In article , Ian Hoare
writes:

When is it right for the dietary preferences (I'm not talking about medical
needs, or allergies for the moment) of one person to limit the diets of 3
others? 7 others? 11 others?

Well, most of my friends (there are several) who are vegetarians,
pesce-vegetarians, etc. are pretty non-demanding. They will politely decline
the things they don't want. But to me the essence of being a good host is going
out of one's way to make your guests welcome. Sure, I'm a meat-eater. But if a
pesce-vegetarian is at the table, what is the harm of making grilled fish (and
using it to showcase a good white Burg, for instance)? If the true vegetarians
are coming, Betsy makes a wonderful mushroon risotto. And for that matter, once
we realized my friend Rachel doesn't like lamb (from 2 dinners where she barely
ate meat, before she "confessed" reason), when she was attending my birthday
dinner last week it was scarcely a hardship to serve Beef in Barolo. I also
have a friend, Jim, who won't eat "anything from the sea" (I know, strange). I
don't feel any of these things are an imposition.
God knows I don't need to eat lamb 7 days a week!

Of course, I don't invite vegetarians to St. Patrick's Day celebrations - I
want my corned beef.

That usually just applies to main courses. As we usually have several sides, I
could frankly care less if someone doesn't like beets.And Jim was at same party
last week, I just didn't offer him the salmon roe and other roe appetizers.

That is my thinking re dinner parties. At our big holiday party, we serve 20
mostly finger-food dishes, without thinking about it -everyone will like
something. And big parties during summer usually feature meat, fish, and
veggies all from grill.

I guess to me the problem with the dinner I cited was that the host, eager to
share his bottle of fine Bordeaux,insisted on serving it with an inappropriate
dish. I think he would have been better off doing one of the following (in
order):
1)saving the Bordeaux for another occasion
2)serving a cheese course with Mimolette, aged Gouda, or the like w/the Gruaud
3)serving a main vegetarian or fish course that could have matched OK (if not
great ) with the Bordeaux- fish in a Bordelaise sauce, grilled portabellos, etc
4) serving the Bordeaux with a meat appetizer of some form (kabobs, pate, etc)

The only situation I've felt that it's not my duty at a dinner party has been
in 2 cases of extremely picky eaters (1 child, 1 adult). The child's parents
just bring chicken pieces that she likes. The adult (son of friends) is a
vegan, and a picky one at tht. If he comes to a party (not someone I usually
would invite to a sitdown dinner), if he doesn't like any of the 15-20 foods
I'm serving, he's welcome to get out jar of peanut butter. But if I invited him
to a sitdown dinner, I'd at least be sure we had plenty of greens and maybe a
rice side.

I am very winecentric, and even when AA friends are at dinner I have wine. But
I do try to make sure we have some other options (juice, sparkling and still
waters, etc).

Making my friends happy is part of the joy of entertaining to me. There are
plenty of other occasions for me to indulge my likes. I also like calves'
liver, rabbit, and artichokes- but Betsy doesn't. There's always restaurants,
dinners when she's touring, etc. I don't feel deprived.
Dale

Dale Williams
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