To object to guests bearing meat

[stinkymonkey]

OK, so this is the situation: I have been vegetarian for about 25 years. DC both veggie, DP is not, but I do most of the cooking so effectively he eats veggie at home. Meat/fish never usually cooked in our house. Very occasionally I have cooked meaty sausages for a guest, but only about 3 times in the last 10 yrs.

Family live far away, so visits usually involve staying for about 4/5 days. Very often, they will bring meat, so I will open up my nice meatfree fridge to see some skanky ham poking out. The worst time was when MIL was on some kind of salmon-heavy diet, and made the whole house stink like cat food. My mum has just been here and has obviously been cooking meat because I could smell it when I turned on the oven.

What is wrong with people that they can't go without meat for a few days? Why does nobody think that, as a veggie household, we might object to meat being cooked here? Does this happen to any other veggies?

Family guests usually babysit, so I am trying to be forgiving, but this is really starting to piss me off.

"By FrannyandZooey on Mon 17-Nov-08 18:35:24

OR if they are staying a while and self-catering, discuss with them what types of meat you are / aren't happy having in the house
eg dripping bloody steak in fridge - no
takeaway eaten from the box - yes"

But what if the dripping bloody steak had come from a happy, free-range, organic beast, while the dead thing in the carry-out almost certainly lived a life of intolerable misery?

plays devil's advocate<

I can see your point OP, but I think you need to sit down and negotiate.

YABU to expect your guests to do without meat for 4 or 5 days - it is inhospitable to say the very least.

If you expect them to follow your rules in your house I think logically you ought to return the favour by eating their meat -based diet whilst staying at their house.

YANBU - we have exactly the same set up in my house, me and dc's veggie, and DH is what I refer to as an "indoor veggie".

Meat doesn't come in my house. I wouldn't be too fussed if people brought meat sandwiches and didn't expect to use my meat free plates or cutlery, but no no no to meat in the fridge! It's really disrespectful, and quite ignorant of people who think they can't live without meat for a day or two.

Really? Can people honestly not do without meat for 4 or 5 days? Wow, that really surprises me.

In any case, it's not as if they'd have to, because we tend to eat out once or twice, and they can have what they like then.

I think it's too late. You have not said anything before now and you admit that you have cooked meat for guests (albeit on only a very small number of occasions). You'll be the tetchy one if you object to it now.

YANBU - your house your rules but I think enforcing it now might be an issue.

I think it depends on whether you want them to stay with you or not. For some people four or five days of eating food that is likely to be very unfamiliar to them might well put them off visiting. We are not talking about a one off meal here after all. So you have to weigh up how much better you will feel with no meat in the house against how much worse they will feel if they can't eat the sort of food they think is normal to them. I am sure it could be negotiated, but it really depends on how much your family respect your vegetarianism, and what sort of a host you want to be. When my brother's partner came to stay with us I made sure I gave her lots of nice veggie options because I think that's part of being a host. I've only stayed with her for a couple of days, and have been fed very well on vegetarian food. When we rented somewhere together we had a mix. I do think you have to remember that it is your diet that is unusual, in the same way they have to remember why you are a veggie (presuming that you are making an ethical choice).

I think you are prioritising your veggie principles above your family relationships

YABU, especially if you have never mentioned your objection. After all they are your DP's parents and your DC's grandparents - surely you want them to feel at home, it's not like they're making you eat it.

YANBU. To a veggie of that long standing it stinks, we can smell cooked meat in our hair, on our clothes. Some people hate the idea of eating dead things so much that they can't stomach food cooked in the same pan. If that's the way you feel you must tell them and tough if they don't like it. But you may have to start cooking for them if you impose rules on what they can eat.

My family set up was exactly the same as yours, DP ate meat, I've been veggie 25 years +. DD is veggie for now. It always annoyed me that when people came to dinner it was expected that we serve meat (which we almost never did at other times).Seems some people really can't get throuth the day without it

YANBU although you have to tell them

I've been totally veggie myself since I was 7 and I actually think YABU. For most people, meat and fish are an integral part of a meal, and although most people are happy to eat the odd veggie meal, my DH or BIL would be miserable if they had to go 4 or 5 days without any meat or fish at all.

