Fed up vegetarian needs advice please

Amber_Sunshine

MrsTine wrote: »

AbFab - just as a point - vegetarianism isn't set in stone... some are more strict about it than others. I know vegetarians who eat fish - and some who just refuse to eat meat in chunks

Not picking at you personally, MrsT, but your friends are not helping those of us who are true vegetarians (eat no fish, poultry or meat). They may call themselves vegetarians, but they're not. They might as well just say they eat fish but not meat, if they need to tell someone what diet they follow, but they are incorrect in claimig to be vegetarians.

Amber_Sunshine

MrsTine wrote: »

The point is to not feed any guest or person something you know they would not eat knowingly (and in this I reserve the right to exclude my beetroot chocolate cake which everyone loves and always gets shocked looks when I tell them it has beetroot in it ) -

How does that work in a cake - is it a sweet vegetable like carrot? It's so long since I tried (and hated) beetroot that I can't remember.

Doom_and_Gloom

Hi OP. I can understand your horror regarding the raw chicken juices completely. My partner is an omnivore but I am a vegan. He’s usually very good about not cross contaminating my foods but every now and then it happens and I do refuse to eat the food which he understands. Cross contamination sometimes isn’t just because of values, which should be respected, but also because of health and safety as well as allergies. The raw chicken issue as others have rightly said is a health issue but for some people even cooked chicken could be as not all peoples bodies can digest meat.

As for your sister in law I personally would never see her again. I have cut people out of my life for much less (my partners entire family have been cut out of my life). She obviously doesn’t respect you as a person as she doesn’t respect your views. His family also sound as if they don’t respect you as a person as they all had a good laugh at you for not noticing! They all sound very immature and personally I wouldn’t want anything to do with them. In your situation if they apologised for what they did as well their behaviour then you could look at being friendly with them but personally all I would be able to think of is ‘will they do it again’.

Your husband’s reactions to all that has happened has shocked me to be honest. If this had happened to me my partner would have been furious. At his sibling for what they had done as well as how the others in his family reacted to it. Also for contaminating the food as I know he was furious with himself once for helping me make a vegan meal and then realising before I ate any that he had contaminated it with dairy (which I’m allergic to). If my partner had acted as yours had with the situations I doubt we’d still be together. Every person deserves to be with someone that respects who they are.

laurel7172

The hygiene aside (horrible), it depends on the context.

Like you, I'm vegi but cook meat for others. I remember being rather coldly livid a few years ago when I found meat in a restaurant soup (despite having asked before I ordered). On the other hand, when I've travelled in places where vegetarianism is an alien concept, on occasion I've had to accept with good grace that the vegi option is the same cabbage soup as everybody else-just with the meatballs lifted out. Also, my Polish sil doesn't register stock as meat-so when she makes "vegetarian" borscht just for me I'm not going to tell her that her (much appreciated) effort isn't good enough.

That's entirely different to deliberately misleading me, though (as the restaurant did). I'd be very unhappy indeed.

fernliebee

Amber_Sunshine wrote: »

How does that work in a cake - is it a sweet vegetable like carrot? It's so long since I tried (and hated) beetroot that I can't remember.

Beetroot chocolate cake is amazing! I adapted it to a vegan recipe with dark choc and it was sooooo good. Cooked beetroot is very different than the pickled beetroot you get most places. In this recipe you grate it so it is similar to a carrot cake or something. I've also seen it done with courgette to and although I haven't tried it, apparently it is just as delicious. TBF most things covered in chocolate would be! yum yum!

rosered1963

Disgruntled_Veggie wrote: »

Hi, I am a regular poster but have created a new user ID as DH knows my usual one. I am really fed up and would appreciate an opinion from fellow veggies on whether I am overreacting or not.

I have been a fairly strict vegetarian for over 25 years, although I completely respect the fact that most people, including my DH, are carnivores. I cook meat dishes for my DH and children but I choose not to eat meat as it is not food to me.

Anyway to cut a long story short, as a treat after a tough few days, I bought a couple of those really nice PizzaExpress pizzas from Tesco, to have a night off from cooking dinner.

I got home from work and did some chores, including preparing a chicken casserole to put in the slow cooker for DH and the children for the next day. I went to empty the washing machine and when I got back my DH was cutting up my cooked pizza on the meat chopping board where I had just been chopping the raw chicken breasts for the casserole, and using the same knife. The chopping board had not been cleaned and was covered in chicken juice, although not drenched.

I got a bit upset and said that I couldn’t eat the pizza now as it was covered in raw chicken. DH just couldn’t understand why I was upset and started to wipe the base of the pizza with a tissue. When I said that would not be OK, he said he could cut the whole base off, and then proceeded to turn the pizza upside down on the same chopping board.

