How can I eat less meat, without sacrificing the family favourite meals?

It’s one of the main headaches in trying to cut down on the meat you eat. You want to make a change to your diet, but you don’t want to change everything. You don’t want to just stop eating the meals that you and your family love to eat.

And that’s totally understandable. So, at Dopsu, aside from our actual product range, we’ve also spent a lot of time thinking about the most effective, easiest and practical ways for people to cut down on the meat they eat, without cutting down the flavours they love. 

Here are our 3 top tips.

1 – Don’t pressure yourself to go cold turkey [insert obvious joke here]

Even if longer term you might be aiming to go fully vegetarian or vegan with your everyday dinners, embrace flexitarianism first! That way you’ll take the pressure off yourself a bit – and you stop the anxiety of ‘falling off the wagon’ getting in the way of what you want to do longer term. 

Of course, because Dopsu tastes so much like meat, it’s absolutely perfect for negotiating the transition, but even so, remember that if you are cutting down on meat for nutritional or environmental reasons, then every little helps. So even if you start by swapping Dopsu into just one family meal a week – a meat free Monday for example, that’s cool!  

2 – Make your swaps easy with Dopsu

Not all meat dinners are equal. Some have the meat front and centre, in others it’s more of a component part. So, if and when you start cutting down on meat, the latter meals are often the best place to start! Meals like stir fries and pies and stews, where veg, sauces and carbs come together, rather than, for example, steaks and joints, are perfect for this. Luckily, Dopsu makes this really easy because the ‘No-’ range has been developed to be extremely versatile, and so is particularly good if you are making a change as a family. As time goes by, and as you (and your family) see that there is no compromise on taste, then other swaps become easier to make.

3 – Allow a little space for ‘new’ favourites

Every family favourite meal has to start somewhere. There was always a time before it achieved that hallowed ‘family favourite’ status. So with that in mind, it’s a good idea to try out some new meals. Like we said, start with those easy swaps, but following that it can actually be a really good idea to try out some recipes that you’re not used to – and let them be defined as ‘meatless meals’. For example, perhaps you’ve never eaten beef Teriyaki stir fry (or at least not very often)? So why not try introducing Dopsu No-Beef Teriyaki stir fry into your roster of meals. That way there’s absolutely no chance of getting that dinner time FOMO. Instead, it’s something fresh and new on your mealtime and it can become a delicious family favourite in its own right!