Vegetarians invited themselves for Christmas- got beef ordered!

[EdenFlower]

So, my vegetarian relatives and asked if they can join us for Christmas? I have it planned- joint of beef on order, I've perfected my roast potatoes and like them cooked in beef dripping, likewise the yorkshire pudding, my sprout recipe is cooked with pancetta, starter is parma ham and figs...and so on! Grrr! Now everything will need to adapted to be veggie because I'm not doing two versions of everything. It was already adapted to be gluten free for MIL but now two more special diet guests is a push.

Would it be rude to ask them to bring their own veggie options with them- nut roast and vegetarian gravy or whatever it is they eat?

(I mix blue cheese with Wensleydale or equivalent and do a lovely big pastry holly leaf on the top :D)
www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/squash-blue-cheese-wellington

If they've invited themselves then I think it's completely fine to ask them to bring a dish.

However, if it were me, I would either buy or premake a dish for them and put it in the freezer until the day.

I'd probably go for a nice cheesey pie. It's hearty and filling. I'd also do a full tray of roast veg - 1/3 potatoes, 1/3 parsnips and 1/3 carrots. Roast them in sunflower oil and pour maple syrup over the carrots and parsnips. That way they've got an entire veggie meal that's only 2 trays and doesn't require you to change anything you're making for your own family.

@YouJustFoldItIn

You said only three things in your Christmas dinner don’t have meat in them! That doesn’t sound like a decent roast, or a discerning cook.

Maybe one of your resolutions should be to experiment more with different flavours?

I experiment with different flavours practically every day of my life. It's literally what I do. Cook new dishes and develop new recipes. This week alone I've cooked four new things from cokkery books that I've never made before and I've been shopping for about six or eight esoteric ingredients that most people probably haven't even heard of, let alone have in their pantry.

A traditional British style roast dinner is based around a joint of meat or a bird. Roast potatoes require fat or they are not roasted, they are just baked. Ask any decent cook who is not a vegetarian and their roast dinner will probably include basting stuff in the meat juices or dripping from the joint, or some goose fat, and making gravy using meat stock. It's sort of the whole point of a roast dinner with meat. The meaty flavour.

I am very happy to try new alternatives to things (except fake vegan Frankenstein 'meats') and I don't eat meat every day. But on Christmas Day I want my Christmas turkey dinner cooked the way most chefs would recommend cooking it. And that includes using meat stock, meat fat and meat juices.

Exactly this. I don't think people quite get it. The vegetarian substitute might taste good, but not the best. I can taste the difference between roasties done with animal fat and vegetable oil quite clearly.

From the other side dhal (lentil curry) is traditionally a vegetarian dish and while people put all sorts of things in it the vegetarian version tastes best. Because that's the point.

@hotmeatymilk I was going to ask if you'd read that threada hahahaha

Most chefs are not cooking a roast dinner like they’re serving Henry VIII.

Neither am I.

I've already said my Christmas dinner consists of the usual things that most people's consists of. Turkey, pigs in blankets, maybe some sausagement in the stuffing, maybe some bacon/pancetta in the sprouts. Meat juices used for the gravy. Meat fat used to baste the potatoes. All pretty standard stuff for a traditional Christmas roast. Flavouring things with the meat juices is not the same as eating excessive amounts of meat.

Most chefs are not sticking religiously to one flavour because of some weird tradition. I think you’ve misunderstood what it means to be a decent cook.*

Oh I think you'll find they are, actually. And it's not a 'weird' tradition. It's Christmas.

Besides, it's not about 'sticking religiously' to one flavour - wherever did I say that? It's about using the flavours known to complement those particular foods. I might have herbs and bit of lemon in the cavity of the turkey, celery and leek and carrots in the tray to add flavour to the stock which will later make the gravy,. I have cranberry sauce made with orange zest and maybe some Grand Marnier, I have sage and onions in the stuffing, chestnuts with the sprouts, honey on the parsmips, etc etc. Sometimes I'll do a spiced red cabbage with red wine, cloves, nutmeg, apple.

But the same way that I don't randomly add pineapple to my beef lasagne I don't add fresh chillies or parmesan cheese or anything jarring or unnecessary or unauthentic to my Christmas roast, just for the sake of being different. I don't want 'different' on Christmas Day. I want familiar. I want nostalgia and tradition thanks very much.

