To kick off your veggie diet here's a BCC recipe for a tex-mex burrito!

Ingredients:

• 2 tomatoes, halved, seeds scooped out, then chopped
• 3 spring onions, chopped
• 1 red chilli, sliced (deseeded if you like it milder)
• 4 eggs
• 100ml milk
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 100g cheddar, grated
• 2 large wraps
• soured cream and guacamole to serve, (optional)

Method:

1.  In a small bowl, mix the tomatoes, half the spring onions and half the red chilli with some seasoning and set aside. Beat the eggs and milk with a fork with some seasoning.
2. Heat the oil in a large non-stick pan and fry the remaining spring onion and chilli for 1 min, then pour in the egg mix. Gently scramble the eggs by dragging the egg mixture as it sets into the middle of the pan. Cook to your liking, then take off the heat and throw on the cheese. Stir through, then divide between the wraps. Tuck up the top and bottom of each wrap and roll up, then slice in half and serve with the homemade tomato salsa, soured cream and guacamole, if you like.

On your vegi travels you may find it interesting to read this book, Skinny Bitch (recommended by the gorge Madi). It gives you an insight as to what the meat industry is like, with quotes and stories from people who work at slaughter houses, so it may be graphic and upsetting for some of you. But it sounds like a great read, "this book has really changed me".

I planned for this article to be my first but it ended up taking longer than I anticipated. The reason I wanted this to be my first was because I knew it had to be something I’m passionate about and, ok, although I suppose I am pretty passionate about clothes I think I’m more involved in this topic – Vegetarianism.

Being a vegetarian is something I’ve always been interested in. I remember being about 8 and telling my Mum I couldn’t eat her lasagne because I’d turned vegetarian, she laughed at me and I presume I ended up eating the lasagne in the end because, after all, pasta has always been my weakness. Carbs, protein and cheese sauce aside, years later I’m still interested. I spent a few years pledging full vegetarianism but nowadays I’m wavering, mainly due to the loveliness that is Mcdonald’s double cheeseburgers, and I go by the phrase “flexatarian”. Despite meaty temptation I’d really like to become a vegetarian again for a multitude of reasons.

People often pick up on the health benefits of cutting meat out of your diet, most of which are true.

• Meat, in particular red meat, is connected with lots of health issues. Including blocked arteries, heart problems and even early death. Cutting meat out of your diet could prevent these problems.
• Because vegetables and fruit contain a lot of water you reap some of the benefits that drinking water give you. Including healthier skin and eyes!
• Animal foods can also aggravate acne.
• ·Vegetables contain considerably less fat than meat, and quorn products contain reduced saturated fat meaning your fat intake will be lessened.
• In the same way plants contain no cholesterol.

From Ronella, a VP user: "I´m not a vegetarian, I´m vegan!  My whole family is and I grew up as vegetarian. But I´m much healthier and I´m actually never ill.  I´d never eat meat bcs that are corpses. Thousands of animals are caged and don´t even have place to move just bcs humans want their meat. Their living conditions are just horrible. they are actually eating their own poo and stand in it and smell it all the time. Cows are actually always pregnant to get milk and the baby cows are separated from their mom immediately after they are born and get a substitute for the milk. I mean what´d humans think if they live like that? No one has a mom, all have just a little place to stand and not even place to sleep, if someone´s ill they get killed. And it´s also a waste of water and food, instead of feeding these thousands of animals much more vegetable could be plant, maybe also enough the poor in Africa."


But not only does switching to veggie hold health benefits there are also lots of environmental and ethical reasons why you should makes the change – which are often forgotten about. I do not want to go too deeply into ethics, or some of the horrors of the meat industry because I believe that's personal view-point and opinion but below here are some more reasons that I'm sure we can all agree on!

•   It takes less fossil fuel to produce plant based foods (77 calories of fossil fuel to produce 1 calorie of beef protein compared to 1 calorie of fossil fuel to produce 1 calorie of soybeans)
• Rainforests are being destroyed to accommodate for herds of livestock. By not supporting the meat industry you are contributing to saving a rainforest!
• By being a vegetarian you’re also helping to conserve water, as producing meat and animal stuffs uses more water than vegetarian alternatives.

Many people boast that after turning vegetarian they almost instantly feel better, not just physically but also in themselves. While it may take a while for your body to adjust to lack of meat there are veggie substitutes for almost every meat product imaginable!!


 If you are considering turning vegetarian remember it’s important that you still get a good balance of all the food groups – especially protein. Protein is needed for growth and repair which it’s mainly associated with meat. You can find protein in other places though, for example lentils, eggs, beans. So, with so many reasons to convert to vegetarian what are you waiting for?! Even if you don’t think you can resist the call of chicken nuggets everyone has to start somewhere. You can always ease yourself in with the “flexatarian” title and then see where it goes from there. Good luck!