Vegetarians at Christmas: the 10 rules

Christmas can be a real nightmare for vegetarians. All those traditional dishes revolving around copious amounts of meat or suet, or vegetables cooked in animal fat.

So here’s a quick guide in the run-up to Christmas, the 10 essential Yuletide “rules” that non-vegetarians should bear in mind when that poor veggie comes to dinner.

It’s based on some painful memories of seasonal fare during my own brief sojourn as a veggie (OK I got early parole for bad behaviour, but that’s another story and involves a bacon sandwich of course)…

1. ‘The Big Problem’

Veggies are often made to feel like they’re A Big Problem. They’re not.

So never ever serve them 10 minutes after everybody else, with a big fuss, and with the stuff on a special plate that says something like “Your Nuts” (or even “You’re Nuts”). That will only make them feel self-conscious and awkward.

2. ‘Vegetarians are from Mars’

Don’t treat vegetarians as Martians either. Perhaps they were Morrissey fans when they were young. Or they saw “Babe” when they were nippers – that engaging little tale of the talking piglet.

I was with my wife in France this summer. Karen is vegetarian but I forgot to tell the waitress this one day when we sat down to lunch. When we did mention it the waitress looked really sad and asked Karen is she was ill. She was very concerned. So no, the French and vegetarianism don’t go together.

- Jean-Michel Gauffre from the Languedoc, who runs a fine dining veggie restaurant in Edinburgh called L’artichaut – check out its wonderful sample menus

Talking of “Babe”, when the film was in Irish cinemas back in 1995, one of our politicians from County Cork got so hot under the collar of his thick red neck that he wanted “Babe” banned, believe it or not.

He even went on national radio claiming it would turn The Kids into vegetarians and ruin the country’s pig industry. Which it eventually did of course.

3. Please don’t do nut roast

Don’t think you’re “leaning over backwards” by doing them a bloody nut roast either (hereafter referred to as a BNR).

You’ve probably never done a BNR before, and it shows.

I know, you’re trying to be thoughtful and when you used your Phone A Friend option they said “why don’t you give them a BNR?”, because a BNR is the one recognisable option that rings a bell with many non-veggies.

Now nut roasts can sometimes be rather good. But try to think more broadly about all the other great vegetarian possibilities too – from vegetarian pâtés and gratins to bakes, curries, tagines, pizzas and so on.

4. He/she is not a martyr

Give vegetarians something you wouldn’t mind eating yourself.

Being vegetarian simply means someone doesn’t eat meat. It doesn’t mean he or she is a fundamentalist food martyr who has just strapped a belt of exploding tofu strapped to his/her waist before entering your house, and that they don’t want to eat anything that looks or tastes remotely interesting, and that they will pummel you with their views and ideas.

There’s a lot of horrible BNR recipes out there, and other fairly awful ready-made stuff too. That’s the real fundamentalism. If you wouldn’t eat it, why should they?

If you want non-meat inspiration – stuff  with passion and pleasure – why not try some recipes from Cork chef Dennis Cotter’s wonderful  “Cafe Paradiso” books, or something by English food writer Nigel Slater (not a veggie as such, but a terrific vegetable enthusiast), or The Veggie Table website.

5. Where’s the trimmings?

Even if you are doing A Special Meal around Christmas time, veggies might actually like some of the “trimmings” that everybody else is getting.

Why are you serving up the BNR with some overcooked rice mixed in with a vegetable mush resembling babyfood that even Baby would turn the nose up at – instead of proper roast spuds, sprouts and so on? Vegetarians might actually like sprouts, potatoes and lots of other tasty things that usually go with turkey.

So maybe leave aside some of the spuds to roast in olive oil or butter, for example, rather than with the bird.

Veggies love gravy too. With vegetable stock of course, but gravy nevertheless. Or some other sauce, because even a good BNR can be quite dry.

