Personal Beliefs Vs. Career choice?!
Answers: I am a vegetarian and I have been one for almost two years, and I plan on being one for the rest of my life. I'll admit that in the beginning the reason I became a vegetarian was not for animal rights, but for health reasons. Now that I have learned more about the horrors that innocent animals face everyday, like being taken away from their families, living under horrible conditions, suffering abuse and then eventual death in slaughter houses; It has made me question my future career choice. Ever since I was little I have been in the kitchen, and I plan on taking up a career in the that field; I haven't decided if I'll specialize in one specific area, yet I would like to be knowledgeable in all areas of cooking. The only problem is that I don't want to work with meat and if I have to cook a dish that has meat in it, or taste test that dish in order to complete a requiered class in order to earn my degree. I wouldn't want to and I was wondering if there is anyway I could get around it?
My fiance only has three days left of culinary school and he will have his degree. We are both so excited! He started school two years ago and about half way through his education, we both became vegetarian. He already put several thousand dollars into school so he wasn't goint to not finish, ya know.
He has cooked and eaten meat all his life up until this point so he knows the proper cooking techniques as well as the flavorings that go along with cooking meat. He still cooks meat in school, but he never eats it. His teachers are surprised that he does such a good job at it. He never adds meat to any food as a flavoring. All of his chef teachers are always adding meat to soup, veggies, salad, ect.
One of his teachers just yesterday told him that he has opened his eyes to vegetarian cooking. His teacher said that he will now think twice about adding meat to a dish as a flavoring because it may just be tasty on it's own and not need it. He has opened the eyes of many meat eating students and professors as well. It has turned into a positive experience for him though he still does encounter cooking meat at times.
He's attending an Art Institute school and there's no way that he could have gotten around cooking meats. You would definitely have to go to a specialty school for that. The vegetarian niche of the market is growing so I think that you have a good chance of going far if you made the choice to be a strictly vegetarian chef. Good luck!!
Sorry I don't know much about the training you'd have to go to in order to qualify as a chef but there must some way you can train in just vegetarian cooking. Most hindus in India are vegetarian so they must have a way of getting around it.
You said that you'd like to be knowledgable in all areas of cooking and so I'm afraid in that case, you'd have to cook meat because that is a huge part of it. You could specialize in vegetarian cuisine if you want to and I'm sure in the future this would prove profitable as more people become vegetarian.
Meat is one of the biggest parts of being in the culinary field.
You could, however, think about being a pastry chef. Most dessert that I know of is vegetarian, except rice crispy treats and jell-o.
http://www.cookingschoolguide.com/cookin...
http://www.compassionatecooks.com/
http://localdc.com/cooking/
http://www.naturalgourmetschool.com/
http://www.zenyoga.org/vegan_cooking.htm...
http://www.vrg.org/links/#schools
http://www.angelshealthfoodinstitute.com...
http://www.chefal.org/
http://www.organictuscany.org/
http://www.tastytuscany.com/
I'm not really sure, but do know there are many vegetarian restaurants and where you can cook, most of them very ethnic.
There are new institutes that focus only on vegetarian food/health food options: http://naturalgourmetschool.com
Otherwise, you could apprentice at many of the new high tech vegan/vegetarian restaurants.
And many of the new vegan restaurants/raw food restaurants are people who just loved to cook (home chef style) and branched out. They took many classes on business and just kept trying new dishes of food to prepare for customers.
It won't be handed to you like a diploma from the four year degree culinary art schools; at least not yet.
If you have the passion there are ways to gain the knowledge you seek. I fear that to many people believe to be trained as a Chef you need to cook meat, the last Pastry Chef I talked to was a vegetarian. In culinary arts you can choose the path you wish to go. Be the best at whatever you choose.
http://www.auc.edu/dept/culinaryarts/cav...
Don't think about "getting around it". You have to decide what your question is about.
Why would you WANT to be knowledgeable in methods of cooking animals, when you yourself say you consider it unethical?
I'm not sure if a culinary school would be subject to the same laws as public universities, but, at laest in principles, your place of education should NEVER require you to do something that violates your beliefs. I'm sure there are a few vegetarian chefs out there, seek out their stories and see if you can go where they went.
As a vegetarian chef, you're sure to have a successful profession, as there aren't too many around!