I think you might have to accept that although being veggie is a way of life for you (and me), we're still very much in the minority. I'd rather my guests were happy and felt welcome at my house, and would always buy meat or fish in so that they could eat the food they enjoy. DH would probably cook it though, as I'm pretty hopeless, given that I don't eat it.

I think your guests are being very unreasonable. Unless for medical reasons they absolutely have to adhere to the Atkins diet or suchlike, its no hardship to eat veggie food. Bringing you own food into someone else's house without asking first is quite odd really; bringing something they know is objectionable really isn't good manners.

How you get out of this situation gracefully, especially if your mum is doing it to wind you up, is not easy though without making you look (unfairly) like the unreasonable one.

'YABU to expect your guests to do without meat for 4 or 5 days - it is inhospitable to say the very least.

If you expect them to follow your rules in your house I think logically you ought to return the favour by eating their meat -based diet whilst staying at their house.'

FFS, poeple can live without meat for a few days. Meat eaters can eat veggie meals but veggies cannot eat meat meals.
I don't allow me in my house. Its my home. When in-laws visit they eat veggie food.

Are they bringing meat out of sympathy with your DH ie as a treat for him? If so, are you sure he is not encouraging them or at least enjoying it?

I also think the root issue is probably your relationship with your mum: if she is (as you think) trying to wind you up then it's a case of either letting her wind you up or, if she doesn't visit that often, just refusing to let it get to you.

I don't understand this "obeying rules" thing. When I have guests I am the host, not some sort of prison warden! If I had the children's friends around I would expect them to behave in a fairly similar way to my children, but when I have family to stay I hope they will feel at home and welcome, not worrying that they are not doing the right thing all the time.

It may not seem a sacrifice to not eat meat for a little while, but if you are a meat and two veg sort of person, which many people are then being expected to prepare your own meals with the centre of the meal missing isn't going to be easy. So I think if you have rules about what can and can't be eaten in your house then you have to provide all the meals, and you have to make sure that your guests like them (I don't mean cook meat, just make sure nothing is too "strange").

I can quite understand a committed veggie not wanting to have meat cooked in the house (I feel the same way about cigarettes), but some thought has to go into the needs of the guests too.

at "my meat-free plates and cutlery"

Did you know you can wash them? Really.

A lot of vegetarians/vegans object to eating from a plate that may have had meat on it. Well, the ones I've known have . Would you expect them to drink out of a bone china cup?

Tell them if they are going to bring meat to bring paper plates as well then. Oh and possibly a small cup of get-over-yourself for you.

I assume those vegetarians never eat out, then? They can of course order vegetarian dishes in a restaurant, but any cutlery/plate they use will surely have seen plenty of meat.

When they are invited for dinner to a friend's house, do they bring their own plates? What do they eat out of when they stay in a hotel?

It sounds like these people need professional help.

Vegetarianism aside, I'd be a bit about someone turning up with mince or ham that'd been sitting in a hot car for an unknown length of time.

YANBU.

Possibly - left to themselves they wouldn't go to an omnivore restaurant anyway - but it's their right to do as they want in their own home re what food and drink passes their doorstop. I admit it seems rude/odd but you either accept someone's foibles for what they are or don't visit them.

YANBU - your house - not theirs.

I don't think anyone here would go to a Jewish household and take some bacon with them for their breakfast!

So should be the same for taking meat into a vegeatrian household.

Oh, I thought the OP said beating meat not bearing.

Was the ham skanky or are you just being arsey?

Did they cook/ eat it in front of you?

Did they leave bits of masticated meat in your toothbrush?

I couldn't live without meat or fish. In fact I would go so far as to say that I wouldn't go and stay with someone who was vegetarian.

I can understand the principle of perhaps not wanting meat in your house, but to a meat eater their meat is as important to them as your vegetables are to you, so to expect people to go without an integral part of their diet for 4/5 days is very unreasonable. How would you feel if you went to someone's house and they said "well, we're quite picky and generally dont eat veg, so here's a nice steak."? It amounts to the same thing.