let’s discuss terrible food at conferences and other work events

by Alison Green on August 17, 2023

Let’s talk about terrible conference food — or hell, we can broaden to terrible work event food in general.

Some stories readers have shared in the past about culinary failures:

  • I have attended several conferences that were bad, but nothing beats the time the group was served chicken on a bed of lettuce. The vegetarian option was just the lettuce. One singular lettuce leaf. The vegetarians assumed they just forgot another protein, like tofu, but no, that was the entire entree.
  • I went to a conference and had specifically told them I was vegan (this was about ten years ago, when that was pretty unusual). For lunch on the first day, I was presented with a bowl of undressed salad leaves and a single cherry tomato.
  • Worst conference food I ever had to deal with was the conference that didn’t think about the need to accommodate those that can’t eat seafood. Three day conference, lunch and dinner provided and every single meal was shellfish of some variety. No vegetarian options, no shellfish free options (though with the quantities of shellfish they were prepping I wouldn’t have trusted the kitchen anyways) – just scallops, crab, shrimp, crawfish, lobster as far as the eye could see. I had to leave for every single meal because of a lack of food.
  • The first day, the afternoon snack was hot items you needed a fork to eat … so everyone figured the next day’s “afternoon snack” (as it was listed on the agenda) would be similar. Nope! The next day’s snack was coffee and tea. No food, and no indication that it would be different. Then the lunch items were kind of all over the place, with the veggie options being the worst – like a limp lettuce sandwich as the only veg option, while everything else was hot plates. They were also frequently running out of food, and people had to go into the city to eat.

Let’s hear your stories of bad conference food/bad work event food.

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  1. Queen of the Introverts*

    Undergraduate research conference. The vegetarian option was a sauteed vegetable sandwich. Not bad…once. It was a three-day conference, and they served it at every meal. We quickly realized we could just go through the “meat” buffet line and have our choices of sides, salads, etc.

    1. Tinkerbell*

      I went to a large three-day writers’ conference – 1500 attendees. The first day, dinner was a chicken quarter with red sauce. The second day, it was the same chicken quarter with green sauce. The third, it was the same chicken quarter with white sauce. I think the sides were the same two of the days, too. The vegetarians got the exact same meal three days in a row even without different sauces :-\

      2. MT1980*

        Omg! I went to a conference with the EXACT breakfast every day for 5 straight days! Nothing else. It was a god awful breakfast burrito (spinach, cold scrambled “eggs” and hash brown potatoes—in a spinach wrap) and fruit I would serve as slop to a hog.

    2. Sloanicota*

      A coworker had do a lot of conferences in the Deep South (in casinos, which was a weirdly common venue for conferences in that job despite our work having nothing to do with gambling) and reported that every time she ordered vegetarian a) the server was extremely flummoxed and b) they would bring her wedge salad with bacon on top, every time. When she pointed it out, the salad was whisked away and then returned … and they had clearly just brushed the bacon bits off, with a few having fallen down between the lettuce leaves. One time it was still served pre-dressed in bacon ranch dressing and they seemed puzzled by the request of any other dressing or at least dressing on the side. She wasn’t even vegan! And this wasn’t like the early nineties, either – this was mid 2010s.

      1. Wendy Darling*

        I worked for a company that was based in a major west coast city and had satellite locations all over the US. They had an annual in-person training where they flew everyone out. It was 3 days long and 100% mandatory that you stay in the hotel it was at, even if you were local.

        Somehow despite it being 2017 and the company being in a major west coast US city where vegetarianism and veganism are very common, they straight up did not bother to provide ANY special diet meal options. No vegetarian much less vegan, no gluten free, no kosher, no halal, nothing.

        There was an all-company dinner at a restaurant where they did a set menu and the options the company had chosen for it were meat, chicken, or fish. I was at a table with a vegan colleague and she basically ended up asking the waiter if the kitchen could make her something she could actually eat. It was ridiculous. And it wasn’t an issue with the restaurant because they were SUPER NICE ABOUT IT and made her a vegan dish special. The company were just idiots.

      2. Jen*

        Years ago when I was vegetarian I was at a deli in Wisconsin and ordered “old world vegetable soup,” which consisted of potatoes, carrots, cabbage and … sausage. Because, Wisconsin?

          1. Princess Sparklepony*

            My 95 year old mom made her vegan neighbor some vegetable soup…. with chicken stock! Mom didn’t realize that stock counted. The vegan noticed it at first sip.

        4. Never Boring*

          I once spent 36 hours on a chunk of the Trans-Siberian Railroad, and my entire group decided to order vegetarian meals on the theory that they would be less likely to give us food poisoning. One “vegetarian” meal consisted of cold boiled spaghetti with chunks of hot dog-like sausages and ketchup.

          1. Food is love*

            I went to a Hungarian restaurant in Poland in college as a vegetarian studying abroad, and our professor had preordered all the meals. The vegetarian option was a SLAB of deep fried cheese the texture of tofu and about 7 inches x 7 inches, with a side of fries

        5. Crooked Bird*

          Haha I’m suddenly reminded of my college cafeteria serving (at least they served it on the side-dish table!) “Asian Noodle Soup” that was very clearly random leftover pasta & leftover sweet & sour chicken thrown into a pot with some water.

      3. Lynx*

        I went to a networking group’s retreat last year that had literally zero options for me (vegan at the time, now vegetarian) and one other vegan who was there. It was just… not factored in. Nobody asked anyone when planning. Super awkward when the non-eggs & breakfast meat breakfast option was… yogurt or cereal with dairy milk only.

        When we went out to the restaurants for group dinners, the restaurants were great and accommodated us. The food served during the day sessions though was… not good. We had to make do with some very sad sides (even the salad had cheese one of the days!) and the clif bars we went to a nearby convenience store to get.

        When they sent out an anonymous feedback survey post-retreat, it’s something I mentioned, and I’m happy to say that on this year’s registration form they asked about dietary restrictions!

      4. Anna*

        Ya the South is weird about that. I moved here recently-ish after previously living on the West Coast for a while . . . have literally seen “if you don’t eat meat go home” style signs in some restaurants, in todays day and age.

        1. Dogmomma*

          qhere?? we live in a small rural town in the south and have never seen that. Course Olive Garden is considered real Italian here,and everybody’s all excited about the brand new built one that’s opening next month.
          I’m not Italian but come from 2 different cities with excellent Italian restaurants and do pretty well in the kitchen. I just roll my eyes.

          1. Queer Earthling*

            …my rural town is also opening an Olive Garden next month, making me wonder if we are in the same rural town or if there’s a sudden Olive Garden epidemic. (We’re just happy because my partner can’t eat wheat and Olive Garden has gf pasta, and sometimes we’re tired of cooking. We’re aware that it isn’t authentic, doesn’t make it inedible.)

        2. Queer Earthling*

          I live in the deep south and there are plenty of veggie and vegan restaurants in the cities, and even some in my fairly rural town (and many more that aren’t strictly veggie but have actual options available). But if you’re going to a barbecue place or something, yeah, I think you can go ahead and expect them not to have non-meat options, because their whole thing is pit barbecue; that is what they specialize in and what they focus on. The apparent hostility is meant humorously I think, but I don’t think you can expect Bubba Joe’s Pork Shack to accommodate for everyone. (Though obviously, you shouldn’t have business meetings at Bubba Joe’s for that same reason.)

        3. Shakti*

          I grew up in Massachusetts and moved to Tennessee and then Florida and honestly it’s so much easier to be a vegetarian in the south than the north! When I asked for vegetarian options in Massachusetts for work events one time the option was mashed potatoes that was it and another time I was given 5 round slices of glazed carrots for dinner I was very very hungry. Here it’s pretty easy there’s always something and people ask more too

      5. Princess Sparklepony*

        If they were bacon bits, then they are vegetarian. They are made out of soy and have been for decades. Calling them bacon is a misnomer, they usually put an apostrophe in to get out of trouble – bac’n.

        “The main ingredient is textured soy flour, a protein-rich meal made from ground soybeans. The soy flour is mixed with canola oil and salt for texture and seasoning. The “bac’n” is dyed with caramel color and red 40 dye.”

    3. Alex the Alchemist*

      Oh god this wasn’t conference food but I was at a conference during a big winter storm and aside from attending the day of events that didn’t get snowed out I was effectively stuck in the hotel food-wise. The only vegetarian option was sauteed balsamic vegetables. I was there for three days.

      1. Pat*

        Did they think that vegetarians need less protein than meat eaters? I guess they actually weren’t giving it a moment’s thought.

    4. Richard Hershberger*

      I have for many years attended an annual early baseball history conference. It includes a catered lunch with the same menu every year. You wouldn’t think you would get tired of something eating it once a year, but it turns out to be possible, and indeed something of a running joke. It doesn’t help that the food is just OK, rather than actually good.

  2. ursula*

    Extremely stoked to see how well-represented my vegetarian/vegan cousins are going to be in this discussion.

    1. ursula*

      Mine is every conference that accounted for the vegetarians and vegans by just putting out a few veg sandwiches on the general buffet, grossly understimating how many non-vegetarians will happy grab a veg half-sandy to mix up their own meal. The number of times I have not ended up being able to get “the vegetarian options” and compiled a meal out of greens and a muffin should be embarrassing for all involved.

      1. General von Klinkerhoffen*

        I operate on an 80:20 rule for buffet as soon as there’s one vegetarian present (80% of the food will be vegetarian, 20% max contains meat).

        To date I haven’t had to cater for vegans so I’m not sure what ratios would be involved in that case but even putting dressings and proteins separately from salads and carbs probably gives 40:40:20.