6. Accept no substitutes

Never just substitute something like a bland salad for the meat part of the dish, particularly for the main course. It never feels quite right. One problem for seasoned meat-eaters when they’re faced with the idea of a vegetarian meal is that they don’t understand the “language” or “grammar” of a vegetarian meal.

With a meat meal, the meat part can give a neat central focus-point, with everything else subservient to it. A simple equation: meat and (two) veg.

But with a vegetarian dish, the meat-eater cook doesn’t understand the completely different mathematical system involved. They keep looking for a single focus, not realising that in the vegetarian meal you can often have several main points of interest and pleasure.

(God, this is beginning to sound like a sex manual. Which perhaps it is). So check out those other gourmet erogenous zones…)

7. No, a salad isn’t a meal

While we’re at it, a bland little salad is not a main course. Why do you think so many restaurants call it “a side salad”? It’s just a bit of something on the side.

An iceberg lettuce that looks like it just hit the Titanic? Plus two or three tasteless tomatoes, a hardboiled egg and three scraggy scallions? Not even dressed? Yuck.

Some waiting staff in Irish restaurants and hotels still think that “The Vegetarian Option” means giving you one of these crappy side salads – only with double portions.

8. But salads can be sexy

For a cool, sexy salad, think more imaginatively. Start with a good base of different fresh greens (rocket, baby spinach, spicy leaves, spring onion etc) rather than that flavourless cheap supermarket lettuce, or the “mixed leaves” that were picked days ago and sprayed with a gas to preserve them.

Then add some tasty counterpoints – herbs such as mint or basil, lemon balm tops, chives, slithers of parmesan if they’re a cheese eater, or black olives that come in olive oil (rather than brine), some baby tomatoes that you’ve “sun-dried” yourself (put ‘em in the oven on a low heat for ages), smashed garlic, maybe some grated lemon zest, or freshly cooked baby beets, minty peas, crushed pistachio nuts, home-made croutons…

And all with a decent salad dressing of course – not something made by Paul Newman or Lloyd Grossman several months ago on a planet far far away, but a simple fresh dressing you’ve just made yourself.

That means some extra virgin olive oil, just a splash of a good vinegar (e.g. cider vinegar or balsamic, not Malt Extra Strength Fish-n-Chip Shop Vinegar), a light sprinkling of freshly ground pepper, a tiny pinch of sugar or a little dash of soy sauce if the salad has tomatoes, maybe a dollop of Dijon mustard and a twist of lemon. Now that’s a salad dressing.

9. When in France…

The French do eat a lot of veg, but vegetarians need a thick skin or a sense of humour, to deal with those raised eyebrows if they are bold enough to say that they’d rather skip the meat. It’s almost akin to heresy, even in the land of the Cathars.

The four essential phrases for vegetarians in France are:

• “Je suis végétarien” - I am a vegetarian
• “Je ne mange pas la viande” - I do not eat meat
• “Je ne mange pas du poisson” - I do not eat fish (or if you are a vegetarian that does eat fish, “je mange du poisson”)
• “Je ne mange pas du poulet” – I do not eat poultry/chicken (if you simply say you don’t eat meat, they may think you still eat chicken)

Notwithstanding all that, the Languedoc is very much a vegetarian paradise. Fruits and vegetables arrive in our corner shop when they are in season, often grown locally, organically, without supermarket uniformity but with superb flavours.

And if you are only a “demi-veg” and eat fish and/or cheese, this is paradise.

10. Fine young cannibals

So in conclusion, it shouldn’t be a problem having a vegetarian for dinner this Christmas (and they’re rather scrummy too).

As it happens, we’ve just been watching one of those films where a plane crashes in some mountains, and the passengers have to eat each other in order to survive. All well and good, but what does your favourite low-budget airline expect vegetarians to do in similar circumstances?

In fact, here’s a modest proposal: scientists ought clone “vegetable people”, a few of whom could travel on each flight, at a suitably discounted price, in rows three and four (the ones that Ryanair doesn’t allow you to sit in) to provide a suitable vegetarian alternative to cannibalism in case of disaster. Sorted.