They can't take it any more!

[Mallow]

I just tried several recipes from a fairly old cookbook. Last night's attempt at "kicking it up a notch" was Stuffed Cabbage Rolls and Shredded Salad, <shudder>. They were truly heinous recipes. They were so UGLY, I actually took pictures of the darn meal. They tasted bad too. My teenage daughter and I laughed about it, but my husband didn't find it amusing at all.

I spent ALL DAY making them, loading the dishwasher FOUR times! My husband actually got angry about dinner, though he said nothing. He just got up and threw out his meal. It's like I'm a newlywed learning to cook again!

Now that I'm McDougalling, my family just doesn't like to eat anymore. We don't like the recipes provided in the fat free vegan cookbooks. Anything NOT on the Maximum Weight Loss program that is similar to "normal" food, like pasta, is sure to make me stop losing weight. I want to keep losing weight, but my family's getting mighty tired of baked potatoes and salad, or rice, etc. BUT, all the recipes I've tried suck. I don't know what to do!

[Sunny]

What cookbooks are you using I still use all my McDougall books for
most of my recipes, I also have several vegan recipe books.
When I started out McDougalling I modified the favorite foods of my family (McDougallized them) that was great, they like pasta w/sauce, so I would add soy crumbles, the same for the chili they ate, they did not even know I was using a meat substitute!!!. I would just have seperate food for myself, cooked ahead of time, I heat it up and eat with the rest of the family What does your family like to eat Maybe we can give you some ideas to help you out. The reason I made seperate food was the foods I gave them had soy and that has more fat.

[Sierra]

Don't give up Mallow!!! There are many great recipes. Are you new to McDougalling? I would suggest that you get The McDougall Quick & Easy Cookbook. Others can point out many other great cookbooks.

Breakfasts: Almost everybody loves oatmeal, hashbrowns, and smoothies.

Lunch & dinner: Many great recipes have been posted on the recipe board. Give them a try!! Does your family like chili? Try the recipe in the Quick & Easy cookbook on page 120. I think everybody likes nachos, so try haystacks and vegetable burritos in the same cookbook on page 171. Vegetable soup is great to have on hand, especially on a cold, rainy day. Roasted root vegetables are filling and satisfying.

It might take a little investigating on your part as the chef for the family. Get your daughter involved in the cooking and planning as well!!

Welcome to the board and keep us posted how things are going!!

[AnnaS]

Get the Quick and Easy cookbook! As the other posters here have said, it has great recipes, really easy to make, and they taste like good old, familiar American foods. For example, try the Black Bean Sloppy Joes--these are a hit with everybody! Even my 74-yr old Dad, who is not a McDougaller, loves these.

Dr. McDougall says that people like familiar foods. It's better to work from what they know and like, and develop from there. Other examples are vegetarian chili, a fat-free, vegetarian pizza, etc. You can get a lot of help here, figuring out what to make.

[Mrs. Doodlepunk]

I was going to suggest that you McDougallize your family's favorite foods and see that is what others are saying too.

The transition to McDougall was the most difficult thing I've ever done. It took a couple months to do and there are still moments where I really think I'm not getting anywhere, but we are eating well. The Meat Eater still loves his meat and hates vegetables, but I think that's mostly because he knows I want him to eat vegetables, know what I mean? He's a stinker.

Don't give up! Just this week I threw out two whole potfulls of some slop I made that was just awful. Two different recipes, they were just bad. It happens. There is not much else as discouraging to me as making food that tastes bad.

[Doris]

I think Sandi's web site would help. I don't know how to link you to it. Maybe Sandi or another McDougaller can do it. Sandi took family favorites and transformed them to the McDougall style.

[Sierra]

I think Sandi's web site would help. I don't know how to link you to it. Maybe Sandi or another McDougaller can do it. Sandi took family favorites and transformed them to the McDougall style.

