Meat is a treat ?

It was interesting to see a committee of MPs suggest that meat ought to be a treat and that we would all benefit if the amount of meat eating was reduced.

I took this view many years ago and became a vegetarian.

What always puzzles me is the requirement some people feel to 'jazz up' vegetarian food to make it 'less boring' - this usually involves asking a clutch of non-vegetarian chefs to come up with dishes they wouldn't normally make using ingredients they wouldn't normally use.  Few things can be thought more likely to put someone off becoming a vegetarian than the instruction to tramp around health food shops and delis looking for silken tofu, artichoke hearts, beetroot essence and pink Himalayan salt crystals. It's enough to make you go home and eat beans on toast in protest. And there perhaps is the point - beans on toast is a perfectly acceptable vegetarian meal.

So many vegetarian dishes are incredibly versatile.  Vegetarian Curry can be made with an endless list of vegetables, beans, lentils and pulses. The choice of different veggie burgers or vegetarian sausage is huge.  Pasta, potato and rice lend themselves to vegetarian food in a way that conjours so many meals.

There are more cheeses available than for many years.

So if you want a vegetarian meal - first think of the ones you have already and then ask a vegetarian.