Good job Sarah.
I have a meat eating bf who refuses to give up meat, but he is quite happy to eat my veggo meals because they taste good. There are so many delicious meals and recipes out there without meat. I would suggest making a few of them, and then perhaps if he is missing the meat you can do as others said and perhaps only buy free range, or slightly higher quality meat and let him add a little to the meal.
Or. You and he can take an adventure in to vegetarian meats together.
My bf will not give up meat, but he enjoys food and he was more than happy to try all the vegetarian meals I brought home from the supermarket.
He is in love with Fry's 'chicken' nuggets. We had them last night in fact and he was like "are you sure these arn't made with chicken??" You can't tell the difference.
Coles now stocks Quorn, which is awesome vegetarian meats. More convincing than Fry's a bit from what I could tell, but that all comes down to taste. Fry's is vegan, Quorn is vegetarian. But probably a great option for adding some "meat" to the diet to keep husband happy. I used the quorn mince for nachos and in tortillas the other day... you can't tell the difference, it is amazing.
There is also stuff like sanitarium nut meat, which I quite enjoyed. It acts like a mince too, instead of tasting like nothing, or like fake meat, it tastes nutty. So it really is up to the individual. I like some of Fry's foods, but I find some to be too heavy in flavour that it turns me off. Quorn hasn't had that problem so far, but I try to reduce that coz I'm aiming for vegan foods, but it is good. Then there are an even bigger range of just veggie burgers and stuff. I like the veggie foods that are made of vegetables, rather than veggie protien and made to look like the real thing. Fun journey to discover what you like though. And that kinda stuff keeps my omni bf happy. Then of course when we eat out or order take away, he will have his ordinary real meat, but just ignore that and focus on the difference you can make inside the home.
As for nutrition, I think a little bit of research and you'll be fine. You'll be healthier and better off too. Now that I gave up meat i've found i'm eating a much bigger variety of vegatables naturally and i'm trying all the good for you things like lentils, chick peas and adding more beans to meals than I ever would. I also think raising a kid on home made, healthy foods will make future feedings a lot easier. I've never had children but I assume that as soon as they start getting little bits of mcdonalds and eating "fun" foods then it becomes hard for them to eat the veggies and good stuff.
For recipes, google vegetarian recipes and so many will come up. If you struggle, try googling your fav meals and just adding 'vegetarian' in front of it and you will find so many ways to make every meal without meat. You can alternate between veggie filled versions and versions with vego 'meat' replacing the meat. Keep the routine spiced up! Another way to make the transition fun is try out some vegan cooking whyveg.com has some great chocolate mudcake and cupcake recipes and that's 100% cruelty free coz its vegan.
It also has some good veggo meal suggestions though. We have a food forum section here too which has a lot of our members dinner ideas and recipe sharing you might want to check out. Most of my dinners are just out of my head or random googling. My fav is vegetarian lasagne. Mmm.
Good luck, just make the journey fun and hopefully he will just be excited by having some new meals and experimenting with new food!
Something like that.