Go here:

http://www.geocities.com/sandieb101/Menu2.html

[groundhogg]

Back when I first started this I used recipes from my favorite cookbooks, stuff we normally ate, that could be tweaked McDougall...as some others here have suggested, using soy crumbles, fake hot dogs, fake bacon, fake burgers...heck even (fake) burgers (with fake cheese maybe? and all the yummy other stuff--fat free nayonnaise for the mayo, etc.) and (oven) fries should be some attempt at normalcy for most household.

It's best to stick with familiar if you are cooking for a family, especially of picky eaters who like familiar foods...I baked cakes from the same cookbook, but left out the fat & eggs (used applesauce or sometimes just got by witout substituting fats at all, and used homemade flax goop or ener-G egg replacer for the eggs)..

Gradually, you can begin working in less familiar foods that don't rely on fake meats, fake cheeses, etc. People's taste preferences do change, very gradually.

Also, if you click on "recipes" on this site, http://heart.kumu.org/main.html
there are some good recipes that are kind of familiar and easy to prepare.

Also, www.fatfree.com has lots of easy, tasty, low-fat vegan recipes. You might have to spend some time at the computer collecting bunches of these things...but well worth it.

[groundhogg]

[url]http://heart.kumu.org/main.html.
[/url]

I don't think my other link to Healing Heart's Site worked...but if you can get there...we LOVE the recipes we've tried from there.

[Malva]

that my family likes bean burritos, veg chili, marinara sauce on pasta, big salads with lots of raw veggies (they add cheese or meat, on the side).

I tried to cook just McDougall for the whole family, and it never really worked in the beginning. So I cooked separate meals, usually a pasta dish for them (with meat & cheese) and a McDougall version for me.
Then I had to get stricter with what I ate, so I cooked completly different for myself (eliminating bread, tortillas and pastas).

Now I eat an even more restricted McDougall diet, and they fix their own.
I've gone back to working full-time, so I don't have time to be a short order cook to a house full of adults. I don't cook anything from a recipe anymore. Just throw lots of veggies together and heat it up. Or a big mixed veggie salad. On weekends I will cook up some of their favorites, but make it a healthier version (if they want junk, then they'll have to cook it themselves). Since they are basically lazy, they'll eat it, and they've learned to enjoy it.

I still have corn chips and potato chips in the house (they no longer tempt me) and they like having chips and veggie dips. I also have chocolate in the house (even in open dishes in the living room) and it sits in there for months until a visitor comes by and eats it. Tastes do change, especially if you expose yourself to lots of good, healthy, unrefined foods.

[Bri]

Mallow, don't give up. Everyone has posted good ideas for you to try out. I especially found the converting familiar receipes helped here. Although, I'm more in the my meal and everyone else's meal pattern. I make as many dishes where they can add meat/cheese to that I don't need to spend too much time altering.

Pizza night I make the crust and everyone else makes their own individual pizza's. Spaghetti I pull out my sauce and then put meat in the rest of it for the family. Tacos, taco salad, chipstacks and burrito's are easy to convert so your family doesn't feel too rebellious.

And yes, I too have had the disasterous failures on some of my receipes, but I'm having less of those and gaining more of my core group that I rotate now.

Another recipe I just tried this week that was quick, easy and good and I even had to substitute on the beans (hint: refried beans makes it more of a spread, which I put on rice cakes) was from the Free Program Dr. McDougall has:

Spicy Sweet Sandwiches
Servings: 4 sandwiches
Preparation Time: 5 minutes
Chilling Time: 2 hours

* 1 15 ounce can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
* 1/3 cup sweet pickle relish
* 1/4 cup finely chopped onion
* 1/4 cup fat-free soy mayonnaise
* 1/2 tablespoon Dijon or spicy mustard
* several twists of fresh ground pepper
* 8 slices whole wheat bread
* Lettuce
* Tomatoes

Place beans in medium bowl. Mash with bean masher or fork. Combine with onion, relish, mayonnaise, mustard and pepper. Refrigerate to blend flavors. Spread on whole wheat bread. Add lettuce and tomatoes, close up and eat.

Good luck with your recipes.

