AIBU to hate the veggie option?

[BabooshkaKate]

It's always halumi.

Why? Why must it always be halumi?

How many different ways can you do halumi?

Why do restaurants never think outside the box?

Look all you angry vegetarians, the meat options for compani/groupChristmas dinners etc. are equally awful.

I've got to say that this is true, that when it comes to some meals, that the addition of a meat doesn't suddenly make it palatable. I've sat through many christmas/staff dinners where the meat option was bloody awful. Just adding meat does not suddenly make the meal perfect.

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE TOFU BUT HAVE only ever seen it in chinese restaurant. One particular chinese restaurant did a "fake duck" and hoisin sauce wrap, it was delicious and tasted very similar to real duck.

I love veggie food but rarely order it when out as it's always veggie lasagne or risotto. i'd love more halloumi options but have only ever seen them in Nandos.

my favourite meals to make at home are

tofu and black bean quesadilla with GUACAMOLE AND SOUR CREAM

sorry about the caps I'm flitting inbetween working and this lol

red thai tofu and asian mushroom noodle soup

halloumi and guacamole wraps

veg chilli with all the sides

crispy fried "beef" (Quorn steak strips) with egg fried rice

mmm hungry now reading this thread

You vegetarians seem full of hate. Collectively, you hate halloumi, blue cheese, Cheddar cheese, goat's cheese, cheese tarts, onion tarts, peppers, spinach, mushrooms, tomatoes, nut roast, risotto and lasagne. No wonder restauranteurs find it difficult to cater to you.

I love tofu in Chinese restaurants and takeaways too..

I remember pre ordering the vegetarian roast at a Jamie Oliver chain restaurant a few years back (xmas meal out with work).
When we arrived, a chef came out full of apologies - despite me ordering it a fortnight before they didn't have it. They would make me a delicious truffle risotto instead.

I can't stand risotto as a main course. Mouthful after mouthful of congealed cheesy rice :(

I'm not full of hate at all.
What I do hate, is the lack of choice or no choice in many restaurants.

At least mediocre meat-based food is usually Christmassy and edible on a Christmas menu.

I've had many many a meal where the meat eaters have reported their food to be ok where mine has been awful. A relatives wedding for example where everyone else's meat dish was fine, and I had the worst risotto I'd ever encountered. It was truly horrible, I suspect made at least the day before. It had gone entirely to mush and was watery, accompanied by very overdone green veg. Totally tasteless and textureless. The meat dish wasn't superb but it was okay at least. I'm not saying it's always the case, but it has happened to me a lot.

I reckon 'collectively' meat eaters hate more foods!

I'm not veggie, but have noticed that goat's cheese makes a regular appearance on the veggie section of menus. I don't hate it, I'm just not terribly keen. There are nicer cheeses.

I'm not full of hate at all.
What I do hate, is the lack of choice or no choice in many restaurants.

And risotto.

eastmids I'm not veggie but i love veggie food, it does get very monotonous seeing the same old thing repeated and i do feel for veggies (but like i said in my post i only ever seem to see veggie lasagne lol)

I think vegetarians in general are full of love more than hate. That's the reason that most of them are vegetarians, after all.

I can't believe people are complaining about spinach and ricotta pasta though. I'd eat it every day if I could Yum!

Eastmids, I think most people don't hate those dishes, they hate that those are the sorts of dishes that are endlessly repeated as the single vegetarian option. After years of eating out it does become quite dull.

My DPs family occasionally like to go to the Cote chain of restaurants. They have two vegetarian mains - a butternut risotto and a goats cheese salad. They haven't changed this for a fair few years. I sigh internally when Cote is chosen as I've eaten these dishes so frequently I am totally bored of them. But there are a wide variety of meat dishes plus specials (which are rarely vegetarian) so it's fine for everyone else. It is similar in most chain restaurants.

I reckon 'collectively' meat eaters hate more foods!

Er, no, because they don't hate meat...

Look, I get it. I was vegetarian for nearly 20 years, but it seems silly to choose a restricted diet and then complain that your diet is restricted.

Here it is goats cheese tart or mushroom risotto.

Not exactly fine dining but zizis actually has a vegan menu, with choices and everything!

Er, no, because they don't hate meat

I'm a vegetarian and I don't hate meat.

It isn't that it's a restrictive diet, that's not the point. Restaurants tend to offer a limited variety of vegetarian choices due usually to lack of interest/enthusiasm. I wouldn't mind a choice of only one or two dishes if they weren't the same one or two dishes that I've encountered for years.

God I love halumi!!! Beats 'caramelised onion tartlet' or fucking stuffed peppers.

I think the worst veggie meal I have had was last year when I was given Turkey at my works Christmas meal. That was the veggie option and had a so called catering manager telling me vegetarians eat turkey! No we don't! I got a refund and got drunk instead

I live outside the UK and my other half and I both LOVE halloumi, but it isn't made/sold here.

So quit your lousy complaining and appreciate what you have! Hmph.

I love halloumi but object to it being shoved between two buns with a giant mushroom and called a burger. It is not.

I'm generally not fussy and like most (vegetarian food) but it is just so boring to be offered the same old risotto or a variation on goat's cheese tart every single time. Worst of all is pasta with Mediterranean vegetables. When I go out I'd rather eat something I wouldn't normally cook at home. It's such a treat when the menu has been given a bit of thought and it's something different. I also don't buy that it's not profitable to cook a vegetarian meal. It's far cheaper than meat. I think it's purely laziness on the part of chefs not to offer something more interesting.

YY to goats cheese. If there can only be one veggie option, must it be one that tastes so... bottom-y?

Halloumi sounds excellent to me, OP, though YANBU to want a choice.

I'm not vegetarian, but I might choose it sometimes if there was more variety. I think one of the problems in the UK and a lot of Europe is that the vegetarian option is an add on whereas in Indian cooking it's a whole separate cuisine so much more choice. I can't imagine any traditional Indian restaurant trying to mimick a particular meat dish like serving vegetarian bacon.

I'd love to see something like Great British Menu do a vegetarian series. I quite liked the first couple of series but after that it's been very much the same, just with some kind of back story with silly plates. Vegetarian would be a cooking challenge.

Vegetarians have already made their choice. They have chosen not to eat meat.

SingaSong 12, you have it spot on about the silly plates.

I'm a chef and I can't stand the lack of choice for vegetarians on menus. I'm not 100% vegetarian myself but a big part of my diet is vegan/vegetarian.
It annoys me that all the veggie options contain either egg or cheese. It's like the chefs don't believe you can actually get enough protein from non animal sources.
I get that veggie dishes are not as popular as the meat ones but surely they can organise their menu enough to utilise ingredients that are used in some of the meat dishes.

Mind you it's better than the 90s offering if ratatouille being the only option.