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I don't eat meat or fish, and I would never call someone who is hosting a dinner to tell them that. Unless you are actually deathly allergic to something, I think it is impolite to expect someone else to cook specifically for you. I find that I never go hungry, and if I'm really worried, I would just eat something before leaving my house.

I don't mind accomodating allergies, religious restrictions or if someone is a vegetarian, but if someone "doesnt' like something"-- that's a different story.

I'm happy to accomodate people, but "doesn't like vegetables" would drive me crazy. There are so many vegetables in the world, if you don't like any of them, you're just not trying. I have a friend who won't eat barely anything. Spaghetti with jarred tomato sauce was on her approved list. But she ended up not eating it because it had basil flecks in it. At that point, I stopped worrying about feeding her anything. She can either enjoy what we reasonably provide or fend for herself.

yes, please explain how you made a vegan meal without vegetables.

i agree with above that that person gets left out. i have no trouble with vegetarians/vegans (its how i often cook for myself) but someone who just doesn't like a category as broad as vegetables seems absurd. did you just have bread, fake meat, and dessert?

Shoot! I thought this might have included suggestions about replacing panko crumbs in other recipes...

Maybe next time?

As a vegetarian, I enjoy hosting because I have the most food restrictions of anybody I know, AND I stock a much wider variety of foods at home. Usually guests are complimentary about what I prepare, so it's a lot of fun.

In the event that I have a picky eater (or three) I provide a couple of menus from local restaurants and call in an order.

Technically it's cheating, but it allows us to entertain any number of guests on short notice.

I've been at least somewhat vegetarian for most of my life, and I just make due at dinner parties. I agree that it seems very rude to expect a host to accommodate my picky eating. But at the same time when I'm hosting, I attempt to accommodate other's eating tastes.

I've gotten so used to cooking for a few of my vegetarian friends, that it's become second nature to make dinner party meals mostly vegetarian, anyway. It's so easy. One of my friends who does eat meat has some crazy allergies (no palm oil, no beets, etc.), and while cooking for her can be a minor challenge, it's also fun to improvise, sometimes on the spot (adding a Japanese turnip salad to the menu when I found out about her beet allergy turned out to be a great success).

I'm a vegetarian, and I hate hate HATE to be fussed over by the host. I eat before the party so I'm not famished, and I just quietly evade the meat. The exception is a really formal sit-down--it would be rude not to tell the hosts that I'm veg in advance in that situation.

There are vegetables I don't like but since I CAN eat them, I do. An ex-boyfriend's grandmother, very lovely Czech woman, ALWAYS made me a special dish of mushrooms when I was over for dinner. She felt if you had mushrooms, you don't need meat. I don't like mushrooms, but I never said so. I ate them, she was happy, and that's the price you pay as The Problem Guest sometimes.

i think my interest in food restrictions comes from my seven years of veganism. my latest interest is, whenever possible, in making the food restrictions actually improve the meal. so i was making a chocolate raspberry tart, and i had to make it gluten-free and vegan.
i used ground almonds and coconut, mixed with earth balance and sugar, for the crust. to make the filling, i mixed melted chocolate (tj's pound plus bar!) with coconut milk and vanilla extract. i then topped it all with raspberries and a lime simple syrup.
the substitutions i made for flour and milk, i felt, made the tart both fuller and more cohesive. to be fair, when i usually make vegan baked goods, i just do basic substitutions (soy or rice (or nut, when appropriate) milk for milk, earth balance for butter, ener-g egg replacer mixed with soymilk for eggs, etc), but i try to be creative when i can.

If someone has a food allergy, that's a different issue. But when I was a vegetarian I could always make do when I was invited to someone's house. Even now, I would never let someone know my likes or dislikes ahead of time or at the meal. It isn't about me. And sometimes you can be pleasantly surprised by making yourself try something you thought you didn't like.
I once invited a relative over for meat loaf and mashed potatoes, and he sat down to the meal and announced he didn't like meat loaf. That's just bad manners. Ultimately, it's not about what you will or won't eat at the meal. It's about the friendship and companionship you find that the table.

thank you vegetarians for being so understanding. I live with 6 picky (adult) eaters and I seriously want to hit them on the head every meal we have together. At least we got over my brothers not liking fish yesterday. I'll accomodate food allergies, some vegetarianism - meaning they will eat tasty side dishes - but food prefrences can kiss my butt.

My wife is vegetarian and I have Type 1 diabetes. No meat for her, low carb food for me. We always have a vegetarian meal and we will honor requests based on life or death allergies. The rest can just not come.

My wife once went out of her way (she researched for hours) to make a no egg no milk cake for someone who had religious restrictions against eggs and milk. No one, not even the picky guest, ate the cake. We'll never do that again.

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one." - Spock

I accomodate vegetarianism and food allergies, but unless someone calls me up and says "I'm so sorry, I just cannot deal with ____" I'm not going to remember that this friend hates onions, that friend despises mushrooms and this other person won't eat fish (not a problem because I don't either but I still won't remember it). If I find out that the dislike is strong enough to induce nausea, I'll try to accomodate but otherwise, sorry. I make enough dishes that you can eat around it. I sometimes think that makes me a bad hostess but there's only so much I can do, you know?

On the flipside, sometimes as a somewhat restricted eater myself, I will serve a gluten-free, no dairy, vegetarian or vegan meal to introduce my friends to dishes that are flashy and tasty despite the restrictions.

I am happy to accomodate just about anything. If I know in advance I enjoy the planning. But I just hate it when I ask people if they have restrictions and/or preferences and they don't state them.

