Mushroom. Fucking. Risotto.

[CompleteBarstool]

We're on a rare trip away, been looking forward to it for ages especially about having some lovely food.

Now I discover tonight's veggie option is mushroom risotto. Mushroom. Fucking. Risotto.

What's the meal that makes your heart sink?

It’s a shit choice. Especially as the only choice, it’s not the 70s anymore.

I had a friend who was celebrating a big birthday and her husband kept going on about this amazing restaurant he was taking her to. It was surf and turf and the only option for her was mushroom risotto. He had lobster and steak.

I’ve had amazing mushroom risotto in Italy but it’s been served as a small course and it works so much better than the only meal you are getting.

Omelette, pasta bake, portobello “burger”

@LunaNorth

Try being a veggie coeliac. All they can usually offer is a lick of the menu.

I'm coeliac but not veggie. I think from the restaurant's pov mushroom risotto is a cop out, because it kills several birds with one stone. It's veggie, vegan, gluten free and dairy free. So whatever anyone's requirements (unless they're allergic to mushrooms or rice) they can point to the risotto and say you can have that.

@DoTheNextRightThing

I love mushroom risotto! I would be thrilled

But would you be thrilled if it was the only option in every bastard restaurant you went in?

I’m very lucky where I live. We have two vegan cafes, a vegan supermarket, a vegan pub, a vegan cocktail bar and a vegetarian pub. This seems to mean that everywhere else has upped their game. Most restaurants near me have about 1/3 vegetarian or vegan stuff on their menus, and interesting stuff at that.
When I was looking at booking a couple of nights away I checked the hotel menu, if the only option is fuck you risotto then I’m not going.

I’m vegetarian and it’s not worth the petrol to drive to any local restaurant for some zero effort swill. £12 for tomato sauce pasta?! Fungus rice? No thanks. Butternut fucking shite? Frozen ‘burger’ thing I wouldn’t eat for free? Nope. If they paid their labourers enough to live, and were capable of creating a decent dish I’d happily go, but they’d rather treat their staff like shit and rake in their profit.

Also- vegan is a whole other thing. I wouldn’t pick a vegan option. I like cheese and eggs.

I've noticed this with veggie menus. They're all vegan gluten-free nut free. There's no in between. I was brought up vegetarian and not a big meat eater, so I will often choose a vegetarian option just because I fancy it. The veggie options in a lot of places have gone vegan - which sometimes can be nice but quite awful more often than not.

Oy I lurve mushroom risotto

And stealth brags about it all eg. wasps don't bother vegetarians. The wasps round our way clearly didn't get that memo

Something else that winds me up...
Our work socials often involve a bbq. Everyone chips in 10 quid for food and drink and we are told it will be really nice. Twice there have been no veggie burgers, sausages etc at all but I have been told there is lots of salad. So I have paid a tenner for salad and a bit of coleslaw and been hungry all night. I didn't go to the last one.

We on ce went to a fancy New Years day lunch. The main meal was gorgeous slow roasted goose with all the trimmings. The veg option was spinach and ricotta tortellini out of a packet. The dessert was fruit salad out of a tin.

Not impressed for £35.00 each (not including booze).

One place we eat regularly always has good vegi options. I was chatting about this to the chef and he made the point that being vegetarian or vegan is a lifestyle choice. And people who make lifestyle choices like that generally have money. And people who have money like to eat out.

@HumbugWhale

Something else that winds me up... Our work socials often involve a bbq. Everyone chips in 10 quid for food and drink and we are told it will be really nice. Twice there have been no veggie burgers, sausages etc at all but I have been told there is lots of salad. So I have paid a tenner for salad and a bit of coleslaw and been hungry all night. I didn't go to the last one.

I refused to go on a work Christmas do a couple of years ago, buffet in a South American grill place, where the veggie option was pasta and tomato sauce, green salad and bread rolls, basically the sides to go with the meat. I was not paying £30 for that! I went for a drink, then made my excuses.

@BikeRunSki don't blame you! Why should veggies pay the same as everyone else and not get anything nice to eat?!

I’ve had some alright mushroom risottos but mostly a bit bland I find. I love goats cheese and beetroot so I’m always happy with that!
I’m disappointed with the amount of halloumi at the moment. I really dislike it. Same with any meat substitute, I don’t like meat so I don’t want something that has the taste and texture of meat.
Or burgers that is just a massive mushroom in a bun, no!
Or when they’ve just decided to have a meat menu and a vegan menu. I want real cheese, butter, cream!

What makes my heart sink is when you go to a restaurant and they have scrapped all veggie options all together and now only do meat or vegan options. I walked out of the last place that did that.

Oh worst veggie meal I had was American Airways, bread roll with a single piece of lettuce in it...yummy.

@Somuddled

Oh worst veggie meal I had was American Airways, bread roll with a single piece of lettuce in it...yummy.

FinnAir gave me some Ryvitas and a kiwi fruit. I stopped feeling shortchanged when I became apparent that the chicken had come with a side order of Salmonella.

I still shudder at seeing peppers stuffed with rice on the menu, I was a vegetarian in the 90’s and that was the standard vegetarian option everywhere!

Vegetable lasagne seems the bog standard option on menus for non meat eaters

Children’s menu with either fish fingers and chips, nuggets and chips or pasta and tomato sauce. And no veg.

Halloumi for the win every time. It’s the only veggie option that I can get excited about

I have been vegetarian for well over 30 years now, and the thing that really annoys me now is that since a vegan diet became so popular, many restaurants will just have a vegan dish on the menu, and it’s invariably spicy. Unfortunately, my body won’t tolerate spicy food at all, so I eat out less and less.
Oh, and don’t mention goats cheese. I loathe it - smells and tastes like a musty old book!
Sometimes I order 2 starters, if eating out is essential and the main is curry or goats cheese or butternut squash.

I like mushroom risotto occasionally, but the I was on holiday in South Africa in 2019 and so many places visited, mushroom risotto was the only vegetarian dish on the menu. The third time this happened, I went into a small, polite “this isn’t acceptable” rant and insisted the chef made me something else. It worked, so that’s always an option.

@LunaNorth

Try being a veggie coeliac. All they can usually offer is a lick of the menu.

OMG this made me laugh. I'm not veggie but recently diagnosed coeliac. Eating out is a very disappointing experience once I've eliminated all wheaty items

Same here OP, for me it's mushroom fucking risotto too; also stuffed fucking peppers; closely followed by bean fucking burgers and plain old fucking salad (and fruit fucking salad for so-called "dessert" arghhhhhh).