Meat in the industry.
I’m neither vegan nor vegetarian. I eat meat, fish, dairy, and eggs.
As someone who not only loves exploring different food, cuisines, and restaurants, but who also has cooked professionally in a variety of restaurants in the last few years, if I want to keep up with and embrace food as a hobby, passion, and career, consuming animal products is hard to avoid.
Not impossible, but hard.
However, I am also a product of our generation, and I would be foolish to be indifferent to environmental issues like global warming, pollution, biodiversity loss, and animal cruelty. As such, I also try to do my part when I can; I don’t cook meat or fish at home, I keep my dairy consumption to a minimum, and try to keep a relatively low-waste lifestyle. Practising sustainability and figuring out how we can get better at it is something we all have to engage with.
It is also something that is slowly but increasingly emphasised in the restaurant industry, particularly when it comes to choosing suppliers and how to utilise the food. Their focus in practising sustainability is to get their ingredients from trustworthy, regional sources with fewer uses of pesticides. It also includes cooking seasonally and keeping food waste to a minimum by using each and every part of the ingredients – resulting in menus featuring dishes with the green tops and leaves of vegetables and animal “off-cuts” like offal.
It is a good step up from previous practices, where restaurants would have no use for cuts other than the expensive filets, order and import fruit and vegetables no matter whether they were in season or not, and only accept produce that was in tip-top shape and potentially genetically or artificially enhanced. So we are off to a good start
The last few years have also seen a slow move towards more plant-based food with more restaurants offering vegan options.
However, this type of cooking often appears to be put into a separate genre from more “traditional” restaurants. Plant-based cooking is still largely viewed as a cuisine in itself. Restaurants that serve mostly or exclusively plant-based food will market themselves accordingly. In the same way that other restaurants would label themselves as an Italian deli, a Japanese sushi restaurant, or a sourdough bakery, there would be a vegan fast-food spot, a vegan bakery, or a vegan fusion restaurant. So if you are looking for vegan food, you can simply look up “vegan restaurants” and start from there.
My problem with this is that it seems to inhibit more traditional restaurants from embracing plant-based cooking. For many “high-quality”, “top-rated” and esteemed restaurants, veganism is not a label they want to identify with. Vegan food is still largely considered an inhibitor to “real” good food. Traditional, carnivorous restaurant goers also still tend to avoid vegan places, as they assume that the food simply is not going to be as good as they want it to be. Or that it won’t feel as complete as a meal containing meat, fish, and dairy. There seems to be an understanding that good food and vegan food are mutually exclusive; there is too much politics, morality, and health in vegan food, making it less appealing for someone for whom the purpose of going out to a nice (i.e. non-vegan) restaurant is to treat themselves to a joyfully guilty pleasure.
As such, despite the evident need for more plant-focused cooking for the planet, people, and animals, many restaurants continue to embrace animal-product forward menus. Indeed, with cooks like Fergus Henderson, there has been a revival of nose-to-tail cooking, on one hand justifying their use of animal products as the most sustainable, but at the same time creating menus with little to no vegan or even vegetarian options. If you go through the Michelin guide or general local guides for “good” restaurants, your choices are dominated by meat- and fish-forward restaurants. Some places may offer a minimal selection of vegetarian and vegan options in case a guest has the audacity to bring along a vegan friend.
In addition, many restaurants would use the authenticity argument to justify their use of animal products. I have no intention of butchering cuisines, disregarding traditions, and ignoring specific techniques and ingredients vital to creating dishes from different cultures. Naturally, to respect certain dishes and cuisines, some ingredients may be non-negotiable or at the very least hard to replace. However, the term authenticity can be tenuously overused. If a British restaurant were to say that a meat-heavy menu is authentic to British cuisine and culture, then that may be historically true. But tradition does not make something true or just. Furthermore, you might argue that eating meat on a daily basis is not authentic to 21st century Britain.
What I want to say, and what I hope will become more of a reality going forward, is that the restaurant industry, especially the higher-end “culinary institutions” with their more traditional restaurant goers will embrace more plant-forward menus without feeling like they are taking a step back in their culinary quality. To be a sustainable and relevant restaurant, more plant-based options must be the norm. With this, veganism will no longer be considered a separate cuisine and as a consequence, may be embraced by even more restaurants.
While tradition and “authenticity” have their place, they can no longer be the sole deciding factor when creating menus. With chefs intent on continuous innovation, let them direct this energy more towards dishes with fewer animal products, perhaps eventually avoiding them altogether.
Sustainability is a shared responsibility, and restaurants play a great role in it. The industry can have a great influence and they must wield it responsibly going forward.