I eat 'differently'' enough all of the rest of the year.

So you're happy to do gluten free but not coating everything in animal is a bridge too far, not to mention the cooking prowess you are keen to emphasise? Uh, O.K.

@YouJustFoldItIn

Most chefs are not cooking a roast dinner like they’re serving Henry VIII.

Neither am I.

I've already said my Christmas dinner consists of the usual things that most people's consists of. Turkey, pigs in blankets, maybe some sausagement in the stuffing, maybe some bacon/pancetta in the sprouts. Meat juices used for the gravy. Meat fat used to baste the potatoes. All pretty standard stuff for a traditional Christmas roast. Flavouring things with the meat juices is not the same as eating excessive amounts of meat.

Most chefs are not sticking religiously to one flavour because of some weird tradition. I think you’ve misunderstood what it means to be a decent cook.*

Oh I think you'll find they are, actually. And it's not a 'weird' tradition. It's Christmas.

Besides, it's not about 'sticking religiously' to one flavour - wherever did I say that? It's about using the flavours known to complement those particular foods. I might have herbs and bit of lemon in the cavity of the turkey, celery and leek and carrots in the tray to add flavour to the stock which will later make the gravy,. I have cranberry sauce made with orange zest and maybe some Grand Marnier, I have sage and onions in the stuffing, chestnuts with the sprouts, honey on the parsmips, etc etc. Sometimes I'll do a spiced red cabbage with red wine, cloves, nutmeg, apple.

But the same way that I don't randomly add pineapple to my beef lasagne I don't add fresh chillies or parmesan cheese or anything jarring or unnecessary or unauthentic to my Christmas roast, just for the sake of being different. I don't want 'different' on Christmas Day. I want familiar. I want nostalgia and tradition thanks very much.

I eat 'differently'' enough all of the rest of the year.

No: you said there were only three meat-free things on your Christmas table and one of them was cranberry sauce.

If chillies and pineapples are exotic for you, I definitely think you need to experiment more with your cooking.

@Pumperthepumper chilies and pineapple would certainly be exotic for a roast dinner

No: you said there were only three meat-free things on your Christmas table and one of them was cranberry sauce.

Yes. That's correct. I said carrots, parsnips and cranberry sauce. Spiced red cabbage would be a fourth if^ I was making it, but I don't always.

The turkey is meat. The pigs in blankets are meat. The sprouts might have pancetta in. That's meat. The gravy will have meat juices and meat stock in it. The potatoes are likely to have been cooked in goose fat or dripping. Even if I used olive oil I would probably add some of the turkey fat rendered off, for flavour. The stuffing is likely to contain meat or meat stock or be basted in some turkey fat. So yes - as I said, unless I cooked separate stuff for a vegetarian your plate would have carrots, parsnips and cranberry sauce on it.

If chillies and pineapples are exotic for you, I definitely think you need to experiment more with your cooking.

And now I know you are just winding me up for the tiny little thrill of it.

I agree your galette sounds far nicer, @TatianaBis. I was just trying to make things easy for OP by sticking to her original menu as closely as possible. I shall have to look out that recipe in the Times. Parsnip and gruyere souffle sounds great, do you have a recipe link?

@YouJustFoldItIn

No: you said there were only three meat-free things on your Christmas table and one of them was cranberry sauce.

Yes. That's correct. I said carrots, parsnips and cranberry sauce. Spiced red cabbage would be a fourth if^ I was making it, but I don't always.

The turkey is meat. The pigs in blankets are meat. The sprouts might have pancetta in. That's meat. The gravy will have meat juices and meat stock in it. The potatoes are likely to have been cooked in goose fat or dripping. Even if I used olive oil I would probably add some of the turkey fat rendered off, for flavour. The stuffing is likely to contain meat or meat stock or be basted in some turkey fat. So yes - as I said, unless I cooked separate stuff for a vegetarian your plate would have carrots, parsnips and cranberry sauce on it.

If chillies and pineapples are exotic for you, I definitely think you need to experiment more with your cooking.

And now I know you are just winding me up for the tiny little thrill of it.

