Monthly Archives: March 2007

Vegetarian – A not-so-bad lifestyle

About two weeks ago I took the vegetarian challenge and began to reshape my fridge and kitchen to reflect the same (and I quit caffeine at the same time!). At first I thought I would still continue to eat fish, but after trying a few of the incredible dishes at www.peta.org (I hate Peta but they do have some amazing recipes there) I decided the only thing animal related I would continue to eat is some dairy. I must have cheese!

Some of the pro’s I’ve found are as follows:

- I feel better. A lot better. I fall asleep at night at a reasonable hour, I have acceptable energy levels throughout the day.
- I look forward to my meals. I’ve done the diets and always was so hungry all the time which encouraged me to cheat more and more. I’m eating my normal foods now, but have incorporated much more fruit into my diet. I’ve also fallen in love with green tea.
- While the cost remains the same for my weekly grocery shopping, I end up with a lot more healthy snacks.
- Veggie burgers are REALLY GOOD.

Some of the con’s are as follows:

- Soy burgers have a really funky smell. They don’t taste bad, they just have a really funky smell.
- Plain soymilk is GROSS.
- Buying veggie meat is really, really expensive. It pains me to see the expense associated with anything that has to do with meat replacement.
- I always forget to take my vitamins =(

So that’s what I’ve been doing these days. Another thing that is really good is I’m no longer tempted by fast food joints – because it’s next to impossible to get vegetarian food there that isn’t in the form of a salad.. and salads != vegetarians.

One of my most favorite recipes I’ve tried out this week is the avocado reuben sandwich as follows:

1/2 avocado, mashed.
Sauerkraut
2 slices rye bread
Mustard
Thousand Island Dressing (recipe following)

Spread dressing on one slice of bread and mustard on the other. Put both slices of rye bread in a skillet over a burner set on medium heat. Add avocado to one slice and sauerkraut to the other slice. Heat until bread is slightly toasty.

Mmmm Mmmm good.

Thousand Island Dressing:

1 cup vegan mayonnaise
1/3 cup ketchup
1/2 tsp. onion powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. garlic powder
3 Tbsp. sweet pickle relish
2 Tbsp. minced stuffed green olives

Combine in a blender.

Movie Review: Bridge to Terabithia

Friday night I decided to skip the 7:10 showing of Bridge to Terabithia and I’m so incredibly glad I did. I have never seen our little movie theater so packed full of children.

And every single one of them was crying. This did not bode well.

I should have known I would end up in tears because of all the tissue boxes scattered around the theater. The manager of the theater indicated it was for those seeing Terabithia. Great – spoilers right from the start.

I had never even heard of this story before I saw the preview for the movie. I was expecting another Narnia-like tale, and was looking forward to losing myself in fantasy for a while. What I got was a hard dose of reality instead – like drinking milk when you were expecting it to be soda – not a pleasant surprise.

Had I gone into the movie with no expectations (built on watching the previews) then I’m sure I would have liked the movie more than I actually did. The kids were cute – the story was good, but it was just a little too real for my taste.