Help! Vegetarian coming for Christmas dinner

[Allaboutthegirliguess]

So we planned to have a quiet Christmas this year, but my son is now coming with his vegetarian girlfriend.

Can anyone help with what we can make her please.
We will be having a roast, meat, and our potatoes are cooked in goose fat.
Ideally I need something that wont create an issue as we are cooking our meal!
So maybe can be done before or done in the airfyer.

Hoping someone can come up with an idea
Tia

That literally is the definition!!

Your DD isn't a vegetarian she's a non meat eater.

Stuff like this makes it so difficult for people who genuinely are vegetarian, people serve them parmesan etc saying 'well Jane eats it and she's vegetarian'.

Well said.

I really don't get what is so difficult to understand. Vegetarian - the clue is in the name.

@RampantIvy ,many people are ignorant when it comes to food.
I've seen posts like

RxxdAxxxs · 29/07/2025 16:42
Beef lard is far more common than pork lard.

(redacted the MNer's username)

This is an annual thread and you will find more ideas on previous iterations - I posted suggestions and links on one of last year's Christmas veggie threads here

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/christmas/5458095-what-are-you-preppingcooking-for-vegan-guests-over-christmas?reply=149122404

Definitely discuss with her what she likes, please don't follow the suggestion of offering her a larger portion of a veg side as her meal. If everyone is eating cauliflower cheese then great, if it's a side dish then telling someone its also their Christmas lunch is a bit like saying "can't be arsed to do anything".

Also as pp say - bear in mind that some cheese is made with animal rennet.

If you have an air fryer separate roasties are easy or you could do veggie roasties for everyone - since my (veggie) lot discovered Mary Berry's garlic and rosemary roasties the want those at Christmas and visiting meat eaters like them just as much..

You’ll get veggie pigs in blankets and a main in most supermarkets and do the roasties in oil and it’ll be easy.

If your gravy has meat juice in bisto is veggie.

Some of the Bisto products are vegetarian, some vegan, others aren't.

Products Archive - Bisto

@LadyInRainbow , you are 256 posts in and have posted something misleading.
It's people posting bollocks that mean some of us do not want to risk eating food prepared by others

I think they were saying to use Bisto as a separate gravy to gravy with meat juices in.

@RampantIvy , the wording wasn't clear but it implied that Bisto was vegetarian.

As I said, some Bistos are not vegetarian. Check the link of you don't believe me.

Would you want to find out after you've eaten the gravy that it wasn't vegetarian despite having been told it was?

It's OK. I scrutinise labels of everything I buy when DD comes to visit, so the only gravy I have in the house is vegetarian anyway. I have some chicken gravy granules from Aldi and some red onion gravy granules from Morrisons that are both vegetarian.

@RampantIvy , you do and I do, but many don't or they might do something like bake a vegetarian quiche but not realise that pastry made with lard isn't vegetarian, or they might think 'MN said Bisto was vege'.

Well people that stupid are probably going to have fed them animal products multiple times anyway.

They're not stupid just not 'food-wise'.

Changing Christmas traditions can often sound a hell of a lot easier than the reality…20 years later, it is still frequently raised to me that I changed a tradition in my family.

Other traditions can be far easier to change.

It depends on the family. We always have a vegetarian Christmas main, with the exception of pigs in blankets for me and DH because we like just about everything but would miss the pigs in blankets and I'm not keen on turkey anyway

DD is an excellent and imaginative cook, and we had the most delicious mushroom wellington one Christmas. One year it was a cheesy leek Pithivier and last year a vegan sausage wellington.

We frame it as a vegetarian meal with a side of meat rather than a meat main with a side for the vegetarian.