To assume people are not vegetarian unless they say they are?

[olimpia]

My DS' party last week. I didn't have time to collect preferences for meals because I organised the party 10 days in advance and the swimming pool needed to know 7 days before the party. So I gave the invitations to my DS to hand to his friends at school and I didn't enquire into vegetarian or other dietary restrictions. I simply arranged for all the children to have a hot dog. I assumed the parents would tell me if their children were vegetarian at the time of letting me know I'd they were coming.
Turns out one little girl was vegetarian and I felt awful she could not have the food.

Actually OP, if it was to be such a restrictive choice then I would have put it on the invite.

I've done swimming parties myself and the dcs have been to a few. There is usually a party buffet on afterwards for the kids and most parents would assume this is the case.

When doing a buffet all tastes are automatically catered for. So you cannot blame the parents and say they should have told you, they would have assumed that because you didn't specify on the invite, that there would be a buffet and their dd could pick and choose what she wanted.

It really should have been mentioned on the invite as some kids might not even like hot dogs. If you warn parents in advance you are likely to get much more feedback.

I feel sorry for the little girl who was sent home without having had anything to eat. What did her parents say when they collected her?

We all choose how to raise our kids in accordance with our own values, and that should be respected

Of course they do but as soon as the DC gets to about 8yrs, it will be up to them how to eat when not at home.

I am just surprised that so many people think that a hotdog=party food, it is just an extra, like a bag of crisps. If she had been making food a big part of the party then it might not have got overlooked. If you don't give special dietary requirements they can't be that important.

Sorry-in the sense that most people expect a visit to the swimming pool to be just that-I'm sure she had a meal when she got home-as did the DCs with one hotdog.

Well actually when the dcs go to a party we usually assume they will be fed.
It may only be party food but it will be something that fills them up, so we know we don't have to worry about giving them lunch before or after the party.

Anyway, that's not really the issue. If every child was to receive a hot dog this would be something I would have mentioned on the party invite i.e. "Swimming party followed by Hot Dogs!" then if parents had an issue, or children didn't like hot dogs they could say so.

I've never heard of a party where children are only given one food choice before. Did they not even have any birthday cake?

Exotic - really? When I was a child, a hotdog with bun plus some side thing (like chips) would have been a full meal!

I think the assault thing is straining a point tbh but I agree with Farlo - surely most people know that if you haven't eaten meat for a long time, it will likely make you ill. If you allow a veggie child to have meat, it is no different in my mind to 'risking' a mildly allergic child with chocolate or some other substance you know they can't have. It's not going to kill them, but it may cause them pain.

And obviously an 8yo in a social situation may eat something they know they're not supposed to! Shyness, peer pressure, not wanting to make a fuss? Maybe not understanding what it is - veggie child may not have really understood what a hot dog was? - etc. It's up to the supervising adult to make sure parents' wishes are respected at that age, imo.

We need OP to come back.I was just reading it that they went swimming and were then handed a small hotdog, just a one up from a packet of crisps. Maybe it was a meal-which would be different.

The OP actually says a small hog dog and some "hips" which are probably "chips"

Plus she says that she realises this wasn't enough for hungry children. They all asked if there was anything else to eat.

Lesson learnt I suppose!

I dunno, I think in the context we can safely assume that 'hips' was from some animal, like haunch of venison or similar.

I see, reading it properly, it was a meal. In that case she had chips so wasn't hungry. I bet that some of the DCs didn't like hotdogs either-perhaps the answer was to make more effort to give a choice.

Don't think you're unreasonable. However, it may be that the other parents thought there would be a variety of food to choose from and therefore it wouldn't matter.

I've had kids turn up at the door for tea and their parents announce then that they're vegetarian. I found that quite annoying.

By the way, not all kids like pizza. My kids wanted pizza for their parties this year and at each party I had a child say they don't like pizza.