        1. Polar Vortex*

          This is my rule too, both when I worked catering and when I order it now. My theory runs on: meat eaters can always eat veggie but veggie eaters can’t eat meat. And honestly you’re not wrong on the vegan thought either, a lot of the vegan options now a days can be really great and people default to them without realizing they’re vegan.

          But once you put GF or Nut Free in the mix it gets real interesting. Or regions, India catering vs US catering. US catering in cities vs in the middle of nowhere… My ratios adjust then.

          1. Zoe Karvonopsina*

            I once ordered my manager a vegan gluten free sandwich for a meeting, and handed her her special labelled gluten free plate.

            “This has…chicken?”

            Apparently they thought I meant a vegan sandwich and a gluten free sandwich.

            1. Paulina*

              Our institution’s special-food labeling system is similarly nonexistent and seems to be based on passing information verbally. We’re sometimes left to guess which special meal is really for whom. Additionally, they don’t label the “for everyone” dish so that we know whether it’s supposed to be safe for those who have restrictions. Is that chicken breast with an unidentified coating gluten-free? Are the salad dressing and soup non-dairy? Turns out they are, hence the lack of alternatives provided, but my colleagues aren’t taking chances on something unlabelled.

          2. Never Boring*

            I once successfully fixed up an Indian-American friend with a Sicilian-American friend. The Indian-American friend had a chunk of the family who were orthodox Jains who don’t eat onions or garlic. Let’s just say there were two separate wedding buffets (I happily tried both!).

            1. Princess Sparklepony*

              I never knew that there were religions that eschewed onions and garlic. Those are my food groups!

              1. Yikes Stripes*

                Strict Jains don’t eat root vegetables at all both to prevent the entire plant from being killed and also to avoid killing small bugs and soil microorganisms. If I recall correctly, it’s the strictest form of veganism out there.

        2. Kit Kendrick*

          I helped a friend do catering for convention volunteer staff once and had hardly any responses for dietary restrictions. She made a large batch of homemade hummus for snacking because we have good access to the raw ingredients and it’s suitable for most people. It turns out there were a lot of vegetarian volunteers but they’d gotten used to being fed two sad slices of white bread with a Kraft single between them by the previous caterer and had just decided they’d fend for themselves. We ran out on the first day of a three day convention. My friend said she could have cried, because once you are making that much hummus, doubling or tripling the batch would not have been that hard. At least we got more accurate responses on the food survey the next year.

          1. Observer*

            My friend said she could have cried, because once you are making that much hummus, doubling or tripling the batch would not have been that hard.

            Yeah. Hummus is really easy to make if you have a decent food processor.

            At least we got more accurate responses on the food survey the next year.

            I can imagine. I can also imagine the vegetarians’ pleasant shock of “Oh, wait! She really meant it!” on seeing the hummus.

        3. Paulina*

          In my experience, part of the problem is caused by the order of the food on the buffet line: it always seems to be in order of most restrictive to least restrictive (vegan, then fish/chicken, then beef). So the stuffed eggplant looks good and a lot of people take some and then continue on to the more meaty dishes loading their plate up more and more.

          1. Mack*

            I think that’s generally because the less costly food is set out at the start! Salad, bread, potato foods, and vegetables are much less expensive than meat.

        4. Quill*

          Yeah, many people will take the vegetarian option because it i the only way to get an edible vegetable. Or because someone only asked about vegetarians and the meat option comes with something that they can’t or would rather not eat. Always get extra vegetarian.

      2. ThatGirl*

        I have to admit, I am not a vegetarian, but I’m not a huge meat eater and largely avoid red meat – so I’m definitely someone who would choose, say, a caprese sandwich over roast beef. I agree that most organizers seem to underestimate that.

        1. Pastor Petty Labelle*

          I am also one of those. I don’t eat piggie productions (no everything is not better with bacon on it). So sometimes my only choice is the vegetarian meal. Sorry about that.

          1. AnonORama*

            Ha! I call myself a fake-a-tarian because I eat vegetarian 95+% of the time but occasionally have chicken or fish. But if I do, it’s not gonna be at a conference buffet! My current job doesn’t involve ordering food, but when I did, always figured there were more folks like me and over-ordered the vegetarian meals.

            1. Tai*

              Right? I am an omnivore, but I do not want to fall asleep at work so I am not going to eat a burger or a cheesesteak: that’s for when I am out with spouse or friends! I will choose the spinach wrap every time.

            2. Where’s the Orchestra?*

              Deathly allergic to seafood – and I’ve long since gone to telling convention catering that I need a vegetarian meal (or taking the vegetarian option) because I lost track of how many times I would fill out the forms and still be served “Mystery Processed Fish Patty” as a main course.

              No – the mystery fish is still seafood y’all, and I still can’t eat it without having severe trouble breathing…….
              I don’t get why that’s so hard to understand.

            3. Caramel & Cheddar*

              I’m the same and if pressed, will just label myself as vegetarian for the purposes of numbers so they aren’t caught short on my account.

            4. Indigo a la mode*

              I refer to myself as a “social carnivore.” I’ll eat meat out, but I typically cook vegetarian because it’s cheaper and the ingredients stay fresh longer.

          2. LilPinkSock*

            Fellow non-pig person as well. It’s actually why I usually check “vegetarian” if I can specify preferences during event registrations—I’ve been to way too many conferences where hot entrees and boxed lunches featured pork medallions, ham, or bacon!

            1. PieAdmin*

              Ordering food in the Deep South, I’ve noticed that they usually understand the concept of vegetarian well enough but cannot understand avoiding pork products. Bread products and green beans are made with bacon grease, sausage is made with pork and there is just no other way to prepare food.

          3. Other Alice*

            That’s my mum as well, she’s not vegetarian but has been eating meat less and less because of her digestion. It also depends on how the meat is cooked, she might eat a slice of pot roast but pass on the heavily spiced and greasy sausages. Many times, she goes for the veggie option because it’s that or an upset stomach. Luckily for her she somehow can get by with just a sandwich or a salad, because many times that’s the only veggie option provided.

        2. Corrigan*

          I would too. Just because I do eat meat doesn’t mean that I eat it or want it for every meal!

          1. Zelda*

            This is me. The joke is “I’m not a vegetarian; I just eat like one.” I’ve been known to tell event organizers that they should count me as a vegetarian if it will make critical mass and result in the “real” vegetarians having a better quantity and variety of options, or count me as an omnivore if they already have a balance of veg options and veg eaters and need me to keep my mitts off it.

            1. Sorrischian*

              Same! Part of it is that there’s a conflation between ‘eats meat’ and ‘ wants meat as the primary component of the meal’ for some reason? For example, I haven’t eaten a steak in years because it’s just too much meat all at once, but a couple of weeks ago I made steak salads with figs, feta, and toasted walnuts over home-grown salad greens and it turned out fantastic. But event food always seems to assume that you want a whole chicken breast or whatever with some sides to fill space, instead of having just enough meat to be an accent to everything else.

          2. Wendy Darling*

            I’m an omnivore but there’s a local sandwich place where the veggie sandwich is straight up the best thing on the menu. I also hate cheese on my sandwiches, which becomes a problem if the sandwiches are toasted, so sometimes if work gets catered sandwiches the veggie option is the only one without cheese on it.

            1. Pat*

              I found out from the AAM comments that cheese very likely is NOT vegetarian unless it says it is. I had no idea. Now I look for “vegetarian” on the package. Cabot brand is always safe, and also Amy’s for frozen meals.

          3. Random Biter*

            Being the survivor of many an “employee” option meal at functions (non-profit worker at fancy schmancy events for donors) I learned early. At a high-end gala held at a large art museum, I warned my fellow worker bees to always go with the vegetarian option. They laughed me off figuring meals at such an upscale venue would be outstanding even for the help until our worker bee meals were served. I had a fabulous pasta primavera, they all had miniscule chicken breasts with mystery sauce and the tail end of the baked potatoes. Lesson learned.

            1. bishbah*

              I was once a volunteer worker bee at a religious conference where we needed to be on site from 4–9pm. It took place on a Friday during Lent. The only food provided to us was a party tray of ham and turkey Subway sandwiches and some bags of potato chips. One vegan volunteer had anticipated that there would be nothing suitable and had packed in her own food. The vegetarians ate mainly the potato chips, so those quickly ran out. Those of us who were meatless for Lent but otherwise omnivores either ate the meat anyway or picked at the sandwiches. I went back to my car and unearthed some peanuts and granola bars. Very irritating that the priests who organized the event failed to anticipate the majority of the volunteers wanting a vegetarian meal! I wonder what the banquet dinner that they all attended served…

        3. Charlotte Lucas*

          I am a vegetarian. My non-vegetarian SO has pointed out that once you get enough food/people involved in a buffet, the vegetarian option often ends up looking best to most people. (He comes from a large extended family & literally has a lifetime of buffet experience, which translates to: when ordering for a crowd, always get more plain cheese pizza than you think you need.)

          1. Ukdancer*

            This so much. Processed meat doesn’t agree with me. I prefer not to spend all evening in the loo so if a buffet has a choice of cheese pizza or pepperoni I go for cheese every time.

            1. Don’t Die*

              I teach high school and in my first few years at my current school I volunteered to chaperone some overnight trips that had been contracted out to travel agencies to plan.

