Guest who is fasting coming for dinner

[learieonthewildmoor]

My brother-in-law’s mother is coming for Easter dinner tomorrow night. She is fasting for Orthodox Christian Easter; so won’t eat meat, dairy or olive oil.

Every year I make vegetarian dishes made with vegetable oil for her, which she recoils from in horror and doesn’t eat. She then eats the lamb and the halloumi salad and the pumpkin roasted in olive oil, and makes comments about how bad she feels about breaking her fast, and what a shame it is there was no food for her.

If I skip making the vegetarian dishes this year, am I being a bad host?

One year she showed up for Christmas dinner and informed me she doesn’t eat pork. Which was what we were having.
I was very proud of myself for saying “well, there’s plenty of salad and vegetables, hopefully you won’t go hungry” rather than racing around whipping up something else for her.
When she was leaving, she told me the pork was delicious.

For those wondering why I invite her: most of the time she just shows up. She assumes that any invite including her son includes her too. We are all Family! I’m just grateful when she doesn’t bring her other son. Who doesn’t know my name after 20 years or so.

The ready made vegan meal is a tempting idea, but I really hate wasting food, and it wouldn’t be eaten. Consensus seems to be I should make other suitable dishes for her. I think I’ll start making things that don’t need oil at all. Basil and tomato salad, rice salad with pomegranates. We can eat those the next day.

She sounds rude as fuck. If I cooked something specially to cater to their dietary requirements and they ignored it and went against their dietary requirements, I would play hell!!

What does she say when you point out the effort you go to, to cater to her needs then doesn't eat it????

I also don't understand why you have invited your borther-in-law's mother repeatidly for Easter meal...

I would cater, but make a big fuss, send her a message now asking her what she'd like you to make for her.

Then as she comes in, say loudly "XXX, I've prepared A, B and C for you, no meat, dairy or olive oil, right? These ones here are for you. [brother in law], these are the dishes for your Mum, make sure she doesn't acidentally get the non-suitable dishes. [Sister], can you make sure your MIL only gets the dishes she can have? It's A, B and C."

Also why do you continue to cater for her dietary requirements if she clearly doesn't actually have any? Does she specifically ask you to?

Agree with @ordinarysnowflake

@AnneLivesGilbert I often cook with lactose free milk at home as i don't often get to eat milky dishes away from home. Why assume the worst about your friend? Both cheese and milk can be fine if we are preparing the meal ourselves.

Just make her a salad and let her get on with it, or starve

@AnneLovesGilbert I often cook with lactose free milk at home as i don't often get to eat milky dishes away from home. Why assume the worst about your friend? Both cheese and milk can be fine if we are preparing the meal ourselves.

Any idea what she didnt like about the meals you made in the past?

If she is really strict you could make her Tahini soup and a nice plate of spinach with olive oil and lemon!
@Magissa is olive oil allowed then? OP says that her guest will not eat it because of the fast.

That is so annoying, but I wonder why you are having Easter dinner before Easter! Not that it would help in this scenario if you are not Orthodox, as Orthodox Easter isn’t until next week.

So she's selective eating then. Not fasting.

Poor you OP - it doesn't sound as if it makes any difference whether you cater for her or not.

Still not understanding the olive oil thing.

Why not simply invite her for Easter Sunday when the Lenten fast will have finished? Then you can all eat the same meal without a problem

I understand why no meat for Good Friday (although I don't fast in this way) but why no olive oil? Are olive trees considered more indulgent providers of earthly indulgence than, say, sunflowers (sunflower oil) or rape (rapeseed oil) - canulla if you find cooking oil triggering.

Serve falafels and a rice salad made with pomegranate, flat leaf parsley, lemon juice and chopped tomatoes, goes great with the lamb and pumpkin by the way. Hummus ax a side perhaps.

How rude and I would say to her don’t eat the lamb etc. I’ve made you this vegan meal

@JessieMcJessie Yes olive oil is allowed on Saturday and Sunday only. This week coming is Megali ebdomada which means Big week aka Holy week so many more people will fast not just strict Orthodox. As someone else pointed out Orthodox Easter is actually next weekend.

It sounds like she is making excuses so she can eat what she really wants to eat.

So she’s told OP nonsense about not eating olive oil?

I'd phone her and ask what "fasting food" she'd like as last year she didn't eat what you prepared and the food went to waste.

Usually I'd say get the BIL to do this, but better to get the straight story.

Looking at your update, this family clearly has ishoos so I expect that nothing she will say will affect how ornery she will be when she turns up.

Print off some A4-sized notices in a HUGE, bold font size saying "This dish IS suitable for Mavis" (with a bright yellow background) and "This dish IS NOT suitable for Mavis" (with a bright orange background). Stick them upright against the serving dishes on wooden skewers or lollipop sticks.

Make up a big bright yellow sticker - nothing tooo big, about 9 inches in diameter should be sufficient - saying "Dietary requirement - YELLOW-labelled food only" and slap it on Mavis (or whatever her actual name is, of course) as she arrives.

Announce loudly to everybody that there's been lots of unfortunate confusion in the past and that you must all play your part and take responsibility to make sure that Mavis's requirements are fully respected this time.

Literally, the only thing she can possibly do to protest this is not come back next time. And the problem with that would be.....?!?!

It sounds like she is making excuses so she can eat what she really wants to eat.

I agree, but I really don't understand whom she thinks she's fooling or making excuses to. It's not like the other people eating non-restricted food are going to be in a position to be able to, or even want to, judge her.

Surely, the easiest thing in the world would be to not invent any dietary requirements in advance, turn up and enjoy the food that she does as normal, along with everybody else, and then thank her hostess for the delicious food at the end. Especially considering that she's only just about related and turns up uninvited anyway.

I could understand her still rejecting the suitable dishes on some spurious grounds and going hungry, if she's the trouble-making attention-seeking type - but exactly what does she think she's achieving, apart from making things awkward for herself?

"For those wondering why I invite her: most of the time she just shows up. She assumes that any invite including her son includes her too."

Presumably your BIL is your sister's husband? What does your sister and BIL say about his mother? Does BIL think she's invited? Or is he a doormat to his mother?

Life really, really is too short for some things. I wouldn't be bothered. She or whoever is bringing her can bring suitable food, or since she's fasting she can stay at home. Why even come to dinner?

Eat or don't eat I wouldn't care less. It's rude attention seeking nonsense anyway I'd screen her out.

Give her bloody jam sandwiches. Honestly, some people.