Exploring Vegetarian:
 

Hey all! :)
So I stopped eating meat about a month ago, and realized that I felt better, I could get through my day without caffeine, and I, in turn, started eating better (cheeseburger no longer being 1st on my list at Wendy's..)

I bought the Vegetarian For Dummies book--and am enjoying finding out more about what it is I'm getting myself into :) I guess I'm a lacto-ovo vegetarian...since, essentially, I'm just cutting the meat.

For future reference: I have mild lactose intolerance, so like.. I can eat a little cheese throughout the day, but if I drank a glass of milk, or ate a cup of yogurt, I'd be out sick!!

A couple questions though:
1. During TOM, I felt really tired and irritable, and I thought it was probably because I wasn't getting the same amounts of iron that I would have normally supplemented with beef. Are there foods (particularly fruits) that counterbalance this?

2. Are there any good items to ask for, that's not grilled cheese and salad, at places like Diners? I work at a casino part time, and they only have meat laden diner food... And it was tiresome enough when I ate chicken and turkey..

I guess that's it for now.. the first question is the more important one to me..

Thanks for all of your help!!

Originally Posted by weegreenlassie:

1. During TOM, I felt really tired and irritable, and I thought it was probably because I wasn't getting the same amounts of iron that I would have normally supplemented with beef. Are there foods (particularly fruits) that counterbalance this?

First, hello and welcome to the wonderful world of meatfree eating! :)

I've struggled with iron at various times myself. Raisins, dried apricots, and figs are great (fruit) sources of iron. 1 cup of dry lentils (not that you'll necessarily eat that many at once) has 80% of your daily iron needs. Other beans are also a good source of iron. 1 cup of uncooked quinoa (a wonderful little grain) has about 40% of your daily iron needs--and 24 grams of protein on top of it! Blackstrap molasses is also a good source of iron.

You can find iron in the most wonderful places. A cup of sun-dried tomatoes, for example, contains about 27% of your daily requirement.

I try to have at least one of the higher iron dried fruits with my breakfast (along with an iron-supplemented hemp milk, molasses, and oatmeal) and beans or lentils with either lunch or dinner. Vitamin C helps with processing iron, so I make sure to get plenty of that throughout the day as well. I also found out that a component of black tea interferes with the absorption of iron, so I cut back on my tea consumption. :(

Good luck!

Here is a good website on iron.
http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/iron.htm

There are a lot of iron enriched foods and some foods, although high in iron, need to be eaten with vitamin c in order to make iron more bioavailable, spinach is a good example of this.

Also, I'd recommend a cast iron skillet. It can put iron into the foods you cook into it.

For your job, are you able to take something to work with you? Restaurants that aren't veg friendly can be difficult to navigate and you'd have to inspect the menu to see what is there. Does the diner have breakfast like items? Oatmeal? Fruit?

It is not unusual for me to look at a restaurant menu and say there is basically nothing for me to eat.

The beginning of an anti-meat lifestyle is the hardest. I know I was sooooo frustrated everywhere I went. And I think it was because I didn't know how to live as a vegetarian (now vegan) But the longer you do it, and the more you research, and learn, the easier and more enjoyable it will become. Like, now, I know exactly what I can eat at any given restaurant, I know which ones I cannot eat at, I even know which gas stations on any given route to anywhere I go have some form of vegan snack. Now, I couldn't imagine my life consuming animal products. So no matter how frustrated you get as you learn to live vegetarian, remember that after while, it'll just be how you live your life, and you won't even remember that it was ever a hassle. :D

So anyway, thank you thank you for giving up meat. The more people not consuming it the better in my eyes!

hi there--

it's been a little over a year since i have ate meat and as someone who has always been low on the energy scale, i just feel better by taking a daily vitamin. there are some who get all the vitamins and minerals needed from food alone, i have tried and for now, while i am still learning the ropes, the daily vitamin stays. of course when i transitioned, i also had to switch vitamins as most contain gelatin which is made from animals. eck. i take solgar vegetarian friendly vitamins http://www.solgar.com/Products___Vegetarian.aspx

my supplement has iron, iodine, vitamin A from beta carotene, and b12 all of which us veg*ns need to watch for. they also make a shellfish free glucosamine. great products:)


as for as menu choices, everything but meat poultry and fish is allowed which leaves room for all sorts of stuff. veggies? beans? not too sure what the diner has to offer, but not eating meat only leaves off a few things. do they have breakfast food 24 hours? this is always an option as well.

