Foooooooooddddd!!

I was told that this is a fantastic restaurant that we should check out. http://www.crystalsunflower.com/

Also, here a few Tofu recipes my co-worker swears by:

"pan seared tofu:
pan sear quarter inch thick slices of firm tofu in olive oil on medium high heat until browned and crispy on both sides. This is your foundation for many firm tofu recipes. If you season with just salt and pepper it works great with a side of vegetables as diet food. You can also top with curries or sauces. You can also prepare tofu this way and use as a meat substitute in pretty much any recipe.

Soy sauce (firm or soft) tofu topping: 4 TBSP light soy sauce, 1 tsp sesame oil, pinch sugar, minced scallions, red pepper flakes (I'm not sure about the measurements but any variation of this is good. You can also do a half and half mixture of soysauce and vinegar with a pinch of sugar and use as a dipping sauce for the pan seared tofu) You can aslo add minced garlic to the soy-sesame sauce, top and layer the seared tofu in a baking seet and bake until garlic is cooked and serve tofu with brown rice and steamed broccoli.

Silken tofu salad:

dice into cubes, let sit in collander for 30 minutes so some of the water drains out. Place in mixing bowl, add jullienned English cucumber, thinly sliced cabbage or lettuce (really thin), alfalfa sprouts, thin slices yellow bell pepper (you can whatever veg but make sure it's mild)

In a mortar crush 2 TBSP of roasted sesame seeds (or maybe just 1) with a TBSP of pinenuts or almonds but pinenuts are better. Transfer that to a small bowl, add equa amounts of light soy, vinegar or rice vinegar and olive oil, pinch sugar to taste and pour over tofu salad just before serving. If you don't drain out the water from the tofu, you will get gross watered down salad. Don't mess this up if u make it..it's my special recipe.

hot spinach and sesame salad:
Take firm tofu and boil it until heated through. put in cheese cloth and mush while draining 75% of the liquid. With this you don't want the tofu too dry but if there's excess moisture it will turn out gross. I think the consistency should be slightlydrier than cottage cheese. boil or sautee spinach and drain/squeeze out all liquid. toss in mixing bowl together, add course salt to taste and sesame oil to taste. I like to serve this with baked salmon and steamed veg or brown rice or just eat by itself for lunch...this is soooo good. "

It appears that we're going to be doing ALOT of real cooking this month. So much for the Foreman. :)

What's the Plan: The Difference Between Vegan & Vegetarian

I found this interesting article that answers some age-old questions.

If you recently started reading about vegetarian diets, you have probably read all sorts of strange vegetarian terms and categories like "vegan," "ovo-lacto vegetarian," and "semi-vegetarian." You probably wondered what the big deal was. Afterall, what is so conceptually tough about not eating meat?

And you were right!
The distinctions between these sub-categories of vegetarian are actually small, but each is very important to members who belong to the groups. For them, these distinctions aren’t arbitrary lines; they are important dietary or ethical decisions.

Let’s take a look at some of these groups:

VEGETARIAN:
Vegetarian is a blanket term used to describe a person who does not consume meat, poultry, fish, or seafood. This grouping includes vegans and the various sub- categories of vegetarian; however, it generally implies someone who has less dietary restrictions than a vegan.

SEMI-VEGETARIAN:
The term semi-vegetarian is usually used to describe someone who is a vegetarian who consumes dairy products, eggs, chicken, and fish, but does not consume other animal flesh.

OVO-LACTO-VEGETARIAN:
Ovo-lacto vegetarians are vegetarians who do not consume meat, poultry, fish, and seafood, but do consume eggs and milk. This is the largest group of vegetarians.

OVO-VEGETARIAN:
Ovo-vegetarian is a term used to describe someone who would be a vegan if they did not consume eggs.

LACTO-VEGETARIAN:
Lacto-vegetarian is a term used to describe someone who would be a vegan if they did not consume milk.

VEGAN:
Vegan is the strictest sub-category of vegetarians. Vegans do not consume any animal products or by-products. Some go as far as not even consuming honey and yeast. Others do not wear any clothing made from animal products.

Ok, so with that said I think we fall in the OVO-LACTO-VEGETARIAN category. Botton line is we are planning a vegetarian diet, without meat: chicken, beef, pork, shrimps, lobster, lamb, etc. Fish is optional, but should not be used as a crutch. If someone decides to bump fish off their list too, then cool....more power to ya! I might give the no-fish movement a try myself once we get started. Milk is also optional, I've been buying both Soy & Lactaid milk for the last couple months so the plan is to officially go Soy for these 30 days.

As far as EGGS! Man, I dunno..that's a tough one. I'll do the best I can with that one...cakes, pastries, fried, scrambled (with cheddar cheese :o), quick boiled eggs in the morning, ha the torture! Pray for me ya'll.

Diet & Exercise

Discussions have been introduced regarding a Work Out Plan to complement the diet plan:

On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 9:01 AM, Mark Nolan <goodspeed915@gmail.com> wrote:

Since being a vegetarian is a lifestyle I believe their are other things we should add to make this lifestyle become really effective. Exercise is the big one. You can change your diet but if you dont exercise will it really work because they do have some vegetarians
who are overweight as well. So since we have couple exercise GURU on board. Why not start out a exercise routine where we all can do something together or even separate. That being running , walking playing a spot just to be active as well. Just a suggestion. Dont know if that is cool with everyone or anyone. Lata

Shake & Bake wrote:

I agree that dietandexercise is one word. I feel everyone has different goals and intents as far as exercise goes. For instance, I am looking to maintain or put on mass. Jenine I know wants to stay at the same weight & tone up. Colleen is ready for American Gladiators...and Dre is just the perenial superstar athlete. So with that, I feel everyone can/should customize their own work out plan.

But we can still add comments suggestions on the blog. Which reminds me, I'll add this discussion to the site. If you want to make a comment directly go to: http://30meatfreedays.blogspot.com/

At the bottom click "Comments" and you can blog to your hearts content...

Shake & Bake

The 30 Day Veggie Diet...1 leaf at a time.

Wassup Family,

Let's do our 30 Day Vegetarian Diet officially. Are you down...

As long as I can remember eating solid foods I’ve been a meat eater. And I did not discriminate either. You name it: ground beef, chicken, salami, steak, turkey, chicken, sausage, hot dogs, chicken, lamb, fish...did I mention chicken!

The old excuse of 'eating good is too expensive' is still true to some extent. But the other side of the game can also hurt the pockets. So now I blame being busy, being ignorant about cooking tofu, blame the convenience of restaurants & supermarkets, etc. So now we'll try to focus that energy on something new. It would be hard to do this on our own, so it's good we have each other. Thanks Jenine for inspiring us to make this big move!

I'm not even quite sure what a vegetarian lifestyle means yet. So I created this the blog a few weeks ahead of time so we can get our game plan on. This way one of us doesn't get caught with a burger in Week II because we didn't research or plan meals properly. We'll need to start things like comparing nutrient sources. For instance, I like to eat the occasional medium-well dripping steak. So I'd like to know exactly how many greens I would need to eat to offset that protein source. I found this so far...

I encourage each of us to post commentary, ideas, suggestions, gripes, complaints, and random thoughts during this entire process. Post recipes, restaurants, snacks, tips, tricks, websites, books - anything and everything healthy and meatless.

Click to subscribe to daily updates, and let's challenge ourselves to put one foot in front of the other and see where it takes us 30 days from Sunday June 1. Be safe, happy, and most of all healthy.