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I’ve been asked to help cook a meal for 6 people a few of which are veggie.  Being a complete and utter carnivore the whole concept is a bit alien to me it.  I like a sprinkling of boiled chicken on my crunchy nut cornflakes in the morning so a main meal is going to be a challenge.

Anyway, fortunately it’s just an informal affair but I’ve just been black balled on just doing “veggie” sausage toad in the hole, lasagne or bolognaise so I need to come up with something relatively interesting.  I can’t be arsed with cooking separate dishes with and without meat either.

Any suggestions like a good curry recipe?

Cheers Ears

Oh no !!!!!!!!!!

I don't have a recipe but look up paneer for currys - tis a lovely indian cheese that works well.

Either that, or find a decent spinach and ricotta cannelloni recipe.

Cheese is great.

Give 'em a fucking carrot.

Mushroom stroganoff is a very nice meal. I’d even pick it over the beef equivalent on occasion. Pretty easy to make as well and if you get a few types of mushrooms you can talk some fluff of how you chose particular ones to accentuate particular flavours.

My tip would be to lightly coat the mushrooms in paprika before you begin to cook them.

i'd avoid doing a risotto if you've never done one before, they take a lot of care and attention and can go very wrong with not done properly.

Like si said, maybe a mushroom stroganof, or one of my favorites its creamed mushrooms with tagiatelle pasta. which is just a load of different types of mushrooms (chestnut, oyster, shittake etc) in most supermarkets they will do a veriaty pack fry them off in a little butter (yes butter, works better with mushrooms than oil) add a bit of salt pepper to season and then a pot of single cream (can replace a bit of the cream with milk if its too rich) then plop ontop of some tagiatelle pasta

or as you mentioned a curry, just find any curry recipie that you like the sounds of and use that as the base, i regulary use meat curries as the basis of my recipie and just leave the meat out and use veg (peppers/mushrooms/potatoes/carots/ basicly anything you want)

or even a lentil curry, which is very easy

I've got a good recipe for a better veggie sausage toad in the hole, made with vegetables instead of sausages.

I've also got a kick ass recipe for a lentil pate, which should impress your veggie mates.

You might be best of getting hold of a veggie cook book and picking something from that, or browsing one of the online recipe websites.

My wife is veggie and when we have people round for dinner, I find it much easier to find something that you can make that is the same for everyone, except for some added meat in the carnivores portion. Curries work well (any chicken/lamb curry recipe can be done using quorn or veg instead of the meat), or try a morrocan tagine - you can make the veg/sauce for everyone then add some pan fried lamb chunks right at the end to the meaty half, serve with cous cous, job done.

Dazzza,    Vegetarian chill is a good shout - there's a good recipe on the BBC good food site. It's got lentils in it, so there will be a wind factor, but It's been well received by carnivores as well.

Beans on toast For The Win.

No messing around, cheap & easy  :D

Surely what this gives is an opportunity to show them the error of their ways ?

Steak - all round  :D

I'm tempted!

Thanks all there are some great ideas there and I'll give it some thought.  I think I'm leaning towards a curry as the base "onion gravy" is the same for pretty much any Indian recipie and I can then play around with the meat replacements.

i'd go for the chilli.
the best chilli i've ever had was a veggie one.
pretty easy to make and really nice

 Pulses are good for veggies and carnivores....require a bit of pre preparation, although tinned are OK.

 So for example, you can make a tidy mousakka out of red kidney beans....you can stuff veg with butter beans. Make croquettes out of chick peas, or use them to make hummus for a starter.

 Chick peas are good for felafel...nice and spicy.  You can make a sort of shepherd's pie using aduki beans...or just create a dhal curry, out of mung beans/lentils etc.

 

 

I agree. Could go for a nice three bean chilli. Yum :)

veggie cooking is a piece of piss as long as you can cook in general

veggie curry is a good shout. just fry the onion garlic and red peppers for a min then bung the rest in and leave for a bit. definitely get some aubergine in there, roasted. use red and yellow peppers, scrap green they taste like shit. courgette. tinned pulses (word reg) for a bit of protein maybe.

rissotto is equally good, if not better. roast some sweet potato and do a simple risots with parmesan, its a beaut. or mushroom pine nuts and spinach, and add a whole jar of green pesto to the water you add.

i'd go for curry or something pasta-ey. you can make pasta yourself or a decent carbonara sauce if you fancy showing off a bit. gnocchi is fun to make and would be nice with a salad or something

the world (minus meat) is your (veggie) oyster

Except your risotto recipe isn't veggie.

ey? which ingredient isn't?

parmesan

ooh, that's news to me. just looked it up.

they'll never know though.

how about pecorino romano instead?

