I like eating out, I consider it a treat and I really look forward to it. Chain restaurants, cafes, pubs etc, I love browsing menus. Sometimes I can scan up and down a menu all I want, only to find a very limited choice of vegetarian options.
Sometimes there will be a helpful, obvious 'V' by a meal description which makes a world of difference as a vegetarian diner. It means I can be sure what i'm eating is suitable for my diet and makes me much happier.
In this day and age it's really a poor show to have barely any vegetarian options. Much as I like pasta and as much as I like mushrooms, I AM TIRED OF MUSHROOM PASTA. Someone who is a normal meat eater surely wants a bit of choice too, they might not always want a meal including meat. As I've touched on in a previous post, some people seem to think vegetarians only eat salad so perhaps restaurant chains are just playing it safe with offering a pasta choice, or a veggie burger. There is so much you can do to make amazing vegetarian friendly meals, just look at the Bistro 1847 menus for an insight into some well thought out, super tasty meat-free food.
Obviously I know there are more people in the world that eat meat, that don't. So I would never expect a menu to be half meat free, half including meat but there could be more choice for veggies.
I recently saw a menu where nearly every dish had a gluten free option too so it seems restaurants don't mind making the effort to prepare food slightly differently yet still they seem to think vegetarians only eat mushrooms. If you were a vegetarian who wasn't keen on mushrooms you'd be pretty stuck sometimes when eating out!
I just did a quick browse of the menus in some popular restaurants - Frankie and Benny's, Chiquito, Nando's, Pizza Hut and Harvester. I was looking at the main meal options, I know these restaurants offer different styles of food - Mexican, Italian, gastro pub etc. So their veggie options will reflect that. Frankie and Benny's didn't fare too badly with 2 pasta options, 4 pizzas, 1 burger and 1 wrap to choose from, however strangely, they didn't offer a vegetarian salad main meal! Chiquito offers one veggie option in nearly every category such a a veggie burger, wrap, fajita, salad, 2 quesadillas. Not the worst but some of the options are lacking in imagination.
If you don't like halloumi you're stuck. I like Nando's and despite halloumi and mushroom not being a groundbreaking combination, it is tasty and I do really like it. Nando's has this to say on preparing vegetarian dishes. It also offers a beanie and mixed veg option. Pizza Hut doesn't have anything big and fancy vegetarian wise but pizza is always good so to have 4 to choose from isn't too bad, the pasta dishes leave a lot to be desired though from when I've eaten them. Harvester stays very safe with their veggie options, they even do a veggie sausage and mash. A cauliflower tart, veggie burger and stuffed peppers. You don't expect anything amazing from basically a pub but at least there are a few choices.
Of course there is choice out there for none meat eaters, some restaurants are better than others at providing good vegetarian food but i'm sure it's a lot better now than it was 20 years ago. I will talk about some of my fave vegetarian places to eat out at on the blog soon. Let me know what your experiences are eating out as a vegetarian, do you think there is enough choice or have you been stuck with barely any options?
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