Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

I think meat eaters get tired of chicken, beef, pork, et al. I know my mom cooked about 8,183,007 chickens, seemingly all in a row for a while - and I couldn't even EAT chicken till about a year after that. I'm not against occasionally having all-vegetarian meals, I like to do that a couple of times a week.

Mashing the potatoes!! Or making pie =]

Try new things! Different cuisines. We make a lot of veggie burritos, rice and beans, fried rice with seitan, risotto with veggies. Vegetarian proteins like tofu and seitan (and veggie sausages, burgers and the like if that's your thing - it's definitely mine) keep much longer than meat, so they're easy to throw in the fridge for pantry meals. Beans keep even longer. There's great meals based around eggs - frittatas, eggs in purgatory, breakfast burritos.

Also, if there's multiple members of your family and some are less enthusiastic than others (or less willing to go cold turkey), you can try a "kosher kitchen" type approach. Make and stock vegetarian food around the house, but don't enforce rules outside of the house.

Neither me nor my partner is vegetarian, but we're both former longtime vegetarians (20+ years in his case, veganism in my case). We're at the point where most of our weekday meals are vegetarian simply because it's easier.

I would have to say that the most important thing is to keep a balanced diet eating a variety of vegetables, grains, and legumes prepared in a variety of ways. The worst thing that people can do is assume that as long as they are eating vegetarian it is healthy. Also, I eat beans in some form pretty much everyday. I could never tire of them. They are delicious and you can do so many things with them. YUM!

Regarding KarynMC:
You can NEVER say that only a family member would try to poison a child. Get real, there are sick people out there who get off on doing their dirty deed.

Also,please let me know where those chocolate chip cookies are being handed out so that I'll miss that house. :)

Liability, Liability, Liability great idea but the reality is that if a child gets sick and the lawyer came knocking at your door then it truly ends up being a situation of “no good deed goes unpunished”. I will agree also with Heartofglass there are a lot of towns that have laws prohibiting distributing food without a health permit.

Having said that I am quite older and when I was young in the late 50’s and 60’s the most popular treats were homemade. There was this woman that gave out candy apples to die for, I’ve never been able to find another candy apple that is just like the ones she made.

What I think is so very sad is that children have to be protect from adults and we as a society don’t see how disturbing that really is

When I was a kid there was a house in the neighborhood that gave out homemade candy apples - but they only had about 2 dozen of them. We used to come home from school, get in our costumes, go to The McHarg's house, get our candy apples, go home, do homework, eat supper and THEN go out and do the rest of our trick-or-treating. We just HAD to have those candy apples - they were the highlight of our Halloween treats. On the other hand - another family gave out popcorn balls. The only reason we went to their house is because we knew them really well and HAD to go to their house. When we got home we would throw the popcorn balls away. We HATED those things.

I used to date a guy who would complain about the food so he didn't have to pay for his dinner when we went out to eat. I, of course, had to pay for mine and my son's. After awhile, I got smart and stopped dating this guy.
There are cheapskates and there are people who just love to see if they can get away with having someone else pay for them. I am the type that doesn't get burnt as much as I once did. I will pay once. After that, I doubt I will be your 'friend'.

"I don't have kids." Just read that again now.

Which explains the whole idea of "pumpkin chocolate chip cookies" or the whole idea of home-made goods to kids on Halloween in the first place.

the only thing homemade that you can get away with is crafts like a toostie pop wrapped in toilet paper so it looks like a ghost. seriously thats the only way

My recipe for sesame noodles is not only vegetarian, but also super healthy and packed with veggies. It's one of my favorites!

http://www.avacatau.com/2009/04/much-lighter-sesame-noodles.html

@trilby I love to do that too. I remember when I was young I loved the cool little bags with two or three items in them. Fun stuff. They where always the first thing I checked out. Sadly the days of homemade popcorn balls and carmel apples from neighbors are over. But like the above posters said, make something for coworkers I know mine love it when I just bring in a plate of brownies.

Many moons ago when I was a trick or treater myself, a woman gave out what she assured us was "homemade fudge", after saying thank you and walking down her steps we saw her lawn was littered with said "homemade fudge".