If you don't eat meat or fish please tell me. If I have invited you to dinner I want you to eat it, not make do. I would be pretty aggrieved if I wasn't told. I know some people who will eat what they are served at dinner parties regardless of their normal intake-- but if you are not one of them I think you should tell your host. Meat and fish are expensive. They may or may not be a center of the plate item at a dinner party. There may or may not be other choices.

I am perfectly happy serving rabbit fricasse to a group of twenty people I don't know very well if everyone has told me they eat everything. If it turns out you don't eat everything I have to scramble and I don't appreciate it.

I agree totally with the people who've said religious, dietary and allergic restrictions are fine, but "don't like" doesn't get accomodated. It seems harsh, but when I figure out that someone is a difficult eater, I just don't invite them to my dinner parties.

I've got vegan and vegetarian friends, and I don't mind cooking for them at all. It's pretty easy to find great meals without meat and/or dairy. But, I can't stand cooking for people who just "don't like" basic and non-scary foods like onions, bell peppers, tomatoes, or fish. I've had experiences with all these dislikes, and I couldn't imagine having all of those people sit at the same table with some vegans, and then try to plan a meal. The vegans can stay, the non-onion eaters will have to eat elsewhere.

It 's so nice to hear all these accommodating, polite people. Maybe I should be having dinner parties with you!

I think it gets sticky when the host may not understand the food requirements. I have relatives who think vegetarians should eat vegetables stewed in beef consomme or pie with lard crust. Or worse, they want me to explain what's in marshmallows. The last thing we want to do is make the host feel uncomfortable or unable to provide a nice meal. I think my in-laws hesitate to invite us over because they fear I am judging their family recipes. I can understand why some of the previous posters would downplay food restrictions in order to make the event more enjoyable for everyone.

but what did you end up making?

My husband is a very picky vegetarian - I call him a fussetarian who won't eat eggs if they look eggs, goat cheese because it comes from a goat etc. He is retired and I work so during the week we are often at different places at dinner time. Weekends, I make meat or chicken for me and any guests along with a substantial vegetable dish. I also do build your own things where everyone can indulge their own choices. We recently had a build your grilled pizza dinner with two kinds of mozarella, two kinds of goat cheese, various vegetables, and pepperoni plus a large green salad. It was a big success.

As a vegetarian, I'm usually the picky eater. I have offered to bring my own substitute a couple times because I didn't want to make a host change the whole menu or cook something special just for me. This is almost a requirement in small town Iowa where even the side veggies have bacon or something on them.

I didn't eat red meat for 6 years. I ate chicken and fish, but no beef, pork, goat, sheep/lamb, etc... During the 4th or 5th year of this at Christmas, my grandmother - well aware of my food/life choice - decided to serve roast beef, spinach salad with bacon, and yorkshire pudding (cooked in the beef drippings) for dinner. I had bread rolls that year and never a more miserable Christmas was had. (She planned the menu in advance and it was re-mentioned to her that one of her guests didn't eat any red meat before anything had been bought or prepared and she honestly just said too bad). I still resent the whole incident.

Now I eat anything (with the exception of a mild aversion to raw bell peppers, but thats because they don't agree with me-won't kill me, just a mild upset stomach. once cooked they're fine.), and I will also accommodate pretty much any food preferences within reason (its a bit hard to be creative for someone who refuses anything but "plain" foods - white rice, plain chicken, baked or boiled potatoes, hamburgers on plain buns with just ketchup etc...). Those who will accommodate for people who are vegetarians but not for someone who doesn't like something are kind of being shortsighted.

When it comes down to it, unless you have a legitimate allergy or other health restriction, all food restrictions are preferential. You will not explode if you are a vegetarian and eat a lard pie crust, its a moral/ethical/health related/personal choice and it should be respected. But so should the choice of someone who doesn't eat onions just because the taste/smell really skeeves them out.

Funny you should use the word "explode" roseslaw. The medical community calls it gastric distress, and that is exactly what happens when a strict vegetarian eats animal products.

Our bodies stop making the enzymes to digest foods that we don't eat. The same thing will happen to a person who never eats beans and then eats a very large portion of them. No, it won't kill you, but it can be really uncomfortable.

P.S. Sorry to hear about your grandmother's insensitive meal planning. I wish you many satisfying Christmas feasts with your family!

Food allergies should be respected, but that's it. Vegans, vegetarians, people who "don't eat vegetables", and other freaks of nature should remain at home.

call me a bitter meat eater, but i don't believe in the whole gastric distress. I had a friend who swore she was lactose intolerant. She ate cream cheese by the bar, but complained of near vomiting when she ate mayonnaise and cheddar cheese (both have no lactose in it). Towards the end of the friendship, i grew petty and started feeding her stuff with animal products in it. lol.... Also, one of the best moments of misunderstanding happened when i was trying to order vegetarian food at panda express for my then vegetarian brother. I asked if they had plain broccoli and got 'Well, we can pick it out of the beef and broccoli for you'. Made me laugh and realize that I will never ever be a veggie head, no matter how much I love animals.

That doesn't sound hard--after all, nuts aren't common in dinner dishes. For the main dish, one could simply make a big vegan legume dish--if there are optional meat or dairy additions, keep them to the side. Then you'd want a veggie dish for most guests and a starch dish for most guests but especially the non-veggie guest--or the starch could be part of the main dish.

Or if you wanted to have meat, you could make the vegan legume dish and a meat dish, as well as the veggie dish and optional starch dish.

I find that the vegan diet is really the basic human diet--I wouldn't want to be restricted to it, but it's easy to be vegan for a day without even noticing. "The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen" is a great book for 'normal' cooking vegan recipes--no meat replacement ingredients, besides yummy legumes.

@Doctrine What a warm, welcoming, and mature way to look at the situation. Anyone else you'd like to place under house arrest in the process?