Easy Meals: 3 Vegetarian Dinner Ideas

2 mins to read

Want to adopt a more plant-based diet that goes beyond just a salad? Nutritionist Robyn Chuter shares her family’s fave hearty vegetarian recipes.

Everyday healthRecipes

From Mexican meals, to belly warming Italian, curry or soup dishes, going meatless doesn’t mean losing the hearty full feeling of traditional comfort foods.

“Plant ‘comfort foods’ such as potatoes, oat porridge and lentils fill you up for hours but have a significantly lower energy density than animal product, meaning you can eat more of them while taking in fewer kilojoules,” Robyn says.

Other bonuses of choosing meat and dairy free meals? Robyn says:

Meat, dairy, eggs and fish lack fibre and resistant starches which feed the beneficial bacteria that inhabit our colon (the ‘gut microbiome’). These beneficial bacteria form part of our immune system, helping to keep us healthy, especially during the winter months
Meat, poultry, eggs and fish are completely devoid of complex carbohydrates, while a plant-based diet high in complex carbohydrates and relatively low in fat will be burned up by your body to produce heat – meaning they’ll warm you up!
Plant foods provide plenty of antioxidants, which boost immune function
Animal products contain more saturated fat which is linked with high cholesterol and other adverse conditions affecting heart health

Here are some of Robyn and her family’s fave vegetarian and vegan comfort food recipes to get you started.

John’s 'world-famous' vegan lasagna

Ingredients

2 packets pre-cooked wholemeal lasagna sheets
400 gm red lentils
1 litre water
2 cans crushed tomatoes
4 tablespoons (no added salt) tomato paste
½ medium red capsicum
250 g packet frozen chopped spinach, defrosted
8 button mushrooms
6 slices grilled eggplant
6 pitted kalamata olives
1 x 400 g can artichokes
Dash of Tabasco sauce
2 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp dried basil
2 x 250 g packets of soft (silken firm) tofu
50 ml plant milk – whole bean soy, oat or almond
Paprika

How to make

Place lentils and water in a large saucepan and bring to the boil. Add crushed tomatoes, all vegetables (finely chopped) and seasonings and simmer, covered, until lentils are tender (about 25 minutes)
Preheat oven to 200°C
Blend tofu and plant milk at high speed until smooth
Spoon ⅓ of lentil-vegetable mixture into a large non-stick baking tray and spread out evenly. Lay lasagna sheets over the top, then spoon in another ⅓ of the mixture, then another lasagna sheet layer. Spoon in remaining ⅓ of mixture layer, then top with tofu mix. Sprinkle some paprika on top
Bake for 40 minutes, covering lasagna with foil if the topping starts to brown excessively

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Carrot, sweet potato & cauliflower rogan josh curry

Ingredients

1 brown onion, peeled and cut into thin wedges
350 g orange-fleshed sweet potato, peeled and cut into 3-4 cm dice
2 carrots, thickly sliced diagonally
⅓ cup Rogan Josh curry paste
½ cup cauliflower, cut into small florets
2 zucchinis, diced
100 g mushrooms, sliced
400 g cooked chick peas
400 g can diced tomatoes
1 cup light coconut milk
100 g baby spinach leaves
125 g mini roma tomatoes, sliced lengthways

How to make

In a large saucepan, sauté onion in a small amount of water for 3 minutes or until soft
Add sweet potato and carrots and cook, stirring often, for 5 minutes
Add curry paste and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes
Add cauliflower, zucchini, mushrooms and canned tomatoes. Cover, bring to the boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes
Add chickpeas and coconut milk. Return to the boil, reduce heat and simmer, covered, for 15 minutes. Stir in spinach and roma tomatoes. Cook for 5 minutes

Hearty winter vegetable soup

Ingredients

½ cup channa dhal (yellow split peas)
½ cup dry pinto or other beans
2 beetroots, peeled and roughly chopped
4 carrots
1 brown onion
2 cloves garlic
2 carrots
Stalks of 4 heads of organic broccoli
2 zucchinis
1 cup mushrooms
Kernels of 1 cob of corn
1 bunch of kale, central ribs removed (use silverbeet, bok choy or other greens if you can’t get kale)
50 g raw cashews or sunflower seeds

How to make

Put lentils and beans into a large soup pot, cover well with water and bring to the boil. Turn the heat off after a minute and let stand for at least an hour, preferably several
Drain and rinse in a colander, return to the pot, add about a cup of water and bring to the boil while making the broth for the soup. To do this, pulverise beetroots and 2 carrots in Thermomix, food processor or powerful blender, adding as much water as you can fit into the blender bowl. Pour into the pot
Add chopped onions and minced garlic, remaining 2 carrots, chopped, and all other vegetables, diced, sliced or chopped, except kale, in order listed. Cover and simmer on lowest possible heat for about an hour, then add finely shredded greens, leaving them on top of the soup. Simmer for 5-10 minutes or until greens are tender (kale will need more cooking time than other greens)
Remove greens with tongs and transfer to a blender or food processor, adding about 2 cups of broth from the soup, and the sunflower seeds or cashews. Blend to a cream then pour back into the soup. Reheat gently and serve