) and she has long been an inspiration to me on the culinary front. She works hard to create and tweak recipes to ease folks into a healthy lifestyle and she is so very enthusiastic and passionate about her work. Recently another good friend from high school has set out upon a vegan path - primarily to improve her family's eating habits and health - and has experienced a lot of success. You can follow their journey here: http://www.chaneylife.blogspot.com/.

And yet another good friend from high school (I'm thinking the Caddo Magnet High connection is meaningful here, no?) is participating in the Daniel Fast for Lent. I'd never heard of it before so I did some research after she mentioned it: http://daniel-fast.com/. Essentially, it's a stricter version of a vegan diet based on scripture that requires some serious dedication and thoughtfulness on the part of the participant. I am so proud of them all! We all grew up eating "traditional" southern foods cooked by our parents and grandparents - often fried or covered with gravy or both, so I figure if they can make some lifestyle changes, so can I!

I live in household made up of some non-veggie eaters (for the most part), so the process might be slow going but... I figure better late than never. I doubt we'll ever go vegan, but eating vegetarian meals a few nights a week would be revolutionary for us right now! I gave up red meat, fried foods, and soft drinks for Lent, so why not take the next step?

Anyway, I'm going to start with Meatless Mondays and go from there. I've already been doing at least one slow cooker meal a week, so maybe that one can be vegetarian as well. Lucy helped me make some delicious banana bread this afternoon (we subbed applesauce for butter and used whole wheat flour and egg substitute to make it a bit healthier) and for supper we're having Bean Burgers and sweet potato fries. Here's the recipe: http://www.parents.com/recipe/vegetables/bean-burgers/.

I think they might be better with black beans and I'd probably add some corn next time too, but overall a good start! I'd love to hear about your best vegetarian and vegan recipes that the meat eaters in your family (especially the kids) love to eat. Wish us luck on our new adventure!