Not sure, but you can buy veggie versions of parmesan (to be called parmesan it has to be made in a certain region and follow certain standards). It will be next to (or near) the parmesan in the supermarket and will look pretty much the same - just check the labels to see if it is veggie. Pretty certain Sainsbury's sell one, they used to, not sure about other supermarkets.

It's the calf rennet in parmesan that's the problem.

You need to be careful with pesto as well, as that might have parmesan in it.

My devout veggie mate, the only male veggie in my peer group - and has gone it alone for 16+ years - didn't know Parmesan wasn't veggie. I think he's a bit gutted that he's been eating it all this time and has to cross that off his list as well. It made me chuckle.

I've never heard that, can I ask why it isn't vegetarian?

My ex and her horrible family were vegetarian, and very parochial about it, and ate a lot of parmesan.  This has made me laugh a lot. I quite fancy slipping a note through their door.

It's got Rennet from Calves stomach's in it, I believe. Same as Gruyere, which means my lovely Cheese Twists are non-Veggie as well.

Cheers Nemo, that's my new fact of the day.  I'm off to shock vegetarians.

The Sainsbury's at Bridgemead has got two veggie versions of Parmesan at the moment. Curiously, I couldn't actually see any real Parmesan in there, a good few copies but no actual Parmesan.

Is real Parmesan expensive, or hard to find?

Got a load of cheap sea bass today so job done.  God bless fishmongereres.

You better hope they're veggies that eat fish then, some don't.

Thankfully I did check but if not I've got a packet of supernoodles in the cupboard.

ALL veggies dont eat fish,

Pescatarians eat fish

I've never got the logic of eating Fish but not Meat.

i often get asked "do you eat fish"

well no, ive just told you im a veggie.

Yes, but people ask because a lot of people who'd call themselves vegetarians inexplicably do.

Like the ones going to Dazzza's dinner party :)

grrr scumbags

My mum eats fish but not meat. She likes fish but doesn't like meat, which seems quite logical when you think about - why eat stuff you don't like?

doing stuff like that makes sense but not saying you're vegetarian which (to me atleast) means something more idealistic

I think people say they are vegetarian because people understand what that means and thus it causes less issues with dietary requirements. If someone said they were a pescatarian then most people don't have a clue what that is. I forgot the proper word for it until I read it on here.

There is nothing idealisitc about it in my point of view, it's just a name given to someone who eats a particular restricted diet. Ideologies may be a reason for adopting that sort of diet. Just my point of view.

that read a bit catty towards yo mamma, tell her i love her still and no offence was meant.

i just want to feel superior for eating less :(

Not really bennett.

And you're fatter than me and I eat meat :)

You're quite right Si, pescatarian is a bit technical for most people. The more commonplace terms for people who call themselves "vegetarian but eat fish" are "hypocrite" or "poseur" :)

<ducks>

Are ducks meat ?

No, but they do eat fish and not meat.

Hmmmmm

Are you sure as they definitely had 3 or 4 by different Italian cheese makers last night? I know it's gonna make me sound a bit of a cock, but it's actually called Parmigiano Reggiano, are you sure you didn't over look the number of cheeses with that name on them? :)

I went in Sainsbury's last night and bought some Grana Padano and they have several verities of that, as well as Pecorino Romano, which is also nice. These Cheeses would be a great substitute for Parmigiano, but fuck knows whether they are vegetarian or not.

EDIT: I just realised i don't know which one the Bridgemead one is.  :-[ I went to the one by the Ferrari garage.

i've got a vegan version of parmesan
it tastes like salty feet

That is Bridgemead :)

:JFW moment: :D

oi!!!

I'm not sure Grana Padano is vegetarian but I find it to be much nicer than Parmesan, mainly because it doesn't smell like someone's sprinkled sick over your meal. I'm sure there are veggie alternatives available somewhere.

You're right, I was only looking for ones with Parmesan on them.

Yes, but no-one would eat them because they taste fowl

I'll not argue with you, not worth getting all my ducks in a row

Good-quality parmesan shouldn't ever smell like sick...

I was going to say that but you beak me to it

Obviously you can't get good quality stuff in the supermarket then. I'll stick to the milder but satisfying alternative.

I'll send you the bill.

Damn it, you can always go one better. You quack me up Nev

Waddle he say next?

Eider guessed another thread goes down the pun route.

That smee !

I think it's a poultry effort myself.

Shouldn't that be guilty mallard, nev?

Water off a duck's back to me Sussex.

Isnt there a Tescos down Drakes way.

It's Eider down there or somewhere else.

I hate myself.