Strict vegetarian being asked to try meat

[PinkFeather]

So, I am a strict vegetarian and have recently started a new job working in a kitchen. The job is wonderful except for one thing...the chef expects me to try meat/meat based products to make sure the flavouring is good.
The thought of trying meat makes me feel physically ill, I have no problem preparing and cooking it, I just don't eat it.
Am I right in thinking it is wrong to ask a vegetarian to do this?

Mumsnet often seems weirdly hostile to vegetarians. I don't think you have to be able to taste all the food prepared in a kitchen where you work. Surely the chef is tasting it anyway?

Just keep saying no thank you or ask if this is a condition of employment. If eating meat was a requirement for the role they should have said as much when you were hired.

Anyway, you'd be useless as a food taster. I've been a vegetarian since I was 10. If I was forced to taste meat to see if it was good my answers would be useless. I think it smells rank, the taste would be worse. What value would my opinion be?

How could you taste it, anyway? Surely even if you did you'd find it abhorrent? Can you get someone else to be your official meat taster?

Zippi beat me to it ^^^

I have been veggie for many years and can't even walk past a butcher's shop without starting to gag - the stench is awful. Other people don't seem to be able to smell it, but I can! (I suppose you a develop a sensitivity to it.) The thought of putting a corpse into my mouth is repugnant.

You are in no position to taste the food. Why can't he taste the food - he's cooked it! What would he do if you vomited into the dish he'd prepared?

Curiously, I have eaten meat for short periods. A couple of times it was after one of our dogs had died. I just had a tremendous urge to devour flesh, and something that would have made me heave before was all I wanted to eat. It didn't last long. The other time was when I was pregnant with DS and just about lived on undercooked liver.

If you are only prepping the food you shouldn't be expected to taste it. Maybe the chef sees potential in you and wants to"teach" you? Or maybe they are just being a twat.
I worked as a chef when I was vegetarian. I had to taste what I cooked. It was my job.

No, if you made it clear in your interview that you are veggie and won't taste meat, then they can't now ask you to do it. Anyway, as someone has already said, if you don't eat meat, how on earth can you tell if its seasoned ok?

I'm waiting for calls of discrimination :o

Can you just pretend to do it and declare it 'too salty' every time? Or 'too meaty'. Or 'too fishy'. They will soon stop asking.

May I be the first to suggest reporting it to hr? Or calling 101 to have it logged?

I actually have no tolerance for this. if you choose a career, you know the ramifications that come with it. So IMO a GP should not ever be allowed to refuse contraception, because managing contraception is part of being a GP. Ditto pharmacists should not be allowed to refuse the MAP. And you should not be exempt from an integral part of your job - you chose to be a chef. Sorry, YABU.

This is surely very straightforward. If they employed you knowing you'd said you would not taste meat, but now expect you to do so, YANBU. End of story. It's got nothing to do with how MNers or anyone else feels about being vegetarian. I'm not a veggie but am at the attitudes displayed towards them on MN sometimes.

I wish people would read threads properly before ranting.

OP is not a chef.

OP preps the food. I imagine that is chopping the vegetables etc.

Vegetarians are not always vegetarians for ethical reasons.

its a bit like working in a nut factory with a nut allergy, it goes with the territory im afraid

What Eolian said.

I think that as you explained yourself at interview YANBU.
However a little extra communication may be needed. I am a chef and taste everything myself. I wouldn't expect someone else to do it for me.

Another long-time vegetarian pondering how you would know if a meat dish tasted right. I wouldn't have a clue, because to me it would taste foul.

If you aren't an actual chef and you discussed this at interview then I think you are perfectly within your rights to say no.

I am not hostile to vegetarians at all. I think it's a principled and ethical way to live your life. But it's clearly incompatible with working in a kitchen cooking meat.

With you being vegetarian, taste testing stuff wouldn't help. you wouldn't know how things are supposed to taste.
they knew this when they hired you.

What is a 'strict' vegetarian. Surely you are or you aren't vegetarian.

Either the chef is being a dick - which is not uncommon in kitchens - or he believes you have potential/is actually doing a great job because he wants everyone in the kitchen to be involved with the final dish.

Obviously your response depends on his motivation.

Need more clarification as to what your actual role is.

I am baffled at a vegetation being happy to prepare meat in the first place, surely the whole point of being a veggie is that you don't agree with such practices:/

YANBU.

You explained in the interview that you wouldn't be tasting any meat dishes. They offered you the job with all the facts in their possession.

Scenes In an ideal world yes, but there are many who don't see the odd chicken wrap as an affront to their vegetarianism.

Grrrrrr MEADOWS...there are many reasons for being a vegetarian. Not all of them are ethical.

Oh difficult one certainly. I opened this thinking it'd be colleague or friend badgering you an I was going to suggest you start at them to try tarantula or maggots.

Working in a kitchen with food prep and not trying some of the food though is awkward. Though how would the chef handle you if you were allergic or Jewish or Muslim?

Seeing that you did state it at the interview (did he or she interview you?) then chances are they are being a dick. There's prattish chefs out there that actively dislike vegetarians for no good reason (other than their inability to produce decent vegetarian dish )