posted 4 years ago
My husband has been "vegan until dinnertime" for about 8 years, and I've been doing it for a few months now...I also don't eat anything processed, make everything I eat from scratch, and now eat meat only raised by myself and not every day. I'm not sure I'm qualified to answer this question, my veganhood not being quite complete, but I'll tell you the number one thing that helped me when I decided on that lifestyle.
The thing that got me through the first few weeks--have several go-to meals, snacks, salads, etc. and make a lot ahead of time. I tend to gravitate toward legumes, greens, and other vitamin-dense veggies.
My husband loves this lentil stew I make, and I probably make it once a week in a big batch-- lentils, onions, carrots, cumin, curry powder, thyme, crushed tomatoes, vegetable stock. When it's done, I ladle it over spinach or some other greens. Variation-- kik alicha--yellow split peas, onions, carrots, coconut oil, vegetable stock, ginger, thyme, tumeric--another one we eat a lot, usually with greens. I also make a lot of chilis and curries for him--just have a good basic recipe for the base and start throwing in the veggies.
Also, I usually make a big batch of some kind of hash for the week--onions, roasted sweet potatoes or winter squash of some sort, black or pinto beans, greens, with paprika, cayenne, thyme--there are countless variations that I make. Soemtimes, I even eat this for dinner. Summertime--stuffed squash reigns in the house.
For the morning, I make a smoothie with lots of greens, frozen half banana, frozen fruit, honey. During a day I don't have the hash, I make one of my favorite salads, with whatever is in season or whatever I have in the pantry. I love avocado, hearts of palm, cucumber, and kalamata olives with dijon vinaigrette. In the summer, I eat giant bowlfuls of sliced cucumber, zucchini, red pepper, kalamata, avocado, red onion.
Snacks--I eat a lot of nuts, fruit, dried and fresh.
And I put pumpkin seeds on everything :)
"Nature is not a place to visit. It is home." --Gary Snyder