My lil man turns 12 on Sunday! In our house it's tradition for the birthday-person to choose whatever they want for the meals for the day... and my son LOVES this part since he tends to think I don't serve meat often enough. So I sat down to write out our "menu" for the next couple weeks and asked him what he wanted for his birthday... and this is what he said. For breakfast he wants "our" pancakes. (made from scratch & vegan) And for lunch HE wants to make Macaroni & Cheese (again, made from scratch - but with real cheese) and fresh kiwis for the family... not a big shock here, this is his all-time favorite meal & he's become quite proud of his ability in the kitchen. But for dinner he said "Mama, since Grandmom is coming over here for dinner... let's have that dish with the brain-beans (garbanzos) and mashed potatoes on top with fresh apples so she HAS to try a vegan food!" It took me awhile to realize he was talking about my shepherd's pie recipe. MY lil guy is gonna have a vegetarian birthday... by CHOICE! AND he's using his one-meal-a-year to show his grandmother that vegetarian dishes taste good! Dessert of course will be chocolate cupcakes - also vegan I am SO shocked... no clue if this is a one-time thing or a slow shift for him, but YAY! love, mom
Aw thats awesome! Happy birthday to him I've heard it really helps kids enjoy the food in the house if you let them choose what they eat, so thats good that you did that!
Happy birthday! There is one great point here - kids chose to be vegetarian, they are not forced to it! And I like it so much!
Just a quick update. My mom is diabetic & needs to "carb-count." So she knew ahead of time that the shepherd's pie would be vegan. After dinner last night she sat back with her cup of tea & admitted, "I was pretty unsure about how a meatless pie would be. But that was surprisingly good!" Dad LOVED it! He sat there dissecting it & guessing at the spices I'd used. Baby sis said it was "Okay" too love, mom
And I said "Not ever" as in NEVER! He has allergies that prevent him from going. And he believes in only putting healthy food into his body - and doesn't feel that heat-lamp treated mass-produced meals count as "healthy."
Yay, but any way, everybody have got his ,,right time" in the different time. Until my 16´s I was a big carnivore and as a child i ate a bones from home garbage iggy: But in the age of 16 the illumination found also my soul ;-)) But it´s great that a young kids are so sensitized.
a big mac is not living...a big mac is the worst kind of suicide and way to go mama on throwing a great birthday! Happy birthday to you little one.
Get out. stupid troll ¬_¬ And heh that's awesome about the little dude, once you lay the options out to kids they'll usually make the right decision it's just most people seem to "force" their kids into doing what they did, which is fair enough i suppose if they think it's suitable.
Oh, sure I started with a recipe from VegSource & changed out the spices... the original is still there if you want to see, but when I copy the link it just shows "vegsource.com/recipe." It's the one labelled "Garbanzo Shepherd's Pie!" I doubled it to make enough for 10... the next time I'll use half as much of everything & add in a Tbsp. of vegan bouillon... I don't say this often, but this REALLY needed a lil salt! Here's what we did: 2 medium onions, chopped 1/2 lb mushrooms, chopped 1/2 cup water 4 large carrots, chopped 3 stalks celery, chopped 2 Tbsp. cornstarch 4 cups soymilk 2 Tbsp. soy sauce 4 cloves garlic, minced 2 tsp. savory 2 tsp. sage 1 tsp. paprika 2 cans garbanzo beans – drained 1 1-lb bag frozen peas mashed potatoes – about 6 potatoes-worth, premade Cook the onions & mushrooms in ½ cup water while chopping the other veggies up. Add in the carrots & celery, and let simmer another 10 minutes, stirring frequently. In a separate pot, whisk the cornstarch into the soymilk & then add the soy sauce & spices, and cook until it thickens – stirring constantly. Preheat the oven to 325F. In a large baking dish, layer the garbanzo beans, the peas & then the carrot-mixture. Pour the sauce over everything & then top with mashed potatoes, spreading them to cover the entire top. Bake for 1 hour & serve hot.
