Food Pet Peeves
Discussion
Fermit The Krog and Sexy Sarah said:
Apologies for jumping in on somebody else's row, but I know a few chefs personally, yet I have never heard any contempt expressed by them towards vegetarians.
Sarah is also a vegi, and I understand the frustration at many places offering limited choice. We went for a meal with the olds recently, to a highly regarded local place. ONE vegetarian offering. Ridiculous in these times, what, is it 1/20 people are now vegetarian?
Why is it ridiculous?Sarah is also a vegi, and I understand the frustration at many places offering limited choice. We went for a meal with the olds recently, to a highly regarded local place. ONE vegetarian offering. Ridiculous in these times, what, is it 1/20 people are now vegetarian?
How many options should you have to cater for 5% of the population?
If you have a choice of 10 main courses, using that percentage, half a course should be vegetarian
The more options offered, the more likely it is to be boil in the bag / microwavable, as it's not economical to do it any other way.
If you have 10 main courses on your menu it's not hard to offer 2-3 that are vegetarian as last time I looked most of the population are omnivores not carnivores that don't eat anything vegetarian. If you want to make them more flexible then that is easy too. You can easily have a vegetarian pasta, risotto and cous cous on the menu for instance and then say + chicken £2 plus beef £3 etc and the meat eater gets a smaller portion plus their meat.
It's the same with things like gluten free. Can be easily done with a little thought and then not much effort. One Aldwych in London revealed their new menu last summer and the whole menu was gluten free and nobody who wasn't a celiac really noticed and apparently nobody complained.
It's the same with things like gluten free. Can be easily done with a little thought and then not much effort. One Aldwych in London revealed their new menu last summer and the whole menu was gluten free and nobody who wasn't a celiac really noticed and apparently nobody complained.
Why should I have to be given the option of just chucking in some pre-cooked meat at the last minute to cater for fussy eaters?
Let's face it - most people eat meat, if a privately owned restaurant doesn't want to offer a wide choice of options to cater for fussy people, then you have the option of taking your custom elsewhere.
It's the perfect solution for all.
Let's face it - most people eat meat, if a privately owned restaurant doesn't want to offer a wide choice of options to cater for fussy people, then you have the option of taking your custom elsewhere.
It's the perfect solution for all.
craigjm said:
Think like a businessman. A bigoted businessman is often an out of business man.
I am thinking like a businessman - I've been working in businesses overing 'food on the move', and in particular hot food on the move for a long, long time now. We've always offered a vegetarian friendly offer for customers - and consistently been throwing it away. Waste on vegetarian options is always significantly higher than on meat options, to the extent that one business I worked for just stopped offering a hot vegetarian option.Trabi601 said:
Fermit The Krog and Sexy Sarah said:
Apologies for jumping in on somebody else's row, but I know a few chefs personally, yet I have never heard any contempt expressed by them towards vegetarians.
Sarah is also a vegi, and I understand the frustration at many places offering limited choice. We went for a meal with the olds recently, to a highly regarded local place. ONE vegetarian offering. Ridiculous in these times, what, is it 1/20 people are now vegetarian?
Why is it ridiculous?Sarah is also a vegi, and I understand the frustration at many places offering limited choice. We went for a meal with the olds recently, to a highly regarded local place. ONE vegetarian offering. Ridiculous in these times, what, is it 1/20 people are now vegetarian?
How many options should you have to cater for 5% of the population?
If you have a choice of 10 main courses, using that percentage, half a course should be vegetarian
The more options offered, the more likely it is to be boil in the bag / microwavable, as it's not economical to do it any other way.
Fermit The Krog and Sexy Sarah said:
Apologies for jumping in on somebody else's row, but I know a few chefs personally, yet I have never heard any contempt expressed by them towards vegetarians.
Sarah is also a vegi, and I understand the frustration at many places offering limited choice. We went for a meal with the olds recently, to a highly regarded local place. ONE vegetarian offering. Ridiculous in these times, what, is it 1/20 people are now vegetarian?
2% as of 2012Sarah is also a vegi, and I understand the frustration at many places offering limited choice. We went for a meal with the olds recently, to a highly regarded local place. ONE vegetarian offering. Ridiculous in these times, what, is it 1/20 people are now vegetarian?
dazco said:
2% as of 2012
What is the source of that figure? A 2016 Vegan Society survey found that the figures equated to over half a million vegans and 3 million vegetarians with a further 6 million people calling themselves "meat reducers" and eating at least a couple of vegetarian meals a week. The survey also showed that the number of vegans and vegetarians were more likely to be women (now there's a surprise) and that the 15-34 age group was the highest concentration and around 1/4 of all declared vegetarians or vegans live in London.