              The first year, we had a student with 20+ food allergies and we were scheduled to eat at a restaurant that was basically a buffet of raw ingredients that were then cooked by an employee on a communal grill as you watched. (TBH that seems hazardous for a lot of reasons but it was a cross-contamination nightmare!) When I told the staff we would need an allergy-safe meal they brought out an already prepared meal…with peanuts right on top! Nuts were one of this student’s main concerns and I had mentioned them specifically. At that point I told the staff we would be going to the bodega down the block and bringing in food for the student to eat. They did not object. (Honestly I was just glad that being inside that restaurant was not enough to make that student ill.) The sad part was that the student was VERY vocally grateful to me for…making sure she did not die? I asked what she had done on the trip her class took the year before and she said that she just didn’t really eat.

              The next year we left at midnight, arrived at a diner at ~5:30 am for breakfast (pancakes which had 100% been prepared in advance and microwaved, plus very greasy sausage), given lunch that came out from under the bus (slimy turkey sandwiches), and stopped for dinner at a pizza place where all the pizza was inexplicably wet on the bottom. There were another two days of the trip and the lunches were identical and I have always wondered if they were just in coolers under the bus for three days. No one died so maybe they refreshed them each day and they just seemed worse each time?

              After that I made the rule that I only chaperone trips that I plan. The person planning the meal should always be a person who will be eating the meal. (I also collect dietary needs in advance, plan menus around them, and try to send out the menus to the people traveling with me in time to make changes in case I missed something!)

              1. I bow down to your wisdom*

                “The person planning the meal should always be a person who will be eating the meal.”
                Ohmigosh – SOO true!!!

          2. alienor*

            I’m also a vegetarian, and I think a lot of meat eaters imagine vegetarian food as being something different to what it really is. They don’t expect to want the vegetarian option – or maybe don’t realize they’re taking it in the moment – because they’re picturing something gross or weird, like a 1970s hippie concoction of unseasoned tofu chunks on a bed of bulgur wheat with alfalfa sprouts. It doesn’t even register that “normal” foods like cheese pizza, bean burritos, caprese sandwiches, etc. are all vegetarian.

            1. Worldwalker*

              So how is an omnivore to know that they’re not allowed to eat the cheese pizza, and have to eat a variety they don’t like because the cheese pizza is secretly reserved for someone else they don’t even know?

              1. Lenora Rose*

                I don’t think cheese pizza is ever “reserved”, it’s just an option vegetarian people can use that nobody thinks of as vegetarian.

              2. NerdyKris*

                I don’t think that’s what they meant, just that people don’t consider those things vegetarian.

              3. Ali*

                That’s a bit of a hostile overreaction. They’re just saying a lot of people take things that happen to be vegetarian/vegan, not thinking about them being vegetarian/vegan. It’s on the event planners if they don’t make enough food for people to eat.

              4. Kwebbel*

                I’d say in a large enough group, there’s a very good chance there are a few vegetarians. If cheese is the only vegetarian option (i.e., there’s no veggie pizza), it’s fair to think of it as being something to leave for people who are vegetarian, just in case.

                1. Emma*

                  That assumes that everyone is looking over all the options first to see what’s there, which is not how most people do a buffet. Most people just go through one item at a time, thinking “oh that looks nice, I’ll have a bit of that”, without considering what else is on the table until they get there.

                  The solution to this problem, as others have said, is to provide a more balanced and realistic selection of food types.

              5. Chilipepper Attitude*

                I’ve been to events with separate tables that are clearly labeled and by the time the vegans/vegetarians got there the food reserved for them was gone! So if you are supposed to know, it will be labeled.

              6. RC*

                That’s the point of the 80/20 ratio above (love the idea). There needs to be a larger fraction of veg-friendly food than the fraction of vegetarians in the group, because there will always be omnivores who would rather the veg option.

              7. alienor*

                Not saying they’re not allowed or have to eat something they don’t like – it’s just a common cause of running out of vegetarian options when the venue hasn’t planned well enough. People aren’t taking the cheese pizza to be jerks, they just don’t see it as something vegetarians eat because they think vegetarian pizza is, like, eggplant on a cauliflower crust.

              8. Nina*

                That’s actually the point – an omnivore isn’t thinking of it as ‘The Vegetarian Option’, they’re thinking of it as ‘cheese pizza, which is normal food that I like’.

                Organizers should know this and be prepared for it by having way, way more vegetarian-friendly food than they expect to have vegetarians. Even in a crowd of all omnivores (unusual where I come from), having an option with no meat in it doesn’t hurt.

              9. Michelle Smith*

                It’s actually pretty easy! Did you have an option when registering to specify dietary restrictions? If so, then the vegetarians, vegans, pescatarians, celiacs, diabetics, observant Muslims, observant Jews, etc. put that information in their registration forms and the venue (hopefully) prepared accordingly. If you didn’t put down any restrictions and you can comfortably eat the pepperoni, grab a slice of pepperoni! Likewise, if you were given the option to preselect an option for your meal and you selected a meat option, that’s what you should take. Even if you aren’t really feeling like meat day of, be kind to someone who will go hungry if you don’t.

                Also, if you see one pizza is labeled cauliflower crust – gluten free and you are not celiac or did not ask for gluten free accommodations, grab one of the 500 standard slices and leave the 8 specialty slices alone. If after everyone has been served and they’re starting to shut down it looks like no one is going to finish that pizza off, by all means, have a slice. But if you eat something that is required for someone else’s diet just because it seems tasty, you should make sure that everyone from that group already got a chance to grab some. You might be equally fine to eat the gluten free pizza as the regular one, but those 3-4 people who specifically need the celiac friendly option will hate you when they’re violently ill because you couldn’t be bothered to just take the slices for the general population.

                Hope that helps!

                1. Frieda*

                  Yep, as a person whose vegetarian meal has been eaten by an omnivore because it looked tasty more times than I can count, this.

                  I can eat a roll and some side salad for my dinner, and I can even be gracious about it to the waitstaff because Lord knows it’s not their fault but if you’ve chosen the only food I can feasibly eat instead of thinking about what you (didn’t) put on your “dietary restrictions” response? I grind my teeth at you.

            3. Jackalope*

              This reminds me of a restaurant visit back in the day when I got the vegetarian option. I did so because I like veggies and it looked good. Apparently that restaurant thought that only people on diets would eat a vegetarian meal. Ugh. I can get leaving off butter and maybe even olive oil (although people on diets often eat olive oil), but they also didn’t bother to add any seasonings or anything and just gave me a sad plate of tasteless steamed veggies. So sad!

          3. Snowflake*

            Once the person who ordered pizza for lunch got “fancy” pizzas instead of making sure there was a plain cheese option – we had some picky eaters, others who didn’t eat pork – always make sure there’s a simple option!

            1. Pizza Pizza*

              This reminds of the time I was at a board meeting for a group I volunteered with and they ordered pizza without asking people’s preferences. Once everyone arrived they said “oh, we ordered pizza, hope everyone’s okay with that.”

              I said, “I love pizza! I’ll eat anything except olives and artichokes.”

              Dear reader, they had ordered one pizza with Kalamata olives and one pizza with artichoke hearts.

              (Thankfully these are not allergies, just preferences, so I ate the pizza and picked off as many olives and artichokes that I could.)

              1. Lynx*

                These are… such weird choices for a group pizza order! I say this as an artichoke lover but an olive hater. I just feel like both are foods that are likely to have a clear love-it-or-hate-it response with no “meh, I’ll eat it” middle ground.

                1. Sorrischian*

                  No kidding! I love both of those but the only time I’d suggest them for a group order was if it was one out of several options AND I knew for sure there were at least four or five other people who also liked them enough that we’d eat that whole pizza and leave the other options for everyone else.

            2. LifeBeforeCorona*

              I’ve learned when ordering pizza for groups that the veggie option goes fast and first because it looks so much better than the pepperoni. Also, people often use it as a chance to try a slice of something that they don’t normally eat.

          4. Mongrel*

            Even when dealing with groups of friends I’ll always throw in a cheese pizza as hard to be offended by it (barring lactose intolerance)

        4. cabbagepants*

          I’m an omnivore who generally prefers a good vegetarian option and it’s such a bummer! I’d much rather have mushroom pizza than pepperoni but I don’t want to eat up all the veg food so I take the pepperoni.

          1. Michelle Smith*

            Your consideration for others is refreshing and greatly appreciated as someone who has had to order Uber Eats to a conference venue because all the plain pizza I could actually eat was taken by others.

          2. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

            Feel free to lie on the pre-registration forms and say that you’re a vegetarian even though you can technically eat meat! Then, you can reluctantly take the meat option if the veggie one ran out, and take the veggie option that you ordered and they planned for you to have if it’s available. This increases flexibility for the whole group (since one of the “vegetarians” can give up their veggie meal if truly needed) and increases the likelihood that you get the veggie meal you’d prefer (since there is one planned for you specifically), so it’s a win-win.

            Vegetarian meals aren’t like accessible parking places, where there can only be so many at a given venue because there are only so many spaces close to the door so it’s important not to ask for one if you don’t need it. The caterer could, given sufficient notice, make enough vegetarian meals for the entire conference to eat. They just need an advance headcount of how many to make.

        5. Tau*

          I was this person in my prevegetarian days, and one of the great things about going fully veggie is that I no longer have to gauge if there’s enough food for the vegetarians and for me to have some too, or whether I need to take a meat option which I can eat in theory but don’t like much.

          1. Phlox*

            i had an omnivore colleague who at staff retreats would take charge of making sure the actual vegetarians had the first pass on the veggie stuff – it was a small act of love and I so appreciated it

            1. General von Klinkerhoffen*

              Also send anyone with allergies up first, way ahead of anyone who doesn’t understand cross contamination and uses the same spoon for every dish.

