I think part of the problem for people moving out for the first time, is they have this idea that eating vegetables means sticking some overcooked brocolli on the plate next to whatever they’re eating, because that’s how a lot of parents raised in the 50s and 60s learned to cook. But my dudes, it doesn’t have to be like that.
1. Invisible Vegetables. This is one that parents of fussy kids have been using for decades. Fucking chop that shit up real tiny and you won’t know it’s there but you’ll still get the nutrition! Buy a grater. Grate everything. Grate carrots. Grate courgettes. Grate sweet potatoes. Hell, grate onions if your eyes can take it. Also spinach. Spinach disolves a lot of the time so you won’t even know it’s there. I make a lasagne with a spinach and cream cheese topping instead of white sauce and I swear to god you would never know the spinach was there.
2. Think you’ve got enough veg? Wrong, add more. Any stew, casserole, pasta sauce, curry, pasta bake, etc. can have more veg in it. I make bolognese and chilli that’s 4 or 5 portions of veg. Making a stew? Try sticking lentils in it. Literally anything Italian? Make sure you start with your carrot/celery/onion/garlic/tomato base. Making Indian style curry? Unless it’s a yoghurt sauce, stick some spinach in that fucker. In fact, stick spinach in everything. I don’t even like spinach, but bags of frozen chopped spinach are cheap and unless you put like half a bag in, you won’t even taste that it’s there.
3. Find Vegetable you like. This one seems obvious, but so many people just force themselves to eat the same veg that they hate over and over because their parents made them eat it. Well I’ve got good news for you my dudes - there is literally no law saying you have to eat veg you hate! Don’t like carrots? Try brocolli? Hate brocolli? Have a leek my dude! Hate leeks? Boiled cabbage is actually really good if you don’t overcook it! Hell, just have frozen peas with every meal if you like, they’re cheap, nutricious and you can cook them in the microwave!
4. Experiment with vegetable substitutes for things. Try root-veg mashes. Swap out normal potatoes for sweet potatoes. Try making vegetable noodles instead of spaghetti or egg-noodles. Try swapping out pasta or potatoes in a layered bake for slices of aubergine or courgette. Put lentils in everything. I picked this URL for a reason. Lentils are great.
5. Learn to make good soup. Good vegetable soup is amazing - you can eat it for literally any meal, it can be ready in half an hour, it freezes… Soup is the best. And it doesn’t have to be vegetarian to be good vegetable based soup. Pea and Ham, cock-a-leekie, french onion, muligatawny, minestrone… they all have a little bit of meat or meat stock for flavour, but they’re still 90% vegetable. And you can put anything in soup (and you’re not a coward, you can also put soup in anything - I made soup pie once, using leftover soup as the sauce for chicken and veg, and it was damn good!). Also you can put lentils in it. Yay lentils!
6. Cut out prep. If you avoid veg because it takes so long, I feel you my dude, I absolutely do, and there is nothing wrong with buying pre-prepared veg. And if you buy the frozen stuff it’s not even that expensive. Just don’t buy frozen mushrooms. The person who first decided to freeze mushrooms was some kind of evil super-villain trying to trick you into eating shit mushrooms.
7. Fruit! You shouldn’t rely of fruit for all your 5 a day, but if you hate veg and love fruit, that’s still going to be better for you than nothing! Have a smoothie, grab an apple or a banana, eat a handful of any dried fruit you like. Hell, do what I do and make a fruit-cake or tea bread, because if you jam enough dried fruit into that thing, it counts! It absolutely counts. My christmas pudding recipe is like 2 of your 5 a day per serving. Also you can put veg in sweet things too! Carrot cake! Courgette cake! Anything is good with icing and spices!
Moving out and cooking for yourself means you can cut out the veg you hate (I have eaten lettuce about 3 times since I left home a decade ago, because fuck lettuce) but it shouldn’t mean you cut out all veg. I aim to get a minimum of 7 portions of fruit and veg into my body each day, and when depression isn’t kicking my ass I manage it. And I mostly managed it when I was unemployed and couldn’t afford to buy fancy veg like what I do now too.
(If anyone wants recipes or tips, hit me up. I’m not a cooking blog, I’m just very passionate about food, but I’ve taught a lot of people to cook and I am absolutely prepared to do the same for you scurvy knaves.)
