MNN - Mother Nature Network

Being a vegetarian takes planning. That's what I learned on my first day of my vegetarian quest. On my way to work Thursday morning, I was thinking about what action I should take in order to challenge myself and help the environment, and decided on trying a vegetarian diet. (After all, I already ride public transit everywhere so taking that on would be cheating.) When telling friends about my two-week veg trial, I was met with responses like "Why?" ... "Good luck with that," ... and even a "yikes!" I thought to myself, is it really so radical not to eat meat? Well, in theory, no, but in practice, definitely.

Starting out with a vegetarian diet, it made me realize just how much meat is really out there. Even most salads these days include chicken. Getting out of work a little late on Thursday, I only had about 10 minutes to grab dinner and I faced my first challenge: finding something fast. A recent transplant in California from New York, I've gone the entire summer without eating pizza, for fear that it wouldn't live up to my expectations. But with little time to spare, I decided to go for it.

 

The result? My fears, confirmed. The bland picture seen above, which, as you can tell, was just about as tasty as cardboard. I ordered a salad for some nutrition and the waiter put chicken on it automatically. Turns out being an on-the-go vegetarian may not be as easy as it seems. Next stop? The grocery store for ingredients of my first home-cooked veg meal.