              1. BeachMum*

                Thank you. I’m severely allergic to shellfish, so will avoid large parts of a buffet (even, sigh, the salad bar) because people aren’t careful about using the correct spoon and/or dripping stuff into other containers. I’d rather not have a (so far non-serious) allergic reaction because it makes me sick for a few days. I’m willing to eat virtually anything that won’t kill me, but have been to meetings and conferences (and parties) where I ate chips because that’s all that was safe.

                1. Where’s the Orchestra?*

                  Deathly allergic to seafood (basically if it lives its whole life in the water I can’t eat it – and I also can’t eat anything cooked with or plated up with it either). Thank you – cross contamination is such a real and dangerous risk.

              2. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

                Yeah, I’m severely allergic to a specific vegetable, which means the whole salad bar is probably off-limits if I’m not the first one through since people use one set of tongs in multiple bins and things from back bins get dropped into front bins and then picked out. (And I may have cross-contamination issues even if I’m first if they cut all of the raw veggies on the same cutting board with the same knife.)

                I miss Sweet Tomatoes. They’d always get a new bin of any veggie placed near my allergen on the salad bar out from under the counter so I wouldn’t have to worry about cross-contamination. It was pretty much the only salad bar I trusted.

        6. Quite anon*

          I will eat meat… but I can’t stand the texture of fat or gristle, and don’t like seafood or shellfish, so when the meat options contain any of those things I will happily snack on veggies instead.

            1. Ms. Carter*

              I usually eat vegetarian, but indulged in a fancy duck breast while out at dinner last week. I took one badly cooked bite, threaded through with long strings of connective tissue and unrendered fat, and nearly gagged.

              1. Lynn*

                Oh, that’s so sad! A fresh duck breast provided by a hunter friend, that I sear in butter at home, is one of my favorite treats.

                ~Another Ms. Carter

        7. SpaceySteph*

          Yeah I am a meat eater, but my favorite sandwich at Panera is the Mediterranean veg. Especially if I’m sitting in a conference all afternoon, I’m going to choose a lighter lunch and that probably skews vegetarian.

          Either keep the vegetarian stuff separate for those who ask, or overbuy it.

        8. Nephron*

          I end up grabbing vegetarian options because you realize by day 2 of traveling that you have not had your normal amounts of fruits and vegetables. This is why so many feel unwell after conferences and conventions, you are not going to do well if you eat nothing but starch and meat for three or four days.

        10. Freya*

          I’m dairy free diabetic, on the registration forms (it’s much more complicated than that, but that description is simple enough for catering people to get it right) and that means for morning tea, afternoon tea, and dessert I always get given fruit.

          Turns out, a lot of people like fruit and will eat that along with their cake. And then I don’t get any between meals snacks at all to help my blood sugar…

      3. Jezebella*

        THIS! The non-veg*ans will eat up all of the veg options before we can get to them. SO ANNOYING.

          1. zinzarin*

            ^this!

            If it’s buffet-style, I’m going to grab what looks best to me. I’m an omnivore and often choose a vegetarian or vegan dish because, well, vegetables are yummy! If there’s not enough vegetarian or vegan food on the buffet or in the food line, that’s the organizer’s fault, not the diners! I think the 80-20 rule (80% vegetarian) someone else illustrated is just perfect for this very reason. Put the imbalance in the vegetarian’s favor and it becomes nearly impossible for them to go unserved.

            1. AngryOctopus*

              Same. And often the mass produced meat option just doesn’t look that appealing, and the meat will be overcooked, so people who may normally choose meat will just skip it.

            2. SpaceySteph*

              This is largely true, but I think it is inconsiderate. Yes the organizer should have ordered better, but once the food is there, that ship has sailed. If you look down a buffet and its mostly meat, it would be considerate to steer mostly away from the veg options to leave those for people who don’t eat meat.

              1. Someone Online*

                If I’m really looking forward to the vegetarian option, I tend to stay back and get my food toward the end of the line to gauge if there will be enough for me.

              2. NoMarie*

                If you’re not the organizer, you don’t know if that veg option is supposed to feed 2 or 200.

                1. Michelle Smith*

                  But the omnivores can eat the meat options or the vegetarian options. The vegetarians can only eat one of the two. Yes, it’s on the organizer to plan accordingly, but it takes so little effort for omnivores to just be thoughtful when selecting what they’ll eat when there are limited options.

            3. ShanShan*

              I do agree that the 80-20 rule is the best choice, but do you understand how irritating it might be for someone who is facing having no meal at all to hear “well, if it’s buffet-style, I’m going to grab what looks best to me!” as if eating something that isn’t your absolute top choice or waiting longer before getting exactly what you want is such a difficult thing?

              Like, I understand that people sometimes aren’t aware of these situations, or make mistakes, etc., but that’s not the same thing as refusing to even try.

          2. Lynn Whitehat*

            If this is an event where they asked ahead of time whether you want the vegetarian option, and if you did not check it, then do not take the vegetarian food.

            1. Worldwalker*

              So omnivores *must* take options containing meat, even if it’s something they hate? For example, if there’s cheese pizza and pepperoni pizza, they have to take the pepperoni pizza even if they utterly hate it?

                1. Not a Real Giraffe*

                  In most circumstances, you will be asked ahead of time if you have any dietary requirements, and conference organizers will take that into consideration when planning the menus. But you’re not going to be asked, “On Day 3 of the conference, we’re serving pizza. What topping(s) do you want and will eat?” So it’s not like you’re committing to a particular meal selection, you’re just answering whether or not you are a person who will eat meat.

                2. Quite anon*

                  Not mistranslated, just doesn’t get granular enough. If the meat option is spicy jalapeno steak burritos, and the vegetarian option is non spicy bean burritos, I’m taking the non spicy, vegetarian or not, because while I am a meat eater, I’m also NOT a spicy jalapeno eater, and I am not making myself sick from eating jalapeno food because the event organizer was a fool. Most food surveys just ask “do you eat meat” and don’t factor in people who eat meat but not fish, or people who eat meat but only if it’s fish, or other more nuanced dietary restrictions.

          3. desdemona*

            One solution that used to work at scouting events when I was a teen – the vegetarians and vegans and other allergies get to go to the buffet first. Then meat-eaters know they can take veggie meals without putting someone out.

            1. Charlotte Lucas*

              This is the same solution used in my SO’s extended family. Anyone with special dietary needs goes first.

              I don’t mind sharing, but it’s a two-way street.

            1. Not a Real Giraffe*

              This is simply not practical at a conference with a large number of attendees, especially when lunch may be on a “flow” for 90 minutes and people can pop by the buffet as their schedule allows. Event organizers just need to plan for far more vegetarians and vegans and other diets than they typically might.

          5. Boof*

            This kind of reminds me of bathroom wars; ie, the disabled stall counts as a bathroom stall, it’s supposed to be INCLUSIVE of people with disabilities, not EXCLUSIVE to people without [??] disabilities.
            Unless everything was preordered individually in an advance and people are grabbing things they didn’t order, I see it as a failing on the conference meal planners to not provide enough vegetarian food (it’s healthy for everyone + tastey and looks good, why not max it out??) rather than on non-vegetarians trying to guess at whether someone else “needs the food more”.

            1. BubbleTea*

              The issue with both these examples is that the impact isn’t the same. Someone who needs the accessible toilet is much more impacted by that single bathroom being occupied than someone who can use any of them.

              1. Quite anon*

                Except when it comes to food, it’s much more nuanced than “the handicapped person can only use that stall, therefore it should be left free for a handicapped person”. When it isn’t a case of each individual person has their own, clearly labelled meal, it’s not right to tell a meat eater who can’t stomach seafood to choke it down anyway because the tofu is for vegans, or a meat eater who gets sick if they eat capsaicin that the not spiced up bean dish isn’t for them. There are lots of people who will not mention a bunch of sensitivities because they’re sensitivities, not life threatening, and don’t want to make a fuss because they know they will be able to scrounge something, and you generally don’t know none of the meat dishes will be things you can eat until you arrive.

              2. Boof*

                @-@ If there is only one bathroom, it needs to be accessible to everyone and people can’t avoid using it because someone might come along! I mean, if someone is waiting in line let them through if they indicate they need it but there’s no point in avoiding an empty bathroom
                Same thing with food; can’t guess who in the line behind you is vegetarian?? Solution is to provide more vegetarian food? / more accessible bathrooms?

                1. Yumyum*

                  I think the solution is that, unless it’s a labelled plate situation where everyone chooses a specific menu option in advance, you have to cater for about 20 percent in excess. Also make sure the majority of the food is plant based, as other commenters have suggested.

        2. MandaPanda*

          Not a convention, but I was on the activities committee for my organization and we had a few vegans/vegetarians on the team. One time, we had a catered ice cream social and a small tub of sorbet off to the side for the three or four people with dietary restrictions. It was AMAZING how suddenly half the employees were obsessed with the sorbet, even jumping out of the ice cream line to ask if they could have some–before our vegan employee had even come downstairs to partake!

          1. Mainly Lurking (UK)*

            Yes anyone who can’t eat certain foods and gets a special dish (gluten-free, veggie, etc) will often find their dining companions are desperate to “try a bite” even though the person has that special dish because they literally can’t eat any of the other food options …

            1. many bells down*

              Oh the number of times my spouse’s company has ordered lunch in… and he’s found someone else happily chowing down on his (labeled, with his name) gluten-free meal.

