I tried the Fat Smash diet which in the 1st phase is detox where you can not have any meat at all. You are allowed low fat milk which I can't stand. But being on the FS diet for 9 days I have really enjoyed not eating meat. I tried Atkins a while back and I could not do all the meat. I felt heavy and gross. I think I really might like this way of eating. However, a friend of mine is a strict vegetarian and all she eats is junk. Does being a vegetarian leave you with so many choices that it could be unhealthy? I don't need to gain anymore weight!!!!! Another question, will this way of eating help me lose weight?

I got totally off the subject!!! Do you find yourself making separate meals for your family like I do? My husband will not eat anything green or healthy and he is as fit as a fiddle!!! Makes me sick.

I think the people who eat junk food either don't' know what to eat or they link junk.

If you focus on whole foods, you can definitely eat a healthy vegetarian diet. Eat to Live is a pretty good plan that you can easily modify. Eating lots of beans/legumes, veggies, fruits and whole grains will provide you with a healthy diet.

Eating vegetarian doesn't mean eating chips and other non-meat items. I have many friends who are vegetarian and they eat very well- AND I have another friend who is vegetarian who is morbidly obese- while he doesn't eat meat he can sure pack in everything else! I think he eats too much junk which is why he is so overweight.

I'm vegetarian, and my husband is not, which means I often end up, if not cooking two meals, cooking one big, vegetarian dish, and some meat separately for him. He's pretty amenable to eating a lot of the vegetarian stuff I cook (I lean towards spicy Asian dishes and curries, where the lack of meat often isn't a big deal to omnivores) but he's not willing to give meat up entirely, and I'm not willing to eat it, so it often works out that I'm effectively cooking two meals. I wish things were different, but in all, I don't find it a particularly onerous burden.

I agree with Nelie that you should read Eat to Live. It can be modified to work for you, and is a good guideline for veg weight loss.

I don't cook 2 meals every night. I used to, and it became too much of a hassle. So I told DH if he doesn't want what I'm cooking, he's welcome to cook his own dinner. If he ever really craves meat at home, he can purchase it and prepare it, I'll keep an eye on it on the grill/stove or in the oven. It's only happened once in the last few years though, we had some family over for a cookout and he wanted to make some beef burgers. Every other night, he eats what I eat. I call him on my way home and give him the options for dinner, he chooses what sounds good to him, and I cook it. He does sometimes add cheese to things I cook, but only after it's on his plate.

And I posted before I saw your second post about seperate meals!

When I first went vegan, I told my husband that I'd cook meat for him, he used to love fish but then he told me that I didn't have to do that. He would eat meat sometimes when we were eating out but he went vegan a few months after me. I've heard stories from vegans where their husbands/partners/etc will cook meat themselves or such.

As for me, even though my husband and I both eat a vegan diet, we eat slightly different as he has a high metabolism and really can't afford to lose weight so I bulk up his meals/make him things I wouldn't otherwise eat as well as the foods we both we eat. So basically we both eat a lot of the same things but he eats additional items.

My son is a meat eater. He eats what we eat, and sometimes he adds on meat of his own, sometimes not. If you don't cook the rest of your meals with meat broth, it's easy to feed the whole plate to you and your meat eater, and just cook a single skillet/baking pan with a portion of meat in it as an add-on. Also, meat is not really necessary 3x a day - so maybe your husband doesn't mind not eating meat at dinner if he's eating it at lunch/breakfast? My son only eats meat a few times a week, but he likes cooking his own because he can eat weird combinations/mix up spices that I wouldn't have cooked for myself.

One thing for sure is that when we gave up meat, my whole family explored vegetables, grains and legumes like never before, and we found new ways of cooking that we hadn't tried - new flavors, like Middle Eastern and African spices, and grains we had never tried before, like millet and quinoa. Your husband may learn to like vegetables after all.

I usually don't cook separate meals. I plan my meals around the vegetables and then add in the meat for those that wish it. Of course there are times when their main meal is meat-centered an therefore 2 meals.