Can I come over for your Christmas? You sound like an excellent cook!

@YouJustFoldItIn

No: you said there were only three meat-free things on your Christmas table and one of them was cranberry sauce.

Yes. That's correct. I said carrots, parsnips and cranberry sauce. Spiced red cabbage would be a fourth if^ I was making it, but I don't always.

The turkey is meat. The pigs in blankets are meat. The sprouts might have pancetta in. That's meat. The gravy will have meat juices and meat stock in it. The potatoes are likely to have been cooked in goose fat or dripping. Even if I used olive oil I would probably add some of the turkey fat rendered off, for flavour. The stuffing is likely to contain meat or meat stock or be basted in some turkey fat. So yes - as I said, unless I cooked separate stuff for a vegetarian your plate would have carrots, parsnips and cranberry sauce on it.

If chillies and pineapples are exotic for you, I definitely think you need to experiment more with your cooking.

And now I know you are just winding me up for the tiny little thrill of it.

Even if I used olive oil I would probably add some of the turkey fat rendered off, for flavour.

See, it’s this: the flavour of meat. The endless meat flavour in your food, it’s bizarre.

@hotmeatymilk

If chillies and pineapples are exotic for you, I definitely think you need to experiment more with your cooking. If reading comprehension is this difficult for you, I definitely think you need to experiment with reading pp’s post carefully, line by line, and perhaps get someone to explain it to you with pictures.

Would you be a love and do it? Thanks

Too busy being a workyticket

I think before you make a decision ask them if they’re okay with their veggie dish being cooked with the meet. The vegetarians in my family would hate this & would prefer to bring their own dish.

I really don’t get how picking up a nut roast and ready made gravy from sainsburys is a massive deal.

It's not the picking them up that would bother me itnowuld be trying to find room in my already crowded oven to cook something that might need a different temperature to anything else I am doing and to serve it up properly cooked and still warm alongside my main course.

@EdenFlower I have cooked the below for the last 2 years on Christmas Day for my veggie husband. I just do a full Wellington though rather than individual. It is better assembled the day before and refrigerated and cooked on the day. Might be worth a trial run before Christmas because it is incredibly tasty whether you’re veggie or not!

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/melty-mushroom-wellingtons

Leave his waste of space ass. Lose the weight (if you want too) and then smile at him- he'll know what his lost!

See, it’s this: the flavour of meat. The endless meat flavour in your food, it’s bizarre.

Well I wouldn't do it in an apple crumble. Or a gazpacho or an omelette. I just do it when I'm cooking a roast because THAT"S HOW TO COOK A ROAST.

@Rubadubdub21

Leave his waste of space ass. Lose the weight (if you want too) and then smile at him- he'll know what his lost!

Oops wrong thread lol.

Don’t be so bloody mean. You should have said no if you don’t want them to come, you can’t ask them to bring their own!! Make an onion gravy reduction, buy a vegan Wellington from marks and boil a few sprouts before you add the pancetta and fry yours off. It isn’t hard to do extra potatoes either, you could even cheat and get pre-made options. Stop being tight!

@YouJustFoldItIn

See, it’s this: the flavour of meat. The endless meat flavour in your food, it’s bizarre.

Well I wouldn't do it in an apple crumble. Or a gazpacho or an omelette. I just do it when I'm cooking a roast because THAT"S HOW TO COOK A ROAST.

No it isn’t. You don’t need meat residue in every side dish.

@chesirecat99

I agree your galette sounds far nicer, *@TatianaBis*. I was just trying to make things easy for OP by sticking to her original menu as closely as possible. I shall have to look out that recipe in the Times. Parsnip and gruyere souffle sounds great, do you have a recipe link?

I think I found it online was something like this: parsnip and gruyere souffle

Except I used a mixture of thyme, bay and rosemary and some mustard.

We’re vegan. When we go to my Mum’s at Christmas we take much of our own food. Its easier. It also helped as my Mum got older as found coping with her own food harder never mind mass catering.

I’m sure your relations don’t mean to be awkward - maybe thing more family time and past the fairly minor menu problems?

If they were Jewish, Muslim, had severe allergy problems, had ibs etc would you have the same somewhat abrasive manner about them coming over fora celebratory family meal?