            2. Babbalou*

              When my niece got married, the night before the wedding there was a large party in a State Park shelter with a pizza food truck. Because I’m GF, and the niece’s twin sister is GF, there were a few GF pizzas being made.

              I cannot tell you how many times I heard people ahead of me in line say, as they looked at the single GF pizza and the large amount of regular pizzas, “Oh, I think I’ll try the GF pizza – I’ve never had it before.”

              1. LifeBeforeCorona*

                I run into that a lot, because we generally serve only 2 or 3 gluten free students, their meals tend to be different and look delicious. The number of times I’ve had to stop non GF people from grabbing the GF option is a lot. It got to the point where the GF option was held back and still people will try to access it and on several occasions when my back is turned, outright steal it and consider it a compliment because it looked so good they couldn’t resist. Meanwhile my poor GF students end up with nothing that they can eat.

            3. Middle Aged Lady*

              I made salmon for a gluten free guest whom I found out at the last minute could not eat my delicious, world-famous lasagna I had made for the others. It was good! It always gets compliments! But boy did they all cast longing glances at his plate.

          2. Dragon_Dreamer*

            We had an ice cream social at my college once, and I’d mentioned I’m lactose intolerant. The dean who organized it got me a special tub of lactose free ice cream. He had to hide it, to make sure I (and anyone else actually intolerant) got any! Apparently folks were convinced that it was “healthier.” In subsequent years, they ordered water ice as well.

            During the beginning of the plague, ALL the specialty ice cream at the supermarket, the gluten free, the lactose free, and the diabetic friendly ones were the first to sell out. People in my area decided those had to be “healthier” and even bragged about eating it for that reason online. I shamed a few of them by reminding them that those kinds were for those of us who COULDN’T have anything else without Consequences.

        3. Worldwalker*

          I try not to do that, but when the omnivore option is something that, say, involves spicy Italian sausage, my options are to eat the vegetarian option or go hungry. And that example in Allison’s post involving the shellfish? It triggers my migraines; I couldn’t eat any of that.

          1. Where’s the Orchestra?*

            Yeah – that one was me. What made that convention a really bad fail:

            The convention was three days on religious, allergy, and disability accommodations in the public school system – yet they completely failed to accommodate any allergies or other dietary restrictions for the attendees at said conference.

            I spent three days having to leave and go to McDonalds because it was the only close food option that wouldn’t kill me. Annoying was an understatement.

        4. Laura*

          I really see the responsibility here with the planners resp. the kitchen.

          A guest at a buffet is sufficiently conscientious if they do not take more than one serving of something at a time, (looking at you, five-steaks-guy!) and put serving spoons and the like back to where they got it from.

          Serving only four schnitzel for fifteen guests or only one veggie dish on a buffet of twelve dishes, that’s a planning issue and while it is great if the guests somehow manage to fix this among themselves, but expecting them to solve it is like expecting your coworkers to solve a management issue.

      4. Lynn*

        We had a work lunch where a non-vegetarian tried to grab the last vegetarian meal because “he tries to eat less meat on the weekdays”. It was passive aggressively suggested that he let real vegetarians have first pick, by multiple people

        1. cabbagepants*

          ? his behavior seems reasonable. The blame for having too many meat options and not enough veg should be on the organizers, not the person who wants to choose his own sandwich.

          1. ThatGirl*

            Yeah, how is not wanting to eat a lot of meat a bad look? You’d think vegetarians/vegans would want us to reduce our meat consumption…

            1. Excalibur*

              It sounds like there were vegetarians waiting for food, so taking the LAST vegetarian meal, this guy was leaving them with nothing to eat whereas he had other options (though maybe they weren’t his first choice).

              1. ferrina*

                Did he know that there were vegetarians waiting for food? If he did, then yes, this is a total jerk move. But it’s also reasonable that he didn’t know. It’s more up to the organizer to make sure that if there’s a limited supply of resources for people with restrictions, that the people with restrictions get priority.

          2. Ukdancer*

            I think it depends if it’s a buffet or a pre-order situation. On a buffet have what you like but if you pre-order then have the decency to eat what you ordered.

          3. SoloKid*

            “organizers” for a work lunch are often office staff, not professional caterers that should know the ratios better.

          4. Vegetarians eat more than lettuce*

            Both of these things are true: have more meat and dairy free options, sure, but if you see there’s one last vegetarian option on the table and you usually eat meat, be courteous and leave it be so your vegetarian co-worker can have lunch, too.

          5. Lenora Rose*

            His behaviour is only reasonable in a buffet situation, not in a situation where only enough vegetarian options were ordered to cater to the actual vegetarians. Think individual plates or wraps brought in by a meeting planner.

            I took a vegan meal once, but:
            – It was a leftover from a prior crew who had all either taken their meals or departed an hour before, so we had actual genuine extra of everything (except gluten free).
            – I made sure all of my crew who needed to eat at all, much less who needed the vegan option, already had their meal.
            – It was one of two vegan ones left over so someone else could even get seconds.

          6. Storm in a teacup*

            No it really doesn’t because he *can* eat the meat but the vegetarian cannot.
            Honestly some of these responses show such a lack of common courtesy it’s shocking.
            Don’t blame the organiser for being an a** to justify your AH behaviour.
            My worst experience as a vegetarian was as a 12 year old on a school trip to France.
            Coming from a multicultural London school about 25-30% of the students didn’t eat the pork (veggie or Jewish or Muslim) served for dinner on the first day. What did we get instead? A pot of yoghurt! And a second pot for dessert. Our teachers ended up running out to buy some chips and salad for us.

            1. cabbagepants*

              It doesn’t make him an asshole to think that he could take and eat a portion of proffered food. Not everyone is constantly thinking about everyone else’s dietary restrictions! It would not have been bad or hard for whoever set out the food to communicate that the vegetarian portions were to be reserved for people who were dedicated vegetarians. If I were grabbing a lunch and there were 3 ham sandwiches on a plate and 1 turkey sandwich, and I went for the turkey instead of the ham, I wouldn’t deserve my colleagues’ passive aggression for taking the last Kosher meal unless it was specifically labelled and set aside as such.

        2. AngryOctopus*

          I mean…then you shouldn’t be ordering *just enough* vegetarian meals to cover vegetarian coworkers? People who eat meat may end up liking the vegetarian option more! Or they don’t like the meat options on offer! Or they want to eat less meat and are planning on having grilled chicken at dinner! It would be one thing to politely say “oh I’m so sorry but X is vegetarian and they haven’t been through yet and this is the last one”, but to be snide about it is just unnecessary, and speaks to your ordering process not being sufficient.

        3. Nusuth*

          As a vegetarian, I’m a little baffled at how many people (in this thread and others) are defending their ABSOLUTE RIGHT to take the last vegetarian meal if they are a meat-eater who feels like veg, because it’s the office’s fault that there’s not enough meals for people who might want them, not theirs. I guess you’re technically right… but wouldn’t you rather one of your coworkers be able to eat?

          1. SoloKid*

            I’m with you. Large conferences are one thing, but in an office situation the budget is often tight and there’s only one meal per person ordered, usually by office staff that doesn’t have time to ask everyone “we know you’re not vegetarian, but are you ok with this specific meat option”.

            1. Quite anon*

              I think there are two situations that are getting confused. There are the office lunches, where food is ordered for specific individuals, and there are conferences where food is set out and people are invited to help themselves. In an office setting, taking the vegetarian food that was specifically ordered for one person is downright rude. In a conference setting, the organizers of the conference really should have planned for this, and people shouldn’t have to choose between eating something they hate that is technically meat and taking a veggie dish because vegetarians “might” need it, if there isn’t enough for all. Because ensuring everyone gets enough food is the event planner’s job.

          3. AngryOctopus*

            But our point is this: if you have 4 vegetarians and you order 4 vegetarian plates, you’re not accounting for 1-people liking the vegetarian option more, 2-people who maybe can’t eat an ingredient in the meat option and think the veg option is just fine 3-the fact that MOST people going through your line aren’t going to know that you only have 4 vegetarians and some haven’t been through the line yet, so they don’t know the veg option is off limits because you didn’t get enough of it.
            There are several solutions: 1-speaking to caterers and learning how ratio your orders, as discussed above, 2-ordering everyone their own meal that is labelled with their name (many places do this for you, esp if you order online and use the ‘notes’ section), 3-holding the veg option separate and having the veg people come to you directly to get it.

            1. Worldwalker*

              Any and all of these make sense.

              Having people have to guess whether they’re allowed to take the food they like, or if it’s been secretly reserved for someone else, does not make sense.

              1. saskia*

                Seriously. We can’t second-guess every single situation we encounter in the world. The conference organizers/lunch-orderers should plan better.

            2. BubbleTea*

              4 – make all the catering vegetarian by default as that serves the largest possible collection of people.

              1. Angry socialist*

                This is always what I do. When doing the meal options for our wedding, everything was vegetarian. When I ordered food for a large meeting at a previous job, I made sure to announce, “This dish here is made of chicken. Everything else is vegetarian.”

                This approach means you have to pick a caterer who has good vegetarian food! The meeting food was from a Middle Eastern place and had lots of protein like hummus and falafel. It was all delicious.

              2. cabbagepants*

                It’s interesting, isn’t it, where the default is. An omnivore “only” having available a grilled veggie and hummus sandwich, rather than the ham they might prefer, is considered worse than a vegetarian only having available the ham sandwich.

                2. Kwebbel*

                  Oooops, I mean the former. Definitely the former. An omnivore being given a veggie and hummus sandwich even though they wanted ham is absolutely better than a vegetarian being given a ham sandwich that they can’t ethically eat.

