What do people mean by eating healthier. I am a vegetarian, though I do eat a bit too many chips (oven at home, fried elsewhere). What other non-meat products should I cut down on?
Not all vegetarian lifestyles are healthy ones. Most veggies fall into the trap of substituting meat/fish with dairy products which are high in fat and calories. Add in butter, milk, yoghurt and the likes with cheese for flavour and suddenly you don't have a very healthy vegetarian lifestyle. So, ironically I would be less concerned about the chips, than I would be about your dairy intake. Cut that back (and I don't mean the low fat horrrible tasting stuff, just eat less of the nice stuff) and you will find your calorie intake drop dramatically. Watch out on eating too much fruit, it is not a great thing to snack on from any point of view (sugar, acid, tooth decay, calories to name a few.) and don't snack attack on nuts either, unless out cycling in which case they are great. Raw veg is a much better snack. Keep a diary of what you eat and when for an entire week: then look at it in detail to the ingredients and work out exactly how many meals you eat that contain dairy - I would expect you to come back around 100% once you start looking at ingredients in things like margarine (buttermilk). I'm not saying stop all dairy, just seriously analyse how much dairy is actually in your diet - that is where a considerable amount of your calories are probably coming from.
Oh I became a vegetarian 28-29 years ago, developed an intolerance to cow's dairy products back 15 years ago and now am allergic to all dairy for the last 4-5 years. Actually getting dairy out of your diet is a mine field in this country. It turns up everywhere including in bread, margarine and of all places soya style cheeses (as caesin to aid melting).
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