To be upset by PILS choice of celebration meal.

OP, your IL's are inconsiderate and you are not at all a fussy eater, surprised at those who think you are. I'd be very annoyed with them. Salmon is disgusting and not good for you given how much is farmed and the fact that they regularly escape into the sea and contaminate wild sealife.

Why could t you have had a discreet word with staff and asked for just the vegetables or if you could pay separately for an alternative?

Also, why would you not ask what is the menu for the set meal before you attended?

Im a vegetarian and if I’m invited to any meal I always find out what is going to be served before I attend.

It's a good point actually, I've never come across a roast dinner served with the gravy already on it.

Same.

I don't like lamb, but could've eaten it at a push and could definitely have picked around it. But if you served me up eggs or squid for example, I'd be gagging and not able to pick at the meal either.

Honestly it sounds like school dinners when I was a child in the 1960s where there were no choices and they put gravy on everything and you had to clear your plate. It was an ordeal every lunchtime.

Why don't you read the OP properly. The whole of the lamb dinner, potatoes and veg, was saturated in rich lamb gravy. Picking tomatoes off a plate is not the same thing. The OP says lamb is one of the very few things she can't eat. And you think that's entitled?

It's in the OP that the vegetables were smothered in lamb gravy so OP couldn't eat any of her main course.

I can't speak for anyone else but personally I physically cannot put food I don't like the taste of in my mouth.
I have preferences - I prefer mash potatoes to roast so in that case I could grin and bare it and eat roasties.
But a food I don't like the taste of...
No. Just No. Can't do it.

The PIL picked that menu because they like that. It’s not like it was the only choice.
It’s very rude to serve up something that your guests aren’t even going to like, even if they are able to force it down.
Clearly it’s a lesson to ring ahead and double check whenever they are involved. I have a coeliac child and a number of times I’ve been told there’s ’loads of choice’ by someone and when I’ve rang there isn’t.

Yes, I could have ordered a separate meal from the restaurant downstairs, but I would have had to eat it down there and leave the party

This is utter bullshit. A quiet word with the staff and they’d have sorted you out an alternative meal to eat in the same place.

Every wedding invitation I’ve received has asked about allergies. The OP is allergic to salmon so at least she would have been able to have a starter she can safely eat if nothing else. I would never just present my guests with a set menu at a restaurant.

I absolutely don't think the OP is a fussy eater either. I live with some. 🙄Having said that there is absolutely nothing on earth I couldn't force down me out of politeness - no allergies - so in that sense not being able to even touch lamb presumably counts as picky to some. I'm not a human dustbin by any means but I'd get something down me off pretty much any plate.

I used to be tremendously fussy but decided years ago I had to give stuff a go, so I have been that person, but I've been lucky that I've just ended up finding out I actually like 90% of things, with texture not really being an issue for me. I realise others have real sensory issues.

I think a lot of people have lost the art of asking nicely. They either never had it, or their skills became rusty during the pandemic. I'm afraid I find it unbelievable that you couldn't have quietly toddled off, had a nice, subtle word with whoever looked in charge, and got them to divert something more suitable to you. I think it would be a very rare restaurant indeed where no one could have been charmed into helping out. You could have got straight on your hind legs as soon as you saw it was a set menu, explaining that your in laws forgot to check with you all.

Your husband is a real piece of work isn't he?Sounds like you put up with a lot of bullshit from him.

No man would ever come between me and being fed, thats for sure.

No wedding invitation I’ve ever received has offered any option other than vegetarian/vegan. We didn’t offer options for a milestone birthday meal other than veggie.

OP, I don’t think you’re a fussy eater at all. Ignore the posters who are saying that you are. They must be human dustbins, to eat anything shoved in front of them. No-one should feel they have to eat things they don’t like!

Yes, this is what I found a little startling as well. Best not upset the man of the house, rather OP goes to bed without any supper. 😳

I'm sure that had you asked, the staff would have brought you a plate with the sides without gravy. It's annoying, but it doesn't sound as though you were proactive in trying to have something that you could eat.

I married a really, really picky eater (ASD). He can only bear lamb in kebab meat (yes, I married a bloody Viking) and he once rejected an entire plate of food because I had the temerity to put some cauliflower on there - he couldn't eat anything because of the "smell". Then, I was an "anything goes" type of person and just suffer - I only drew the line at oysters and abalone! However, I found I'm very intolerant of dairy, so much so, that for many years - years! - I took those IBS pills daily, on prescription, when really dairy was the main problem. As a result, I have gone from totally unfussy eater to a right nightmare. We are both a right nightmare for different reasons.

Here is the thing, though. We go to dinners out and we check the menu before we go. I particularly do not trust anyone to be a good host, because I particularly know how much goes into being a good host. It is quite the thing to cater for a large group and involves going into a lot of thought and detail. So, your PILS put in zero thought, but honestly they could have put in "some" thought and still have got it wrong.

So it really is on you. You know you're picky, so why on earth didn't you check? We don't go anywhere without checking the menu. We're going to a catered event next weekend and have paid full price, and I'm actually cooking and taking our main course with us because neither of us can eat what's on offer. I don't like being a fussy arsehole, but that is far better than just passing up two plates at the table. You must have looked absolutely dreadful to wave away two courses. It will have made some others feel very uncomfortable and that's not on. It's impolite.

You're the picky one, so you need to be picky. At your dinner, my DH wouldn't have touched the main (and disliking lamb isn't that uncommon, so granted it was an odd choice), and I wouldn't have touched the pudding, or perhaps some of the vegetables, so we would have ensured that we were catered for ahead of time. It would have made everyone more comfortable in the end.

Sorry, but why would you have had to go to a different dining room?

What sort of restaurant has such crap service that they could not bring food from the other kitchen to you? Why would you have to go to the food?

I've experienced it, in a private dining room, and the birthday-haver had chosen a meal that he saw as a huge treat (as I suspect has probably happened here). I don't think it's that uncommon as a concept but the pre-meal communication seems to have been lacking on this occasion.

It is very odd!

I'm with you op, hate Salmon and even the smell of lamb or lamb gravy makes me feel ill - although I would have excused myself and gone downstairs for a lovely dinner on my own and left them to it 😂

Usually set menus have a few options, like a Christmas work party, and everyone chooses beforehand. I have never been to a meal where one or two members of the party choose and book for everyone else without so much as asking.

They were thoughtless. Even 34 years ago we let guests know that the first course at our wedding was a venison pate thing followed by fresh salmon and asked if veggie options/alternatives were required.