(i'm always a little dumbfounded when i get "oh my god, what do you eat?!?" after telling someone i am vegetarian....ummm...everything but like three things, dude).


good luck. so glad you've made this step and the animals are too:)

p.s. no caffeine?!?!

Awesome help! Thank you all so much for everything!
Yeah-- I'm very excited with the changes, and the dropping weight is just a nice little side-bonus :)

I ordered a salad and grilled cheese from the Casino (only 4 more days of working there! yes!), and I tasted a STRONG beef flavor... It was SO weird! So I harped on them about not cleaning the grill often enough.. lol and my salad had ham on it.. (gee thanks)

I suppose if I'm one of THOUSANDS that come into that silly place everyday, they're not going to listen to me. And if I'm only there for 4 more days (working once a week for the next month), they're not going to listen anyways. I'm grateful to say that I have a new job working with Kids-- and there is a starbucks, and a whole-foods restaurant within walking distance :)

Ollie: Yeah!! No caffeine! It's so nice!! If I drink coke, or coffee now, I get SUPER jittery and feel sick later... so I'm on water, juice, and tea now :) I used to down a 2-liter of diet coke in a day.. (and I even thought it was gross while I was doing it..)

And, Betsy, Thank you so much for that fantastic list! I'm going to try those this month, and hopefully I won't have such adverse affects from TOM...

I'm definitely taking things slow-- figuring out "not eating meat"-- which has been really easy :) Not eating eggs or milk, though, would be an extreme change for me (and my poor boyfriend who is a ~meatloaf and potatoes~ kind of guy). I sincerely admire vegans-- you really have to have an extreme sense of self before committing to such a lifestyle :) Congrats on that, Dara :)

Oh! And Nellie-- really?? cooking in a cast-iron skillet infuses your food with iron? ...So would that mean that cooking in aluminum or titanium pans infuses your foods with THAT...????

Actually with aluminum definitely, that is one reason they recommend not cooking acidic items in aluminum cookware (tomatoes and such). I've switched to either cast iron or stainless steel cookware. (No aluminum, no nonstick)

Originally Posted by weegreenlassie:
2. Are there any good items to ask for, that's not grilled cheese and salad, at places like Diners?

I know that different diners have different foods, but at diners by me there's a bunch of stuff that vegetarians can eat - eggplant, spinach & roasted pepper wraps, spaghetti and marinara sauce, salads & soups (and salad bars) omelets, pancakes, bagels, fettuccine alfredo, fruit, etc. You can pretty much order anything as long as there's no meat in it and if there is, you can ask for it without it.

As for the iron issue, I take a multivitamin with an iron supplement. I also take a B-12 vitamin as well to make sure that I'm getting enough nutrients. I recently donated blood and my hemoglobin levels were perfect, so I must be doing something right. :)

You can also get iron in soy milk, raisin bran cereal, oatmeal, spaghetti, chick peas (and other beans), tofu, broccoli, spinach (really any green, leafy vegetables) - just to give you a bit of an idea but if you do a search on google ("iron rich vegetarian foods") you can find a bunch of information :)

Awesome :) Thanks so much for this great advice!
Most everything is making sense, and clarifying these things up has helped greatly!!

With the disclaimer that I am NOT veggie ... but my college roommate was veggie and I ate veggie for many years at home ...! I have always been the cook, so when my roommate went veggie, I learned to cook a lot of veggie dishes.

Dark leafy greens are a great source of iron. Spinach. Kale. Greens.

Also what Nelie said about cast iron is true. My favorite cooking pan is my huge cast iron skillet that I got from my Southern g'ma. Except whereas she cooked fried chicken and gravy in it (*grin*) I cook greens, stir fry, and other yummy healthy things.

Be careful with supplements as getting too much iron might cause you to become constipated. Not fun, take it from me! :)

Congrats on doing so well with your lifestyle choice ... while I will never be entirely veggie, I have a great deal of respect for those who make the decision and are able to stick with it.

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