Revolting

You should probably assume that any party will have a proportion of fussy kids who won't like everything, and plan from there. Don't get sidetracked by the vegetarian issue. My non-veggie DS2 is a far bigger PITA to feed at parties than veggie DS1 ever was, because he turns his delicate little nose up at sandwiches and processed meats. Doesn't stop him wiring into the sugary treats, though. DS1 got used to making do with chips till he got home.

No, you're not. The parents should have the nous to mention it in advance, why wouldn't you think to do this?

Wow, didn't expect all the responses! Thank you!
It was a proper sit down meal but the choice was pizza or hot dog and I had to decide 1 week in advance!! We decided to do the party last week because his birthday is in August and so it had to be either before or after the school break. Dates for early September were already taken so we went with last Saturday and gave out the invitations on Wednesday the week before.
All 20 children attended so the short notice was not an issue! As I said the difficulty was that i had to tell them what they were having within 3 days of booking it. I don't know about you but parents of my DS' friends are not the most efficient at RSVP! So I figured I had to make a decision on the food and couldn't give them the option! Between pizza and hotdog I chose hotdog because I figured that would be the most popular by the majority. I didn't want to do half and half to avoid arguments when the food arrived...my two always want the same thing and all children are like that IME.
We live in a rural community so not many children from different cultural backgrounds. With hindsight I should have gone with pizza.
Yes, had the chips (not hips ) been enough it wouldn't have been that bad on the little girl who was left with no food. The problem was made worse by the extra 3 children who sat at the table uninvited and who were served food without being counted because there were another 2 children who were left hungry. Who was unreasonable about that?
I did make a huge birthday cake so at least they had cake that but still...

Uninvited kids? Now that's a whole different thread OP!

But yes, sounds like you did your best but in future I'd say if there is only going to be one food choice then make it clear on the invite, just to avoid any issues. And always always always put that numbers are limited so you need to know in advance how many are going. That might help with the late repliers and might just stop uninvited guests.

I hate kids birthday parties. But I like meat

I think it's the responsibility of the parent(s) of the child with special dietary requirements to make sure they inform the host parent(s) in advance.

If, when I used to throw children's parties, I'd had a parent approach me and say that x couldn't eat certain things I would have been happy to find out what they could eat and provide accordingly. I would have expected them to approach me though.

Strange how there was only one choice of party food, I've been loads to of children's parties over the past few years with my two small ones, and there has always been a choice of food!
For the hot food ones, it has always said on the invite to tick your preference.
If I was hosting a child's birthday party and there was the choice of hot dog or vegetarian pizza only, then I would always go for the vegetarian option.
Simply because that way there's more chance everyone can eat it.
I wouldn't dream of having hot dogs only when I haven't a clue if everyone's a meat eater or not, that's pretty poor for the little child who's sat there going hungry.

If there was a choice you could have put that on the invite and collected that with the replies, or at least asked about dietary requirements. I think its unreasonable to assume that of a group of twenty children there will be no vegetarian, halal, or gluten restrictions . My children all have between 3-5 children in their classes who are either vegetarian or will say they are for parties.

YANBU. If someone has special dietary requirements it's up to them to mention it.

I've never in my life had a party invitation asking if you're a vegetarian/allergic to anything etc.

I do pretty much veg only at our parties as I think that covers pretty much everyone except vegans and is so easy to do. I had a mcdonalds party this year and I ensured they had veggie burgers - so pretty much everyone was catered for and my dbf who's vegan had black coffee and chips (yuk) - but everyone was catered for. I also always do a substantial great bean salad for vegans (the parents).

Never found it skin of my nose at all.

I don't think that some of you have read it properly as to the choice and the decision!

It is all explained by OP.

You do however have to read beyond the first post!

I think that most people have read past the first post - It just doesn't change things - the OP made a choice on food because she didn't think that anyone would reply to the rsvp or be vegetarian.
She doesn't know if people would have responded to a question about pizza vs hot dog because people weren't given the choice, and the assumption that no-one would be vegetarian because of a limited cultural mix was obviously incorrect.