Growing up veg. (snapshots).(vegetarian)(Brief Article)

Although Lucie and Caty Sargent have never tasted fried chicken, tuna salad or roast turkey, they have probably eaten a more diverse diet than most kids their age.

The sisters were raised vegetarian by their mother Susan Belsinger, an herbalist and cook who has practiced a vegetarian diet for 31 years.

The girls and their mother agree that their vegetarian lifestyle affords them a greater variety of fare than the diets of their meat-eating friends.

The girls' friends always have adventures in eating when they visit Belsinger's kitchen. "And kids come to dinner and find flowers and herbs in their salads," Belsinger says. "There are lots of kids who've never eaten eggplant. Some of them ask, `When I come back, will you make this for me again?'"

"I'm glad I don't eat red meat, fish or chicken. There are so many other foods and choices," says Lucie, who is a passionate vegetarian. "Most of my friends have never heard of some of the the foods that I eat."

Life without meat evokes a slew of questions from friends and parents.

"My friends always ask me how I can live without meat," says Gaty.