it’s also important to be a good guest. a host isn’t a servant. they didn’t make anyone do anything; they offered food and shared their home, and that’s pretty cool.
also, doesn’t sound like in-laws. “dated” implies casuality, and also past tense.
I’m wondering if they even told them they were vegan. Its not hard to cook meat separately and let people mix it back into the veggies and whatever else.
You’re very much presenting a doomed if you do, doomed if you don’t scenario. As a picky eater (non vegan) I’ve found that if you’re unwilling to eat something a host made they get upset. They may never directly say it, but there’s always some negativity. Bringing your own food is considered disrespectful, for better or worse. The “rules” of politeness and manners in these types of situations sadly don’t follow much logic.
So, if a host knows there is a vegan and prepares a dish with meat in it, what can the vegan do? Separating it out doesn’t seem good, there’s still probably meat juices and things they don’t want mixed in. Bringing their own food will seem rude and disrespectful to many hosts. Refusing to eat will likely be viewed as them being overdramatic by the hosts.
So while it’s true that the host has no true obligation to prepare something separate, they’re still knowingly putting the vegan guest into a catch 22 scenario. The host isn’t under obligation to provide food at all but they are and they’re knowingly choosing something that a guest can’t pick due to dietary restrictions.
I’m basing this on the types of gatherings and families I grew up around in the American southeast. It’s not universal, of course. Even here it isn’t. But I also believe the types of hosts who would be tolerant of you not eating or bringing your own food are also the ones who would be polite enough to separate the meat before and cook them separately or they’d make something the vegan guest can eat just in general.
There’s no obligation other than being a decent person. Even my GB News loving in-laws prepare everything vegan when we’re over. They’ll usually have an extra pan of chicken/prawn/etc to add to theirs but the base of things is usually close to vegan anyway or can be made be so just laziness not to do so. If someone offered me their food with animal bits to pick out I’d tell them to ram it and phone a takeaway.
Nah, it’s not hard to make dishes modular. Not doing that is entirely disrespectful.
But if the hosts show no interest in making dishes vegan-possible, I usually bring my own food anyways.
If there’s no coordination up front, the burden of which must fall no the hosts, I don’t see any issue with the vegans in question taking care of themselves while the omnis take care of themselves. Visiting each other can be more than sharing the same or a similar meal.
It’s kind of the same thing when hosts ask guests to Bring Your Own Beer (BYOB). With that, the hosts make the request explicit. With vegan food, it’s more implicit unless the hosts tell the vegans to do so.
This is untrue. In many cooking styles using animal based stock as the entire foundation of the dish is completely normal. Subbing veggie stock isn’t always possible given the chef is going for a certain flavor profile. Veggie fond is not the same as animal fond, which also changes the flavor. Animal proteins denature differently, and some proteins are specifically used for their chemical and physical properties (think cream for a sauce, or eggs for a souffle).
While it is usually possible to sub vegan ingredients to approximate most of the effects of non-vegan ingredients, doing so entirely changes the flavor profile, presentation, and shopping list.
Can it be done? Absolutely. Is it as trivial as you make it out to be? Not even close.
I say this as a seasoned chef who has worked in commercial kitchens and cooks 3 meals a day at home from scratch. When I know I have guests coming over for a meal I attempt to accommodate for their dietary requirements (this doesn’t just apply to vegans), but it is rarely as easy as leaving one thing out. It usually means making two (or more) sets of completely separate mains and sides, which doubles the work and significantly increases the time spent.
it’s also important to be a good guest. a host isn’t a servant. they didn’t make anyone do anything; they offered food and shared their home, and that’s pretty cool.
also, doesn’t sound like in-laws. “dated” implies casuality, and also past tense.
No, fuck that. A host isn’t a servant, fine. But if they knew the person and still made only food, they had to pick shit out, they are just bad hosts.
I’m wondering if they even told them they were vegan. Its not hard to cook meat separately and let people mix it back into the veggies and whatever else.
You’re very much presenting a doomed if you do, doomed if you don’t scenario. As a picky eater (non vegan) I’ve found that if you’re unwilling to eat something a host made they get upset. They may never directly say it, but there’s always some negativity. Bringing your own food is considered disrespectful, for better or worse. The “rules” of politeness and manners in these types of situations sadly don’t follow much logic.
So, if a host knows there is a vegan and prepares a dish with meat in it, what can the vegan do? Separating it out doesn’t seem good, there’s still probably meat juices and things they don’t want mixed in. Bringing their own food will seem rude and disrespectful to many hosts. Refusing to eat will likely be viewed as them being overdramatic by the hosts.
So while it’s true that the host has no true obligation to prepare something separate, they’re still knowingly putting the vegan guest into a catch 22 scenario. The host isn’t under obligation to provide food at all but they are and they’re knowingly choosing something that a guest can’t pick due to dietary restrictions.
I’m basing this on the types of gatherings and families I grew up around in the American southeast. It’s not universal, of course. Even here it isn’t. But I also believe the types of hosts who would be tolerant of you not eating or bringing your own food are also the ones who would be polite enough to separate the meat before and cook them separately or they’d make something the vegan guest can eat just in general.
There’s no obligation other than being a decent person. Even my GB News loving in-laws prepare everything vegan when we’re over. They’ll usually have an extra pan of chicken/prawn/etc to add to theirs but the base of things is usually close to vegan anyway or can be made be so just laziness not to do so. If someone offered me their food with animal bits to pick out I’d tell them to ram it and phone a takeaway.
Nah, it’s not hard to make dishes modular. Not doing that is entirely disrespectful.
But if the hosts show no interest in making dishes vegan-possible, I usually bring my own food anyways.
If there’s no coordination up front, the burden of which must fall no the hosts, I don’t see any issue with the vegans in question taking care of themselves while the omnis take care of themselves. Visiting each other can be more than sharing the same or a similar meal.
It’s kind of the same thing when hosts ask guests to Bring Your Own Beer (BYOB). With that, the hosts make the request explicit. With vegan food, it’s more implicit unless the hosts tell the vegans to do so.
This is untrue. In many cooking styles using animal based stock as the entire foundation of the dish is completely normal. Subbing veggie stock isn’t always possible given the chef is going for a certain flavor profile. Veggie fond is not the same as animal fond, which also changes the flavor. Animal proteins denature differently, and some proteins are specifically used for their chemical and physical properties (think cream for a sauce, or eggs for a souffle).
While it is usually possible to sub vegan ingredients to approximate most of the effects of non-vegan ingredients, doing so entirely changes the flavor profile, presentation, and shopping list.
Can it be done? Absolutely. Is it as trivial as you make it out to be? Not even close.
I say this as a seasoned chef who has worked in commercial kitchens and cooks 3 meals a day at home from scratch. When I know I have guests coming over for a meal I attempt to accommodate for their dietary requirements (this doesn’t just apply to vegans), but it is rarely as easy as leaving one thing out. It usually means making two (or more) sets of completely separate mains and sides, which doubles the work and significantly increases the time spent.
It’s not hard to swap animal stock for vegetable stock.
The question is whether the flavor lost from the lack of animal stock can be gained in another way?
See this as more of an excuse than a reason.