To be annoyed that vegan options have replaced vegetarian?

[Sacredhandbag]

It's only a silly gripe in the grand scheme of things but it's bloody annoying.

I've been a vegetarian my whole life but since veganism has become more popular and more and more people are becoming part of the movement (and good on them!) it's like restaurants, cafes and hotels have skipped adding vegetarian options and thought "well vegan options covers both so we'll just add a few of those"

No! I am not vegan. I am vegetarian. I still want my eggs, my cream, my cheese, my butter. I want a stilton and broccoli bake, not a grilled bit of cauliflower!

Afternoon tea (I'm a fan and have one as often as I can) is the worst for it. There's an ordinary menu and then there's a vegan menu and that's it. You order one or the other. I don't want chicken or fish sandwiches but I sure as hell want my scones with proper clotted cream! So I have to be specific about the sandwiches and say I want some from one menu and some from the other. Bloody annoying.

Any other veggies feel the same?

Last pub meal I had the vegan option was vegetarian minus cheese , sauce and anything else that made it taste of anything. I basically had a plate of beetroot. This is not at all uncommon

People's bodies are different. I would be so ill on a vegan diet. Fair play to you if you weren't, but one of the most annoying things about some vegans is how they try to insist that veganism is healthier or even as healthy as being an omnivore. Unless you have a lot of time to dedicate to getting the balance of vitamins just right, it is a challenge to get a properly balanced diet if you are relying solely on plants. Which is fine, but what isn't fine is the sort of militant vegan who would like to ban meat and dairy.

I am not omnivore. I cannot digest meat or fish.

No idea about GBK as I only go there for a burger but I know places like Prezzo have a lot of options. Sadly my local one closed as they were always happy to tweak dishes for me.

Not this one.

We used to go there for a burger but they stopped doing any vegetarian ones and only had vegan options! DH wants CHEESE on his burger! GBK used to do a nice portobello mushroom one but not any more. Not even halloumi.

I agree that they should be mindful of those who will only eat that; but to an omnivore (as opposed to a carnivorous animal), it's all just food that they eat, so they aren't necessarily seeking to deprive you.

When I was little, the only vegetable I would eat was carrots, so when we ate out, my Mum & Dad would swap their peas/cabbage/etc. with me, so that I could have all of the carrots; but others eating at the same time, when there were large serving dishes, wouldn't have known or thought that, if they liked the look of the carrots and went heavy on them, that meant that I wouldn't have had any veg - even though they had still left plenty of veg.

Luckily, I live in a city with great vegetarian food. However, I have noticed this occasionally in other places. Vegan 'cheese' makes me ill, so in some paces which are more adaptable I can ask for real cheese, cream, and butter instead.

The worst was when we went for a very special but expensive meal somewhere in the Canary Islands. There were 3 set menus: Vegan, Fish and Meat-based. We spent ages arranging if we could cherry pick from each menu, as the fish and meat menus had the better (vegetarian) starters and desserts.

Whatever happened to BKs spicy beanburger ?

But that doesn't stop humans in general being omnivores.

It's still true to say that humans are a bipedal species - even though some people only have one leg or none at all.

I've just looked on the Deliveroo app and my local GBK does either a bean patty or a beyond burger and it let me add either American or cheddar cheese. No halloumi though unfortunately

I was once told in a Tesco cafe that they couldn't give me butter for my toast because it was a vegan meal so they're not allowed to give butter to put with it. I can't even remembered what I had on my toast, it must have been avacado or something.
What's really bizarre about that though is it's a Tesco cafe - the butter comes in foil packets! How can it contaminate anything? In the end I had to buy some packets of butter for 35p or something stupid. Every other breakfast involving toast just comes with butter!!

Yes, I have found vegetarian options vanishing in favour of vegan ones. I hate it and get very cross.

What I personally hate about it is the fake meat - I don’t want anything that looks like or tastes like meat. They usually replace proper veggie burgers now. Why not have both

I think two vegetarian options and two vegan options on a menu that has, say ten options overall is very reasonable.
That means most of the population have ten options, a smaller part have four options and the smallest group has two.
I can get on board with that!

Hmm... Just my fusiness eh?

The food I've eaten my entire life is disappearing in favour of people who eat less of a variety of foods than I do and that's due to MY fussiness, is it?

And why the bloody hell should I be paying to eat out but taking stuff with me in my handbag to make the food I've paid for taste nice?!

YANBU op. I also hate that veggie food has all but disappeared.

I have just done a little research on places local to me. The two gastro pubs have nothing vegetarian as a main course although they do offer cheese toasties (gee thanks). One of them is offering only a beyond meat burger.

There is a new local self described ‘authentic Italian’ and the menu is all vegetarian but every vegetarian single dish, bar one, has Parmesan cheese in it or on it.. veggies had to deal with that crap years ago, thought that had gone away…

And they often don't specify on the menu what that burger is, so I have to ask them, is the burger a fake meat burger or a proper veggie one with vegetables in it?
50% of the time I will get blank stares 😂

The sheer gall of a vegan telling a vegetarian not to be fussy...

We leave them and their animal byproduct aversion alone, they can back off about our honey, eggs and dairy. And wool.

I don't understand this stance either.

Vegans/vegetarians don't tend to avoid eating meat because they don't like the way it looks (or even tastes)and if they do, they're not the type to eat that type of food anyway.

It always struck me as odd that vegans or vegetarians would eat food that has been ultra processed to look like bacon or meat. If eating meat bothers you that much why on earth would you eat something that mimics it?

It always strikes me as odd that some meat eaters can’t work out why some vegetarians/vegans may want to eat something that resembles meat in taste, texture and looks, which isn’t actually meat. It’s really not hard to work out the answer if you engage your brain.

Omg yes! Lol! So annoying! Burger King done that - their original veggie burger was lovely too

So chickens and cows should be allowed to die out?

I haven't noticed this in restaurants but it has started to affect a conference I attend regularly although the organiser and venue change from year to year. A few years ago the caterers for the last night dinner clearly assumed that if you were vegetarian you must be vegan, so I missed out on a very nice looking pavlova for pudding and just got a bowl of fruit. Then last year the organisers decided they were going to be really virtuously green - no branded bag or notepaper, and all documentation online so I had to ask specially for a hard copy of the abstract book as I don't have a mobile. And all the lunches were vegan. I soon learned to avoid the skewers of mildew flavoured compressed rubber vegan cheese.

I agree! I recently went to a cafe and ordered the vegan burger, but asked for real cheese instead of fake cheese. They wouldn't do it! Bloody ridiculous. I just had chips and even then they were hesitant to bring me mayo with them because 'I had previously suggested I was vegan and the mayo isn't vegan'. Worlds gone mad.

The other thing that bothers me is when fake meat is the only option. I don't like meat, don't want to be reminded of it, don't want it!