Two friends of mine, Justin and Helen, are a special, and challenging case to cook for. Justin is your basic ovo-lacto vegetarian – he will eat milk and some limited egg products, like cheese. Helen, though, is a die hard Vegan – which means she eats no animal products of any kind. Put a dinner party all together – non vegetarian, an ovo-lacto vegetarian, and a Vegan, makes menu planning difficult. But it can also open your eyes to the many ways you can make healthy foods work for you.

I enjoy them being over for dinner, because we can experiment on new foods, cooked in new, healthy ways.

Either approach, meat eating or vegetarian, can provide all of your protein needs. The real difference is that meat eaters can provide all of their amino acid needs through a diet including 25-35 grams of protein. Vegetarians, however, need to plan their diets around eating complimentary protein sources to meet all of their amino acid needs, like rice and beans served together.