Vegetarian meal help-ideas needed

Weekend Warrior

My wife's best friend (our Maid of Honor) will be dropping in this evening for an overnight as a pit stop on a business trip. She is a strict vegetarian; I once watched her pick every miniscule piece of bacon out of a serving of my baked beans. I have cooked for her before but am looking for ideas. My ideas so far are veggie pizza, seafood pizza and shrimp stir fry.(I have a wok) I would appreciate all your Veg-egg-able ideas as well.

Thanks, Mark

fishlessman

i dont have the recipe, but i had a deepfried salad this weekend that any meat eater could eat. brocolli and cauliflower dipped in a milk/egg wash then rolled in parmesian cheese and deepfried til the cheese was golden, laid on a bed of spinach leaves with a good drizzle of a lemon dressing. wish i could give you more as it was an incredible salad

AZRP

How about some green chili and cheese enchiladas? -RP

fishlessman

how come when you go to a vegatarians house they always serve you a vegatarian salad even though you eat meat and pretty much only meat. ive picked enough lettuce out of salads and discarded it on the side because it completely disrupts my system, nasua, headaches, almost to the point it feels like a bad case of food poisoning. not that i want a vegatarian cooking me a steak, but they should try as hard as a meat eater serving veggies to make them happy.

Chef Charles

My nephew visited us a month ago and he is vegetarian. I went with vegetarian pizza the first night and then did up a vegetarian meatloaf the second night based on a recipe I found on Recipezaar (see below). I made a few modifications to the recipe -- cooked the lentils in vegetable stock and I topped the loaf with a BBQ sauce. I cooked the loaf indirect using some cherry wood with 375 dome temperature. Everyone seemed to be happy with the end result.

Really Good Vegetarian Meatloaf (really!)
Recipe #33921

By: SaraFish
Jul 11, 2002

High in fiber and protein, low in fat, easy and really yummy! I've always think meatloaf looks and smells so delicious and savory so, as a vegetarian, I decided to make a no-meat version! This is basically our favorite meatloaf recipe but with cooked mashed lentils instead of ground meat. The result is a very tasty dinner!
SERVES 4 -6 (change servings and units)

Ingredients
2 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup lentils
1 small onion, diced
1 cup quick-cooking oat
3/4 cup grated cheese (cheddar, swiss, jack or american)
1 egg, beaten
4 1/2 ounces spaghetti sauce or tomato sauce
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1/2 teaspoon seasoning salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
Directions

1 Add salt to water and boil in a saucepan.

2 Add lentils and simmer covered 25-30 minutes, until lentils are soft and most of water is evaporated.

3 Remove from fire.

4 Drain and partially mash lentils.

5 Scrape into mixing bowl and allow to cool slightly.

6 Stir in onion, oats and cheese until mixed.

7 Add egg, tomato sauce, garlic, basil, parsley, seasoning salt and pepper.

8 Mix well.

9 Spoon into loaf pan that has been generously sprayed with Pam (non-stick cooking spray) or well-greased.

10 Smooth top with back of spoon.

11 Bake at 350 degrees for 30- 45 minutes until top of loaf is dry, firm and golden brown.

12 Cool in pan on rack for about 10 minutes.

13 Run a sharp knife around edges of pan then turn out loaf onto serving platter.

gdenby

If she is a strict vegetarian, she won't eat shrimp, altho since she ate beans that had been cooked with bacon means she's not fanatic. If she is a vegan, cheese is out also. If she is an ovo-lactarian, cheese, milk, eggs are O.K. So, (sigh) you'll need to find out how narrow your choices are.

My ovo-lactarian daughter is happy with pesto topped grilled portobellos. A reasonable substitute for pesto might be a drizzle of Italian dressing, some pine nuts and a few slices of pepproncini. Even non-vegetarians like that.

Grilled seitan coated with teriyaki is edible too.

Weekend Warrior

Haha! You're absolutely right. I once made the Red Lobster crab-stuffed-mushrooms recipe which are a bunch of work only to find out she didn't like mushrooms either!

Weekend Warrior

She will eat fish and seafood. Thanks for all the ideas. Keep them coming. You're guys are terrific. I'd really like to wok something for her to show off the Egg's versatility. She has eaten things I've prepared on it before and I'm trying to convince her that she and her husband need an EGG!

Old Salt

Try a vegetarian lasagna. We are definately not vegans but my wife makes it once in awhile. It is very good.

Jeffersonian

Let me second grilled portobellos. I do those now and then as "burgers" and I'm nowhere near vegetarian. They're just good eatin'.