                3. Quite anon*

                  I’d say what makes it “worse” isn’t the meat eater having to eat veggies, per se, it’s that a lot of the protein options in vegan food are also things a lot of people have sensitivities or allergies to. Thinking specifically soy, mushrooms, tree nuts, and peanuts, and it’s specifically a problem because basic non vegetarian food is generally meat on bread, with possibility of gluten free bread or lettuce instead of bread, but basic vegetarian food tends to have a ton of ingredients, increasing the probability of triggering a food sensitivity. It’s not always immediately apparent that tasty veggies are tasty because they were marinated in sesame oil, for example.

                4. Anna*

                  Wanna second Quite Anon here: the issue isn’t “what if we made it vegetarian and then someone who would have liked meat better is sad .” The issue is that vegetarian is not the only food restriction or sensitivity that exists.

                  Vegetarian-centric dishes are actually *more* likely to have ingredients that will make me ill (celiac). It’s more frequently bread or pasta-based, and a lot of meat substitutes and salad seasonings have gluten as well. And there is, unfortunately, a decent amount of caterers who think that “yes-meat or no-meat” is the *only* thing they need to worry about, to the extent of mocking or shaming people for not being able to eat something because “it’s already vegetarian.” (There are a bunch of threads in this comment section about this phenomenon.)

                  I’m not going to play pain Olympics and try to make a case for whether “vegetarian is left only with a meat-option” or “celiac is left only with gluten-containing food” is “worse” – but at the very least let’s be honest the situation is more complex then “meat eater sad .”

                  Like, people like to shame those who grab a vegetarian portion if they’ve seen that person eat meant before, even when “are you vegetarian/vegan?” was the only thing the caterer bothered to ask anybody. And they forget the existence of things like:
                  – Dairy, egg, or shellfish allergies
                  – Religious restriction that allow some types of meat but not others
                  – Migraine triggers in spices or marinaded used in the meat option
                  – Caterers that will only do gluten-free cross-contamination procedures for their vegan food because they don’t want to make multiple alternative meals
                  – etc.

          4. DataSci*

            Sometimes it might be that they aren’t vegetarian but don’t eat every kind of meat – they may not eat pork, or red meat, or fish. So if the choices are veggies or a ham sandwich, some non-vegetarians may feel justified in taking the veggie option.

            1. Worldwalker*

              Yeah. The ham sandwich would be off-limits to anyone who needs kosher or halal food, too. And most conference ham sandwiches, at least that I’ve eaten, seem to be made of some material that feels like gelatin and tastes like smoke and salt and leaves you longing for a good deli sandwich. Even if the vegetarian option was a sorrowful salad, it would probably be better than those things.

            2. Elizabeth West*

              This is me at family dinners eating only side dishes because the entree is a ham.

              I like the suggestion to just do all veggie, or 80% veggie.

          5. Storm in a teacup*

            Exactly this! As I said above it’s shows a lack of common courtesy / politeness.

          6. Anna*

            I mean, I agree someone is being an asshole if they take food they *know* was specifically ordered for a person with dietary restrictions and only in the amount required for the number of people with declared dietary restrictions. (I.e., any case where they order one meal per person and ask you to declare relevant restrictions beforehand.) Or in cases like offices that are small enough for “okay we are starting to run low on vegetarian food, has anyone vegetarian not gotten food yet?” is something people could reasonably verify.

            But the vast majority of “blame the caterers” comments are *not* talking about this situation- they’re talking about buffets in large catered events (given, you know, the question was about conferences), in which case people getting their food have no way of knowing how many people with X-food restriction are present or have eaten yet. And a lot of times people getting their food don’t even realize if something is the designated Halal-option or gluten-free option or shellfish-free option or nut-free option etc. if it’s not labeled as such.

            So yes, I do indeed blame the caterers in that context, because it’s not reasonable to expect people getting food in a buffet to predict how much there is for [insert dietary restriction here] when we are talking about the scope of hundreds or thousands attendees.

            And even more than that, I would like to point at the thread in this comment section about caterers conflating various dietary restrictions (e.g., things like assuming “gluten-free” means “vegan”). Because being vegetarian is not the only form of dietary restriction that exists, a lot of different people’s dietary restrictions conflict with one another, and sometimes caterers like to have one “food sensitive” dish so they don’t have to prepare multiple alternatives. As in, if there is a meat option and a vegetarian option *but the meat option contains ingredients that will make me sick*, I’m obviously going to take the vegetarian one.

        4. ToDoList*

          Yes, that’s totally understandable. It’s great that meat-eaters want to grab the vegetarian / vegan option! I love that! But — if , as a meat-eater, you’d like to have the option to grab a vegetarian / vegan meal, then please tell the organizers so that they have the information they need! If non-vegetarians don’t let anyone know that they might want the veggie option, then that runs the risk of leaving vegetarians / vegan with no food, which I think we can agree is not okay.

          1. AngryOctopus*

            I don’t know if I want the veg option at a buffet until I see what’s available and what’s in each dish. The real way to deal with this is to either learn how to order (discussed by those who know above), or to make sure everyone gets individual meals with names on them. I don’t want to be yelled at for grabbing egg salad when the other options are roast beef with horseradish (no thank you) and chicken salad that has celery in it (barf). You want everyone to be able to have something that they WANT to eat as well as CAN eat. So again, because a lot of choices are not known until you’re actually there, it would behove you (not specific you, but really a more “your company” generic you) to make sure you’re ordering good ratios of veg to non veg.
            I’ll will say that vegan and/or gluten free is generally so different that it may be put aside with an organizer for the vegan(s) to grab personally (like if you have sandwich trays, the meat and veg will all be out, but they’ll bag the vegan/gluten free lunch to assure no cross contamination).

            1. Quite anon*

              Meanwhile I’d shudder in disgust at the mayo in the chicken and egg salad, try to eat the roast beef with horseradish, and possibly throw it up an hour later depending on how easily removed the horseradish is. Horseradish does not agree with me, but mayo agrees with me even less.

              Having a variety of dishes which don’t have overlapping ingredients is a good way to make everyone happy.

            2. UKDancer*

              Definitely. I’ve been to buffets with 3 options (meat, fish and veggie) and haven’t liked the meat or fish options but the veggie one is something like tomato pasta or veg lasagne which I do quite like. I’m not going to have the meat one I don’t like because I’m an omnivore. Caterers should make sure they have a good amount of each option when it’s an open buffet. Otherwise do something with individual dishes.

      5. ursula*

        I don’t blame the non-vegetarian attendees for this, btw! I totally get it, and lots of people are generally kinda trying to eat less meat or more vegetables or just like the variety. The salty tone here is purely directed like 90% at the event organizers and like 10% at the catering services.

        1. Tau*

          Honestly, one of the contributing factors to me going completely vegetarian was that drastically reducing my meat consumption did not work well with office catering. Either I ate the meat thing that I was really actively trying to avoid, or I risked being a rude omnivore eating the vegetarians’ food so they didn’t have any. It’s a really frustrating situation to be in if you’re serious about only eating meat rarely and/or from trusted sources. At some point I decided that I was eating so little meat I might as well go all the way and be the vegetarian complaining about my food getting eaten instead!

      6. Forkeater*

        Yeah imagine that! Meat eaters eat vegetables! Who’d a thunk it? Sorry for the sarcasm, frustrated vegetarian here.

      7. WheresMyPen*

        My best friend was on a flight once, and had requested a vegetarian meal in advance as she really was vegetarian. Problem was, loads of passengers fancied the look of the veggie meal and by the time they got to my friend they’d run out. The stewardess did feel really bad and kept plying her with bread rolls the whole flight.

        1. Mockingjay*

          In my experience, it depends on the airline. The large, “name brand” carriers usually reserve and label specific meals that were requested in advance by that person’s seat number. Low cost carriers – you’re probably better off bringing your own food. Of course it also depends on the length of the flight; anything under 3 hours and all that’s offered is a snack no matter what airline you fly.

          1. Juli*

            I recently flew and indeed when meal time came around the stewardess brought me a specially labelled vegetarian meal and I was like uh?

            It caused a momentary kerfuffle till they had confirmed that they got the right person and I had merely forgotten that I have set my meal requirements as vegetarian in the airline profile to assure I have something to eat on a flight.

            And, yes, it was a brand name one.

            On the return flight I was even happier with that decision since what I got was a lot more interesting than what the other people got.

        2. Nina*

          My experience with ordering vegetarian meals in advance on planes has been –
          Singapore had about half the cart full of vegetarian options (plural! more than one!) and it was meat meals that actually ran out first
          Qantas wrote my name and seat number on the lid of the food to make sure I got it (caught a glimpse of the rest of the warmer drawer of vegetarian meals and yep, all labeled)
          I have no experience with getting meals on US airlines lol

          2. Meerkat*

            qantas was the airline that refused to let me preorder a vegan meal and also stocked approximately two of the vegetarian option for the entire cabin! it turned out they had vegan options for purchase but every other airline I’d flown had never done anything like that so I hadn’t expected it.

        3. Storm in a teacup*

          If anyone is flying out of the UK I highly recommend ordering Asian (ie Indian) vegetarian. Often made in Hounslow (near Heathrow) and as it’s got a large Indian community the food is authentic and really tasty.

      8. Snowflake*

        At my sisters college graduation we preordered vegetarian sandwiches. Day of, they let people take sandwiches first-come first-serve without checking what people ordered in advance – they only made a handful of vegetarian sandwiches and I’m sure lots of people preferred veggie over the meat options that day. It took us an hour to get fed…

      9. Artemesia*

        I can’t believe that people still haven’t figure this out. separate the food for vegetarians or have enough for everyone. Get cheese pizza for everyone, because all the meat eaters will take at least one slice.