His point of view was that I was overreacting and the chicken would hardly kill me. To illustrate that point, he mentioned that when we had visited his sister for dinner recently, the pea soup she had made specially and sworn was vegetarian actually contained bacon stock. Also the main course contained bits of tuna where she had used the same pan for my vegetarian dish and couldn't be bothered to wash it. And they had all commented how I hadn’t even noticed! DH says he didn't know until afterwards and did have a word with his sister though.

I know it is stupid but I feel quite violated at the moment. Surely this is no different to someone spiking your drink against your will?

Anyway, many thanks for reading, I guess my main questions are – if you are a vegetarian, would you have eaten the pizza and would you be really upset by the revelations about DH’s sister’s meal?
xx

Hi Disgruntled Veggie!

I have been a veggie for 20 years. I cook meat for my husband and other people but don't eat it. I'm with you - the pizza thing is outrageous. My OH takes my vegetarianism very seriously and is very careful. I think it's about respect. I don't expect my loved ones who are meat eaters to understand why I am a veggie, but they do respect it. As for someone givng me food I thought was veggie that had meat stock in it, I would feel very hurt. Yes it's a violation. maybe time to explain that your vegetarianism ins't a food fad - it's part of the person you are?


Edit = PS - it's great to read posts from other vegetarians. All my veggie friends (and my veggie parents of 30 years) have gone back to eating meat. I feel very alone and it's great to know there are other veggies out there.

Reagrding restaurants, I have worked in many but never eat in them ever. Every single veggie option I saw done in a hotel or restaurant kitchen I worked in, they put chicken stock cubes in the food with a snigger.

Hugs

RR X

Mrs_pbradley936

JBD wrote: »

I eat fish but not meat so I just say I don't eat meat rather than putting a label on it as this seems to confuse people even more. I have come across people who think chicken doesn't count as meat so it is best to be specific if someone else is doing the cooking. However in a restaurant I expect to be able to trust that the food is described on the menu.
Back to the original topic, I would just like to add that salmonella, as caught from raw chickens can actually be fatal ,certainly for the very old and the very young. So your husband potentially put yourself, himself and your children at risk, also other people you come into contact with. Really he is lucky just to have had an upset tummy.Also OP I don't know if you were joking about the laxatives but I would advise against it as it might affect your husbands health even further.

That is extremely common and there is a reason. Before vegetarianism became mainstream/common it really was thought that they would all be going down with deficiency diseases and so they were encouraged to give up "red meat". The very first vegetarian restaurants were called "Cranks" and people were considered "odd". BUT you have to remember that war time food rationing was still in place well into the 1950s and meat was a luxury item - nobody but nobody was able to eat meat every day much less at every meal. That has been comparatively recent. So being able to choose what you eat and what you will refrain from is a modern concept and of course if you are in you teens or 20s you will not be aware of how wider society views the issue. It is exactly the same with race relations - if you are young you will be totally unaware that keeping company with black people was illegal in the USA and South Africa.

SugarSpun

Emmzi wrote: »

Their insistence on calling themselves vegetarians causes no end of bother to those of us who turn up at dinner parties to be presented with fish and told "but you didn't say you were vegan".

I don't care about the morality of it. I'll happily watch someone wolf down half a raw gazelle. I just dislike people using words which confuse my host.

Exactly. I was a vegetarian for 15 years, which involved no meat, fish, chicken or the stock made from them. I've no moral issue with people eating meat; I simply chose not to do it myself.

BlondeHeadOn wrote: »

I have friends who vary widely on the 'vegetarian' scale, from strict vegans to someone who says she's 'a vegetarian who eats meat' (go figure....) :rotfl:

:oI'm one of those, although now I refer to myself as a frustrated vegetarian. I got pregnant and craved meat. All the time, and no amount of spinach and broccoli (for iron) or meat substitute would work. So I started eating meat, and now I'm breastfeeding I'm exhausted to the point of non-functioning without meat in my diet.

But if someone's a vegetarian, that means there's no meat in their diet, whether the meat comes from a baby seal, a baby calf or a fish or a chicken.

daska

How do you describe a vegetarian with a dairy protein allergy? I've given up trying to explain what dad can and can't eat when booking restaurant tables, I just describe him as vegan. He isn't, but it's easily understood by restaurants. The same can not be said about describing someone as vegetarian, it's still not uncommon to turn up and find chicken or fish on the menu, which can be a bit of an issue when a large proportion of your family are vegetarian. So, when arranging a meal we no longer rely on using the term vegetarian, we add a light-hearted comment about not eating anything with a face. Of course you still run the risk of getting served winkles but...

Emmzi

daska, technically if he eats eggs but not milk based products, ovo-vegetarian. if it's just cows milk avoided it gets more comlex, so 'vegetarian who doesnt take milk products' woud be the best you can do!

vegan, for caterers, is unequivocable.

then we get into fruitarian, and it all gets complicated...