Little Steven

WW,

If she will eat seafood, why don't you try a paella and use the vegan hot sausage instead of the chorizo?
Stuffed bell peppers work with the vegan "ground beef".
Rissoto is always good too.

Steve

jonboy

grilled portebellos with montreal (steak) seasoning
grilled romaine/aruba
grilled pineapple w/cinnamon,brown sugar and rum
jon

emilluca

Just saw today and It could be done in a CI pot
http://food.yahoo.com/recipes/eatingwell/1021/squash-chickpea-and-red-lentil-stew
Great amount of protein.

fishlessman

ive done shark and pineapple kabobs that were real good but i just winged the recipe for a marinade. i think your doomed anyways with this one, maybe look up tuna and pineapple kabobs, i would cook them separatly with all tuna on a couple and all pineapple on a couple then maybe a few pepper onion tomato kabobs. there are some recipes on the web with lime pineapple marinades which is good, but dont marinade them as long as most call for, keep the marinade times under an hour.

Weekend Warrior

Thanks for all your help. I "think" I've settled on a shrimp stir-fry that will have a lot of color in the wok and that we will all like. I'll just need to go pick up some snow peas after work. I think I have everything else at home. Thanks for all of the suggestions!

FlaPoolman

Have to jump on the portobellos band wagon. Wife loves them and can be topped with just about anything.

Weekend Warrior

Thanks, but she doesn't like mushrooms. I've settled on a shrimp stir-fry in the wok. Thanks for all of the replies. You guys are the best. Mark

Fidel

vegetarian meatloaf

Huh? :blink:

stike

"strict vegetarian" that eats fish?

i never can keep it straight. some eat no red meat for dietary reasons, sometimes it's that they don't eat anything living, for ethical reasons.... i always get confused.

had a co-worker say that she never ate anything that was alive. i asked about veggies and she clarified. nothing that has consciousness. a while later, i sent her an article about a scientist that discovered quaking aspens could communicate chemically through their singular root system. and it was found that some plants under stress from insects or while being physically damaged would send out chemical signals to other nearby plants of the same species as a warning of sorts. the scientist said essentially, they are communicating with each other.

i don't know if she gave up on veggies too, or just adopted the same sliding scale most of us have

Weekend Warrior

Haha! You got that sh*t right. I guess I should have been more specific. She won't eat animals, but she probably eats stuff made with by-products of animals and she does eat fish and seafood, and she doesn't like mushrooms. Luckily, I only have to deal with her a couple times a year! :laugh:

stike

i recall a friend of ours who was a vegetarian. then she got pregnant, and her craving was for steak. she laughs about it to this day. still eats steak, too.

civil eggineer

Make better friends that are meat eaters. I guess the less she eats the more meat for me. I will not shrug my responsibilities and will attempt to eat every living animal in her honor.

YB

This recipe from Nature Boy is GREAT.
Larry

http://www.eggheadforum.com/index.php?option=com_simpleboard&Itemid=112&catid=1&func=view&year=2002&number=24719

Charleston Dave

How about an assortment of skewers?

I have had success cooking for mixed groups of meat-eaters and non-meat-eaters by preparing kebabs. Make enough beef or chicken or shrimp skewers for the carnivores, and enough zucchini/tomato/onion vegetarian skewers for the vegetarians. EVOO and your favorite rub to season everything. A nice raita-style dipping sauce makes everybody happy. And the leftovers, if there are any, can be reheated easily enough for tomorrow's lunch or put into an over-the-top killer salad.

It's a simple way to keep everybody happy without making a fuss or pressuring people to eat what they don't like. People like to pick and choose sometimes, and this is a way to prepare a variety of food in scalable quantities with just one setup and cooking method.

What's especially cool is that you won't feel aggrieved that you went to a lot of extra trouble, yet they will feel like you did something special for them. It's magic!

Actually, the skewered veggies are tasty enough that most of the meat-lovers will grab one to go with their rods o' beef.

The Ohio State Buckeye BBQ Guy

I've got numerous friends that are weed-eaters. My solution is simple, I throw a bag of chips at them and save the BGE for the meat!

Jersey Doug

Our neighbors have a "vegetarian" daughter-in-law who eats chicken.

When we know some our guests are vegetarians (of any sort) we include carbohydrates, legumes and vegetables prepared with no animal products in the menu and make whatever we want for ourselves. An example would be something like brown rice, spicy beans and a veggie salad for everyone - and some sort of beef on the BGE for us. We've tried seafood (and chicken) in the past only to find that the "vegetarians" aren't strict and they eat our dinner. Beef, especially rare beef, is a pretty safe bet in that respect.