We are starting Sunday lunches at the place i work next week.What is a popular vegetarian alternative?!
We are starting Sunday lunches at the place i work next week.What is a popular vegetarian alternative?
Answers: A red onion, cherry tomato and goat's cheese tart, on puff pastry would do me!
Whatever you decide to do, please don't just give us nut roast - it's an alternative that lacks imagination and most of the time it's badly cooked.
Also, please make sure you're giving the same value for money as the meat eaters - a lot of the time I see meat piled high on people's plates and for the same money we get a stingy portion of pasta (poor value for money and hardly the same nutrition!). Thanks for thinking of us! Without knowing what sort of restaurant you work in, I can't recommend a specific dish. I can tell what NOT to make: a "roasted vegetable platter." This is the lame attempt at a vegetarian alternative that most meat-centered restaurants serve, and it's boring and bland.
Think of it this way: your vegetarian entree should fit into the menu, and be appetizing for anyone, not just vegetarians. I am vegetarian - I like cauliflower cheese grills or vegetable kievs - yummy! Just add it to the rest of a normal Sunday lunch. Cheese and red onion tart is really nice too.
PS. Not pasta or nut anything! Pitas with tofu. Quorn do a really good soya roast joint thing and lots of non vegetarians seem to like it also, i have done veggie sausages with mine before or nutloaf but that is so predictable, as a former vegetarian I would just have all the veg and yorkies which was more than enough, offer extra yorkie and roasties for them falafel..... I make a mean kind of cashew nut pie with tomatoes and stuff in it and a crust. Everybody loves it. As a veggie I've had a mushroom wellington at a carvery before. Was very nice. people love a good fresh loaf of ye olde bread serve with a dip...hummus anyone??? and veggies. I love nut roast! One thing which this thread is demonstrating is that vegetarians like anyone else, all have different tastes, so the most important thing is, if possible, to offer more than one vegetarian alternative. There's nothing worse than going to an event and being expected to feel grateful that you've been provided with one, no-choice vegetarian alternative, when it's something you can't stand. Where I work we sell a vegetable lunch, which is just vegetables with roast and mashed potatoes, yorkshire pudding and vegetarian gravy. It's quite a good seller. Another meal we sell a lot of is a meat free breakfast, as we serve breakfast all day.My favourite non-meat meal is Quorn cottage pie. Goat's cheese and red pepper quiche. Why not go to your local supermarket and have a look at their ready meals? I'm not in any way suggesting that's what you should serve, but it might give you some ideas of the range of things you could do.
Whatever you do, don't just serve meat substitutes! OK, if you're serving bangers and mash you could use onion gravy rather than meat gravy and offer veggie sausages, but Death By TVP does nobody any favours.
I agree with the other answerer that the veggie dishes should appeal to everyone - I'm a meat eater but if I see something vegetarian on the menu that looks interesting, I'll order it. It's just as easy to make meat dishes badly as it is veggie ones, so having them as part of the main menu rather than on a "special" list or tucked away in a corner means that they should be the same quality as everything else.
Also, one of my friends is vegetarian but allergic to cheese, which is apparently not as rare as it seems so it may be worth offering something vegan/dairy free (check the supermarket ingredients list and you'd be amazed how much veggie stuff contains cheese, egg or milk proteins). Vegetarian chilli is a classic example, and you could serve it with or with sour cream/grated cheese as an extra rather than included (also a way of adding a few pennies to the bill!).
Lasagne is another option, or cannelloni. These could use roasted veg, spinach and ricotta, Quorn or lentil "bolognese" style sauce. There is nothing popular about vegetarian food...plus do you really want those obnoxious people in your restaurant? Try a grass clipping salad topped with tree bark and twigs and berries. Well as you phrase it my dear -- a "vegetarian alternative" would be beef, pork, poultry, fish, seafood. Any of those would be quite popular.
I'm sure, since it sounds like all the food will be vegetarian, your meat course will be a welcome sight for the majority of the people there. Avoid anything that is specifically vegetarian - it makes them feel like awkward outsiders.
Cous-cous is a great all rounder - fry some finely chopped onions with some ground corriander, cloves, cumin seeds and a few chilli flakes. Add the cous-cous and equal volume of a good vegetable stock. Add the juice of a couple of limes and a heap of coursly chopped flat leaf parsley. Top it off with roughly broken up feta cheese. Serve it with a flat bread, warmed through and some roasted vegetables.
Just be carefull the non-vegetarians don't get to it first! One dish I used to do was an omelet salad. It is very easy and looks special on the plate.
Make a cheese or mushroom omelet, cook it both sides and cut into thick strips. Mix it into a herby leaf salad with plenty of cherry tomatoes, black olives, chives etc.
Another tip. Always make your soups vegetarian if not vegan.
Now that winter is coming, try a walnut and leek steamed pudding. A competent chef should be able to work out to use vegetarian suet, sweat down leeks, onions, thyme and nutmeg.
Make individual ones to be steamed for 2 hours depending on size and reheat as order comes in. Serve with veggy gravy.