I guess part of being a good restaurant is market research and knowing the tastes of the people in your catchment area so if your place is in London or aimed at the15-34 age group you might be more likely to have potential customers that are vegetarian/vegan than if you are somewhere else. In London there are specific veggie Pret A Manger sandwich shops and halal Subways ans KFCs for instance, clearly catering for local demand.
This thread has gone way off track with this. Back to the peeves.....
I have a number of friends who are vegetarian or celiacs or Muslim etc and many restaurants do not bother to mark which food, if any is suitable on their menu. It's not difficult and if you travel throughout Europe it's the norm in many countries. I think one of the issues is poor catering training in this area at college etc because often you find dishes labelled as vegetarian yet try contain Parmesan for instance which is an animal renet cheese.
Trabi601 said:
You've not worked in food service, have you?
Drinks have shelf lives measured in weeks, months, years - not hours.
Our local, whilst not Gordon Ramseys, but nice all the same, offers 4 vegetarian dishes. Goats cheese tart, veg lasagna, veg cannelloni and a broccoli bake. Can you advise which of these have a shelf life of just hours? Side accompaniments that have a short shelf life shall also be offered with meat dishes.Drinks have shelf lives measured in weeks, months, years - not hours.
Anyhows, as mentioned this has gone off on a tangent, so I'll refrain from further posts on the subject.
Fermit The Krog and Sexy Sarah said:
Our local, whilst not Gordon Ramseys, but nice all the same, offers 4 vegetarian dishes. Goats cheese tart, veg lasagna, veg cannelloni and a broccoli bake. Can you advise which of these have a shelf life of just hours? Side accompaniments that have a short shelf life shall also be offered with meat dishes.
Anyhows, as mentioned this has gone off on a tangent, so I'll refrain from further posts on the subject.
All frozen, pre-prepared dishes which you can quickly pull out, re-heat and serve! Exactly the kind of 'lazy' vegetarian offering complained about up there somewhere.Anyhows, as mentioned this has gone off on a tangent, so I'll refrain from further posts on the subject.
What you cannot do is pre-prepare any fresh vegetarian dishes with the expectation they'll sell.
Cold toast and cooked tomatoes that are clearly not cooked. Burgers that are way over done and/or require a dislocated jaw to eat. Not being trusted with sauce and getting an absolutely tiny ramekin dish worth between 4 people. Pretentious menus.
Also slightly annoyed by places that don't have draught beer of some kind.
Also slightly annoyed by places that don't have draught beer of some kind.
It is interesting that a good number of high end restaurants in London have started to offer a selection of vegan/ vegetarian options and even dedicated vegan/ vegetarian tasting menus.
As somebody said above, if a place offers a poor selection of vegetarian options, I will likely not opt to go there. Indeed, my wife, or friends who aren't vegetarian, will often reject restaurants with a poor selection when picking somewhere for a meal. So those restaurants are missing out on quite a lot of custom...
If wastage is high, then that simply suggests that too much is being prepared. Plenty of restaurants offer a decent selection and seem constantly busy (and I assume profitable given they've been around a long time), so it clearly can be done.
As somebody said above, if a place offers a poor selection of vegetarian options, I will likely not opt to go there. Indeed, my wife, or friends who aren't vegetarian, will often reject restaurants with a poor selection when picking somewhere for a meal. So those restaurants are missing out on quite a lot of custom...
If wastage is high, then that simply suggests that too much is being prepared. Plenty of restaurants offer a decent selection and seem constantly busy (and I assume profitable given they've been around a long time), so it clearly can be done.
It's a terribly silly idea to not cater for vegetarians.
1. There's a steady influx in people becoming veg or vegan or simply significantly cutting down the amount of meat in their diet.
2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
1. There's a steady influx in people becoming veg or vegan or simply significantly cutting down the amount of meat in their diet.
2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
TopGear7 said:
2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
What if it goes for a vote? If I want to go to a steak restaurant that does not have a vegie option, the veggie can pass. Likewise if someone suggests a meal at a restaurant where the cuisine is not to my liking, I can pass. So you can't expect the 9 to bend to the will of the 1. You can't please everyone all the time.
TopGear7 said:
It's a terribly silly idea to not cater for vegetarians.
2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
having 2 vegetarian friends and 1 vegan it annoys me. It's not much of an issue with the vegetarians as there is always an option, but for the vegan sometimes the only option at a steak/bbq/burger place on their menu is literally salad or chips, the burger will usually be halloumi or some kind of cheese.2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
ambuletz said:
TopGear7 said:
It's a terribly silly idea to not cater for vegetarians.
2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
having 2 vegetarian friends and 1 vegan it annoys me. It's not much of an issue with the vegetarians as there is always an option, but for the vegan sometimes the only option at a steak/bbq/burger place on their menu is literally salad or chips, the burger will usually be halloumi or some kind of cheese.2. Eg there's a group of 10 mates going for dinner, one is a veggie, that restaurant who chose not to bother with veggies has lost out on 10 customers.
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