[veganruthie]

Right now, McDougall is more of a tweaking for my husband and I, we've been vegan forever... but I, too, am getting fed up with nights where he sits down, eats a couple bites (slowly) and looks at me and says, hesitantly "...it's good..." instead of gobbling it up without coming up for air. I guess this is a healthier type of consumption but it's hard on me! I feel like a lousy cook. I want McDougall meals that will disappear from the table with lots of "Mmmm"s!"! He says he just wishes the meals were more flavorful, but I think the lack of flavor isn't from too little spices, but not having the oil to carry the flavor throughout the sauce/dish. *shrugs* I'll keep trying. There has to be some good recipes out there somewhere! I already have a good chili recipe, but how many times can you eat chili in a week?

[WendyW]

Since my husband married a meat-eater who has now gone vegan I do not make him eat the way I do unless he wants to. I make such meals as vegan mashed potatoes (because he can't tell the difference), a veggie, and some sort of protien for him. We are doing just fine this way. In the beginning of veganism, I tried all sorts of recipies, but now I just keep my meals simple and something everyone can enjoy peacefully.

Another example is that I just spent 3 weeks at my sisters house taking care of my Dad (he's 93) while they went on vacation. I would fix him whatever he wanted for breakfast, then while he napped, I would begin a pot of veggie soup or stew. When it came time to serve up lunch, I would add a bit of protien to the bottom of his soup bowl and have mine as it was. Very delicious and very simple. I would add a half a sandwich to his meal since that's what he was used to, and I would have a whole wheat roll with vegan margarine. For dinners we would basically eat the same starches and veggies, but I would add a small amount of protien there as well. We had a great time together!

My 7-year-old grandson doesn't understand my being vegan, but that's okay--some day he will.

Good luck.
WendyW

[Mallow]

Hmm.. what were my family's favorite dishes? Heh, heh, they used to be Flank Steak, Pot Roast, Chicken Piccata, Veal Saltimbocca, Beef Burgundy, Prime Rib, Lamb Chops, Tamale Pie, King's Ranch Chicken, General Tso's Chicken, Alice Springs Chicken, Teriyaki Chicken, Beef Donburi, Butter Wasabi Tuna, Cedar Planked Salmon, you get the picture.

My speciality was MEAT dishes, many were taught to me by my Australian mother-in-law, who made Donna Reed look like a slacker! Dishes that don't lend themselves well to veganifying. Dishes that made carnivorous young children give me spontaneous hugs and say "I love you Aunt Sandy!" So, even a casserole is a disappointment to them.

I guess a big issue of mine is that a large part of my self esteem was wrapped up in my excellent SAD cooking. Now, husbands, daughters, daughter's friends, nephews and neighbor children no longer like my food, and I'll have to find other ways to obtain hugs,

[groundhogg]

Well, it sounds like a very big change for you and your family!

You could always cook their favorites and then something easier for yourself, as some have suggested above. Maybe with time they will gradually become more interested in your own meals and will move in that direction on their own.

I was always pretty proud of my cooking knack too, and met with increasing challenges on becoming first a vegetarian, then vegan, then McDougaller, and now gluten-free. If I cut anything else out, I'm just going for raw vegan...it would be so much easier, and some of their recipes are pretty good! My family is comprised of picky eaters...so it's always a challenge coming up with stuff everybody likes.

I think your tastes do change, eventually. Things I once loved now don't sound that good to me anymore, a decade later. I never thought I'd be able to live without cheese and ice cream...and I have to say I felt I sacrificed a great deal giving those up...now I can smell foul odors coming from them as i walk by in the store. I love Tofutti and stuff like that...non McDougall temptations I someimtes give in to...but real ice cream smells like soemthing rotten and dirty...very dirty animally smell to me now, finally! So, theoretically, given time, your family's tastes would eventually change, although it will have to be approached gradually and won't happen overnight. It's probably easier to make the change when someone's health is very sensitive to dietary change...then you can see the effects of diet more immediately and understand what's more important in the long haul.

Some things I loved in the past I just decided were not worth the health gamble, so I've scratched them off the list forever. Can't look back...gotta keep movin' forward