      10. Nonanaon*

        I was lucky enough to be friends with the people who coordinated catered lunches at one of my old jobs. It was great specifically being able to request “vegetarian option; Wakeen, if anyone tries to take my vegetarian meal, slap them away and tell them no”
        …we OBVIOUSLY never had to do this but I did always get my veggie meal

        1. Dragon_Dreamer*

          Obviously, I’ve been playing too much Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 because I had the immediate image of the Goddess of Trade (tall, literally glowing blonde lady named Waukeen) slapping someone upside the head for touching a salad.

      11. Jack Russell Terrier*

        This is an issue with a pizza party too! Often they have plain and pepperoni pies. Omnivores pile both on their plates … and all too often vegetarians are left staring at a pepperoni. I’ve taken to putting a sign saying ‘Please leave enough for vegetarians, thanks’.

        1. Dahlia*

          Kinda just sounds like you need to order a lot more cheese pizza? How is anyone supposed to know how many vegetarians are left?

      12. Lulu*

        I remember an event during my college orientation many years ago. You had to request a vegetarian option in advance so they’d have enough, and by the time I got to the line, they were completely out of the veggie burgers. They had also collected requests for vegan options, so since they were out of vegetarian, I asked for the vegan instead. They initially refused because “that’s for the vegans,” and tried to convince me that I would just have to take one of the regular burgers. Nope, that’s not how that works. You can get more restrictive, not less. Whether people had taken the veggie burger by accident, or by preference, I’ll never know. But it just doesn’t work well when catering to assume that everyone has the one standard thing, and then collect specific numbers for the restricted things. I’m sure some people weren’t vegetarian but don’t like beef, or missed the sign-up window, or had an iffy stomach that day, or whatever.

    2. Queen of the Introverts*

      The funny thing is, IT’S NOT THAT HARD. Caterers, at least until a decade or so, seemed so think “vegetarian” meant “must serve an entirely different meal” even when the meal they were serving was entirely meat-free aside from the main meat.

      Thankfully last week I was at an event and “veggie lasagna on the left, meat lasagna on the right” was just a matter of course.

      1. desdemona*

        I experienced this on an overnight flight once, apparently because the veg meal was supplied by a different company. Dinner was fine, but my breakfast was a fruit cup consisting mostly of honeydew (blech). Everyone else got a croissant.

        1. Jezebella*

          It’s like they think we’re on a no-carb low-cal diet just because we don’t eat meat. Every veggie plane meal I’ve ever gotten involved fruit as dessert. It’s not like there’s meat in the cookies, people.

          1. FrivYeti*

            No, but there is butter. It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of those alternatives default to “vegan” rather than “vegetarian” in order to avoid the work of a third alternative.

            1. cabbagepants*

              yes, it’s clear that some places have a “regular” option and a “food restrictions” option, with the latter covering vegetarian, vegan, gluten free, low carb, peanut free, etc etc. Not much is left in this latter category!

              1. AngryOctopus*

                Yeah, I attend a conference each year with ~14K attendees. They have a regular option and a vegan/gluten free option. With that many people they need to limit what it is they’re preparing. I think they even say that certain allergies can’t be accommodated due to the sheer number of meals being prepared (but you do get fair warning).
                That same conference led to one of my most fascinating moments where I followed 2 women into the keynote/lunch setup and they looked at the tables, already set with lunches (box lunches, you have assigned table numbers and your box has your name on it) and said “OH….they’re serving BOX lunches???” in an absolutely shocked tone. Not sure how they thought a kitchen would be able to put out 14K hot meals in the 75′ keynote time. I wish I had asked them though.

                1. Tau*

                  And then one of my relatives comes and tells you she can’t have fructose and the whole system explodes. (Although admittedly that one is both unusual and so restrictive I think she just always brings her own food.)

          2. Lalaith*

            Or when, like, a restaurant offers a veggie sandwich with a side salad instead of fries. I still like fries! I don’t always want to be healthy! XD

              1. Al*

                In the U.S., at least, that’s usually a unique selling-point, not the standard. I’ve never encountered duck-fat fries or schmaltzy potatoes where that aspect wasn’t vaunted and much discussed on the menu. Most fries are fried in vegetable oil (often peanut oil).

          3. Hosta*

            It’s because they lump together vegan and vegetarian. Other restricted diets sometimes get thrown in there too, like no pork or beef. There’s only one extra set of food to make and keep separate, so I guess it makes sense if you don’t think about what peoplre actually want.

            It’s the same reason why so many restaurants neglect cheese in vegetarian dishes, which, as a cheese loving non-vegetarian, I think is bullpucky.

            1. Tau*

              Sudden forceful reminder of how we had catering for a family event a few months ago and somehow my mom telling them that there was a vegetarian (me) attending so could there please be a vegetarian option ended up with us getting vegan food (and only vegan food), including vegan cheese.

              I can eat cheese. I love cheese. Please do not deprive me of cheese :( :(.

          4. Storm in a teacup*

            This exactly!
            I always get Asian Indian vegetarian meals when I fly if they’re available. Way nicer than the average vegetarian option

        2. She of Many Hats*

          As the person who arranges the office catering and deals with dietary needs ranging from vegetarian to gf to finned fish allergies and everything in-between, it’s challenging. Breakfast is hardest because most breads used by vendors are enriched breads containing eggs and/or dairy.

          1. desdemona*

            I understand that! My main frustration was that when I asked if I could have a “non-vegetarian” breakfast, they fully refused. They didn’t say they were out of the “meat” options – it came across like the person I asked either didn’t believe me or they would get in trouble? Or some secret 3rd option I’m unaware of.

            Further confusing this was that the meat-eaters were offered choice of meals for dinner – veg, fish, or chicken – and I had only listed myself as veg so I could guarantee they didn’t run out of veg before getting to me.

          2. Sloanicota*

            I agree, as the person who often ends up ordering the food (and this is in no way my background or interest, just something that gets dumped on my – heh – plate) – I do have a lot of pity on the organizers. This is an entire comments section of people who are some combination (one or more!) of GF, vegan, vegetarian, halal, kosher, allergic to tomatoes, allergic to onions, allergic to peppers, must have CHEESE on vegetarian, want meat but not meat they don’t like, no seafood, paleo, on a diet, or not on a diet, is annoyed their vegan option is also GF, or thinks the food at meetings is too boring and repetitive. It’s really, really hard to plan a meal that will make everyone happy, especially on a budget! I try to pick “disassembled” things like taco or salad bars where people can add or subtract their own ingredients, but that doesn’t resolve cross-contamination issues.

            1. Hosta*

              If I’m the one you’re referring to as demanding cheese on a vegetarian meal, I’m actually not. But it blows to get raw fruit for breakfast when everyone around you is enjoying eggs and delicious pastries, or sliced lettuce and tomato when they could have just left off the ham from a ham and cheese sandwich. Or getting another dish of raw fruit instead of the pear and brie in puff pastry. (All examples I’ve seen or heard about in real life)

              It’s frustrating to be the only one with additional limits imposed on your diet when everyone around you gets something you actually could have eaten.

              1. Certaintroublemaker*

                Yes! Totally agree. When I went vegetarian back in the Dark Ages, SO many times I’d go to an event at a nice hotel where people were served steak with a beautiful baked potato, creamed spinach, rice, gorgeous mixed vegetables on the side. Then my vegetarian plate would be a small pile of leftover crudite tossed into a steamer for a couple of minutes and dumped onto the plate. No seasoning, no oil or sauces, nothing. I would think, just give me the steak plate without the steak!

                1. Birdle*

                  Yes! The best thing would be to have an actual real vegetarian meal, but if that isn’t going to happen, why are they making more work for themselves? Send the vegetarian plates down the serving line first and double up on a side.

                  Oh my gosh I’m having flashbacks to the time lunch was a roast veggie wrap with vinegarette and feta, and my vegetarian friend got plain roast vegetables and carrot sticks instead of chips. I thought she was going to pop.

      2. Lulubelle*

        I’m always surprised at the lack of knowledge by caterers. Food is their business !!! and it’s not excusable when they think they can just brush off the bacon bits. Or think chicken isn’t meat. Or don’t know that soup with a meat stock is not vegetarian.

        I called many caterers when planning a big event and always asked them “what are your options for vegetarians?” If they said things like “we can give them a nice plate of steamed vegetables” my reply was always “ thank you, I’ll think about that, good bye.”

        I worked at a place with an absolutely clueless receptionist who ordered all the food for meetings. Even when people asked nicely about making sure vegetarians were accommodated, she couldn’t get it right. 25 pepperoni pizzas and one cheese pizza. Sandwiches: chicken-lettuce-tomato, ham-lettuce-tomato, and lettuce-tomato (this vegetarian option with the same single small leaf of lettuce and one slice of tomato so thin you could read a newspaper through it.).

        2. General von Klinkerhoffen*

          I’m thinking of my wedding (reception at a famous hotel) where the kitchen moved heaven and earth to make sure that every combination of requirements was met, with as few visible differences as possible so strangers weren’t having to discuss their diets to nosey seat neighbours. The chefs absolutely cared that every guest was getting an equal culinary experience that day.

        3. Never Boring*

          I am always boggled by this. A vegan friend of mine was hospitalized for a completely non-dietary issue and the hospital would literally give her an apple as an entire meal. I have better vegan meal options than that in my desk drawer on an average day (granola bars, nuts, dried fruit, multigrain crackers, etc.) Don’t hospitals typically have dieticians on staff? How can they be so clueless?

