Dr. Peter J. Weiss

Pretty much every­one knows that eat­ing more veg­eta­bles, less meat and less processed food would be a health­ier way to live. 

It’s just hard to do it, and when we don’t want to try some­thing, we often turn to excuses.  A com­mon one is, “I don’t like veg­eta­bles.”

When I hear some­one say that I spring into action.  “Really,” I ask in return, “which ones?”  “Oh, ALL of them,” is the typ­i­cal reply.

Then I ask the indi­vid­ual to list all of the veg­eta­bles they have eaten more than once which they don’t like.  “Please, write them down,” I ask.

So they start writ­ing — car­rots, beets, onions, cel­ery, cucum­bers, pep­pers, sweet pota­toes, etc.

By the time they’ve iden­ti­fied about 10 or so they’re run­ning out of steam.  With prod­ding many can eke out another five or 10.

So that makes maybe twenty or so veg­eta­bles that they “don’t like.”

Then I ask them to take a look at this list of veg­eta­bles:   

Alfalfa sprouts, Arti­choke, Arugula, Aspara­gus, Avo­cado, Bam­boo shoots, Bean sprouts, Beets, Bell Pep­pers, Bok Choy, Broc­coli, Brus­sels sprouts, Cab­bage, Car­rots, Cau­li­flower, Cel­ery, Chard, Chick­peas, Chile pep­pers, Chi­nese cab­bage, Chives, Col­lard greens, Corn, Cucum­ber, Egg­plant, Endive Gar­lic, Green beans, Green onions, Green peas, Greens, Horse­rad­ish, Jicama, Kale, Kid­ney beans, Kohlrabi, Leeks, Lemon grass, Lentil beans, Let­tuce, Lima beans, Mush­rooms, Mus­tard Greens, Navy Beans, Okra, Onions, Pars­ley, Potato, Pump­kin, Radishes, Radic­chio, Rhubarb, Rutabaga, Sauer­kraut, Shal­lot, Snow Peas, Soy­beans, Spinach, Split Peas, Squash, Sweet potato, Tomato, Turnip, Water chest­nuts, Water­cress, Yams, and Zuc­chini.

Impres­sive, isn’t it.  (I know some read­ers are tak­ing me to task because, tech­ni­cally, some of these are fruits.  True, but they’re usu­ally thought of as veg­eta­bles.)  And this is actu­ally a pretty short list.  Many more are local del­i­ca­cies or sta­ples in far away loca­tions — sea­weed in Japan, for exam­ple.

After review­ing the list, we cover ways of prepa­ra­tion — raw, steamed, roasted, etc.

What ways haven’t they tried?  Have they tried stir-fry, or veg­etable stews or soups?  How about Indian or Mid­dle East­ern veg­etable dishes?  And so on.

Two things gen­er­ally hap­pen:

1) they real­ize how much vari­ety is avail­able, and agree that per­haps there might be some indi­vid­ual veg­eta­bles and dishes which will appeal to them, and

2) we usu­ally stum­ble over one or more things that they actu­ally do like — per­haps hum­mus, mine­strone, or corn.  Aha!  We’ve got some­thing to build on.

Now they’re ready to end the “I don’t like veg­eta­bles” mantra and begin a jour­ney of dis­cov­ery in search of healthy and tasty plant-based foods. This really works.  If this is you, why not try get­ting started with what you do like.

Then push the bound­aries a lit­tle every month and see where you go.

Are you still resis­tant?  Maybe you’re think­ing to your­self, “No.  Really, I don’t like veg­eta­bles — any of them!”  Per­haps that is so.  You would know bet­ter than I about your taste for veg­gies, but let me sug­gest that you can learn to like them.

Check it out for your­self.  Per­form an inter­net search on “learn­ing to like new foods” and see what comes up.  You’ll find all kinds of advice.

My sug­ges­tion is a sim­ple one — just keep eat­ing the things you know are good for you but may not be the most enjoy­able.  If you per­sist you will learn to like them.

Grad­u­ally your taste pref­er­ences will adjust.  Soon you’ll be think­ing, “this isn’t so bad” and then it’ll be a short step to your actu­ally lik­ing it.

Don’t believe me?  Con­sider beer.  I admit beer is not a veg­etable, but very few peo­ple like beer the first time they taste it.  Yet they keep try­ing it because they like how it makes them feel.  Even­tu­ally most adults learn to enjoy the taste of beer.

Often, the very same bit­ter­ness that turned them off at first becomes part of what they look for in a good beer.

Sim­i­larly, if you eat more veg­eta­bles (and less of the bad stuff), you will like how it makes you feel — healthy and alive with energy.   Of course it will take longer to feel the ben­e­fi­cial effects of veg­eta­bles than the effects of beer.

So give it some time.  Eat your veg­gies.  You really will feel bet­ter, and very soon you’ll enjoy the fla­vor.

You can do it!