Red Meat Swaps You've Got to Try

by Bev Sklar (Subscribe to Bev Sklar's posts)
May 1st 2009 3:00PM

There's more to meat substitutes than Tofurky, that scary-looking tofu loaf some veggies slice on Thanksgiving. I'd know, I cooked for my vegetarian husband the first three years of our marriage, until I covertly convinced him to start joining me in occasional chicken and fish. That roasting chicken worked, and we're now flexitarians (aka part-time veggies).

Cracking open the bbq this weekend? A diet heavy in red meat is not the best choice, and charred red meat is even worse. Take a look at these five vegetarian swap-outs from AskMen. Here are three I love:

Seitan -- This king of the grill, soups and stews is not soy-based, it's wheat gluten, made from the same dough used for pasta. I often find it in seasoned or unseasoned slices, but it can be purchased in block form, too. It'd be great on a bbq kabob. Seitan has as much protein as beef, but be aware, it's high in sodium.
Textured Vegetable Protein -- TVP is defatted soy flour, primarily sold in dried chunks or flakes, which require rehydration. I always pack high-protein TVP soups when I backpack -- like tofu, it picks up the flavors around it. Next time you make a burger or turkey joes, substitute in some TVP and see how it goes.
Tofu -- This nutritional powerhouse boasts nearly 20 percent of your daily protein in only half a cup. That 100-calorie serving also has more calcium than a cup of milk and is a good source of iron. Sold in soft, silken or firm/extra-firm, tofu is immensely versatile for everything from your pre/post workout smoothie (try soft or silken) or marinated, then tossed in a fresh veggie stir-fry (extra-firm). Crispy, seasoned baked tofu is incredibly good. The World's Healthiest Foods non-profit talks all about tofu here.

If you're still scratching your head at the thought of veggie grilling this summer, order "The Vegetarian Grill" or "The Complete Book of Vegetarian Grilling" from your local library.

Source

Comments (1)

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

u262f 5-01-2009 @ 5:41PM

teehee! My boyfriend also used to be vegetarian until I convinced him otherwise.

Really, I think even vegetarians would be healthier by eating food that looks and tastes the way the food was meant to look. Frankly, I think people who think they're being healthy by eating vegetables that have been turned into meat substitutes are just fooling themselves. Turning vegetables into "meat-wannabe" is still a form of processing. Wannabe-meats are no longer whole, natural foods.

Vegetables are delicious in their own right. I particularly love grilled zucchini and eggplant: just slice and warm on the grill, nothing else needed. Edamame is also delicious in its own right, without mangling it into tofu or whatever other processed forms they're concocting these days. Now, don't get me wrong: I love tofu. However, I count it as part of the "dessert: use sparingly" category due to everything they put the poor soybean through in order to get it into that form. I don't kid myself that all that processing is healthy.