          1. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

            I had the best food experience of my life in the hospital, but I think I hit it just right with a new dietician who wasn’t burned out yet. They were able to give me soy-free vegetarian meals that contained foods I actually wanted to eat, and I think back on that hospital menu fondly whenever I’m trying to find something I can eat in a hotel.

            (It probably helps that I genuinely love broccoli, so was happy to order a side of it at each meal and eat it plain, and prefer drinking milk to soda, so I’d be saying things like “I think I could use a little more protein with dinner – is it possible to get a glass of milk?” or “Is there any way I can get a side with more fiber? I like broccoli if you have it”, which are the kinds of things a dietician as opposed to a chef is pretty happy to hear after getting yelled at about the lack of bacon cheeseburgers by the last 5 people. My dad had a great experience on the “gut” floor of that same hospital, because they’d let him live on chocolate nutrition shakes for all of his meals, and a lousy experience on the heart floor, which did not believe in chocolate milkshakes of any kind and kept everything low-fat even though his issue was caused by a pathogen rather than his diet.)

        4. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

          My favorite was my college cafeteria, where I once asked if a dish contained soy. The worker stirred the big pan of whatever-it-was and told me he didn’t see any, so it should be fine. I really wanted him to draw me a picture of what he thought he was looking for…

          1. Mosquito*

            I had something similar in the work canteen. “Does the lasagne have mushrooms?” “Of course not!” with a look of, ‘Who the hell puts mushrooms in lasagne????’

            Yeah, there were mushrooms.

            Yeah, I had to go home, dose myself with antihistamines, and sleep for two days.

    3. The Prettiest Curse*

      I went to a meeting industry panel discussion earlier this year and one of the panel members said that he’d been to an event where the default menu was vegan or vegetarian and you had to opt in if you wanted meat. Apparently, some conference organisers are doing this for environmental / sustainability reasons.

      I thought it was a pretty interesting idea, and according to the panel member, a lot of the conference attendees didn’t even notice that the food was vegan until the organisers pointed it out.

      2. alienor*

        I sometimes go to a coffee shop where the default is plant milk and you can opt in to dairy milk if you want, and I LOVE IT. I’m not vegan, just vegetarian, but dairy milk upsets my stomach (I don’t like the taste either, but that’s secondary), so if my drink gets made with dairy milk I’ll either have to get it remade or throw it away.

        1. ferrina*

          Former barista and current coffee snob here. I’m all for this as long as they post that this is their policy. Beyond the taste, the different types of milk froth very differently. Whole milk can hold the most air in the froth; soy milk doesn’t hold much at all. One of my proudest accomplishments as a barista was making a dry soy cappuccino (a dry cappuccino has a lot of froth and very little liquid milk)- it took me several minutes and very specialized techniques to get enough froth.

          1. alienor*

            They do have it posted and will also let people know when they’re ordering unless it’s someone they recognize as a regular – just a quick “our default is plant milk; is that ok or would you prefer dairy?” I’ve also been to a different shop where I asked for almond and the barista let me know that the almond milk wasn’t frothing well that day, and would I like oat instead, which I appreciated.

        2. Dragon_Dreamer*

          I got my community college to stock lactose-free milk in the cafeteria… and it got to the point where they were selling MORE of that than the regular stuff! After that, you had to specifically ask for milk containing lactose. (Pretty sure it was related to the “lactose-free must be healthier” thing I mentioned above, even though the incidents were 15 years apart and at different schools/towns.)

          Fun fact: Lactase is a “use it or lose it” enzyme. I lost most of my ability to produce it by not drinking milk for most of a year. So those folks drinking lactose-free milk who didn’t need to were shooting themselves in the foot!

      3. AngryOctopus*

        This is a really great idea. There are so many ways to make great vegan and vegetarian food, and it has to be more sustainable and cost effective for the caterers.

      4. Minimal Pear*

        Ooh I love this idea and will remember it in case I’m ever in a position to do the ordering for an event like this!

      5. Sloanicota*

        Oh man, I remember somewhere (Slate?) there was a letter about a vegan or vegetarian bride who wanted her wedding to be meat-free but was inviting her meat-eating extended family and people in the comments were FURIOUS! It was really strange. People felt it was a failure of hospitality and were opining they’d have to swing by McDonalds on their way to the reception or whatever. I suspect it has changed a bit since then, but perhaps not as muc as I’d hope.

        1. Kwebbel*

          My husband and I celebrated our joint birthday this year, and we decided to make it half-meat half-veg even though we’re both veg*ans. We just figured it would be more comfortable for our guests, who always accommodate us, since many of them are from a place where veggie meals are a rarity. We were blown away: Almost everyone came up to us at the end of the party and said, “hey, you know, that was kind of you, but you could have made it all veg. We really would have been happy with that.” So people are more open than I think I was giving them credit for!

        2. Her name was Lola, she was an intern*

          My wedding was vegetarian Italian food, because my husband and I wanted to be able to eat everything! A relative decided to tell me that people were upset there was no meat. We know that others stopped to get burgers on the way, because apparently meatless lasagna, bread, potatoes and vegetables simply would not be filling!

          2. Jackalope*

            Related, but I’ve read in AITA on Reddit that there are people who are beside themselves with anger at being going to a wedding and then learning that it’s dry (no alcohol). I read about this in multiple thread there; people saying they arrived at a reception and were so furious that there was no alcohol that they left, in some cases huge numbers of guests, or people who asked whether there was even a point to going to a reception with no alcohol (apparently celebrating the new couple was not enough), etc. I was shocked. Maybe my region doesn’t do alcohol at weddings as much, or maybe it’s my subculture (used to be evangelical). But most of the weddings I’ve attended, including my own, were dry weddings, and as far as I could tell no one cared. Maybe some people went out afterwards to get hammered, which is fine, but they didn’t complain or storm out or anything. This issue seems even weirder to me than refusing to eat a vegetarian meal (our wedding had mostly vegetarian food with a couple of exceptions); alcohol is not an actual need, unlike regular meals.

      6. Yay! I’m a llama again!*

        I was thinking this. We need to reduce the amount of meat we eat, and I bet if all catered food events like this dropped meat it would have a massive impact! And most people probably wouldn’t even notice.

        1. anon diabetic*

          I’d notice.

          Most times, I walk away still hungry from buffets, because I’m only allowed so many grams of carbs per day – and that’s about the same as two slices of bread. Per day, not per meal.

          It’s shocking how high-carb beans and legumes are. Same for a lot of common vegetables, like carrots. Most plant-based proteins are quite carby.

          And I’m pretty sure you don’t want to be stuck in a buffet line behind me where I’m frantically trying to figure out if that appetizing tan dish is eggplant (low carb) or lentils (super high carb) and whether, if I split the bunless impossible burger with my husband, can I eat one baby carrot, or two?

          Truth is, the profit margins are far better on starches than they are on proteins, so you’d think it would be easier to make veg meals standard – but it’s not always practical to do so, unfortunately.

          I absolutely sympathise with the vegs and vegans, for sure! But if there’s no main that’s carb-free, I’m going to need to stop for burgers on the way home.

          1. The Prettiest Curse*

            You can absolutely still get meat at events that are catered that way, though – you just have to ask for it in advance.

        2. Dragon_Dreamer*

          I’d notice. I’m an obligate carnivore due to gut issues and a sulfur allergy, which results in an intolerance to sulfur-rich foods. I CAN eat veggies, but soy makes me sick, and if I eat too many veggies I’ll get sick also. Especially if they’re veggies high in sulfur, like broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, most beans, etc. Meats are easiest for me to digest and NOT get sick. Except egg yolks. (Though eggs in baked goods seem to be fine, eggs by themselves are a Bad Idea.)

          I *love* pasta, but due to my diabetes, I can’t live off that, either. I can have some seafood, but not all, and it can’t be prepared with fresh garlic or garlic oil, both of which are common. At weddings and the like, I usually get the pasta (requesting no garlic), whatever it is, and then make sure to have a ham sandwich or something when I get back to wherever I’m staying.

          If you think about it, meat is pre-digested veggies anyway. :P

      7. Language Lover*

        I went to a local conference a few years ago where the meals were all vegetarian (or maybe even vegan.) The food was the best conference food I’d ever had. And since the food was limited to things you’d even find on a meat eaters’ plate (vegetables, nuts, cheese as opposed to tofu or replacement meats), I don’t think most attendees didn’t realize how the organizers decided to make it easier on themselves.

        1. GarlicBreadAfficianado*

          On the surface I love this idea.

          In reality, I would hate this. Because everything in there will have been tainted by avocado. People put that on EVERYTHING nowadays.

          And I have a latex fruit allergy and within 30 minutes of ingesting something that has even touched an avocado I’m in the bathroom praying to shuffle off this mortal coil. Same with tomatoes.

          And heaven forbid I ingest kiwi or banana (at least usually you can spot that) but now I’m in itchy mouth central and I look like a dog with a mouth full of peanut butter. My allergist has warned me that the next step is anaphalaxis land… though I do wonder if you’re poisoned at a conference.. is that workers comp?

          1. AngryOctopus*

            I mean…you can’t accommodate EVERY food restriction ever. If you’re food allergies/sensitivities are that severe, then just bring your own meals or make other arrangements. It’s like how there’s not a universal company gift that everyone will like. Sometimes you have to acknowledge that when serving 600 people, they’re not going to be able to make YOU food you can eat.

            1. Dahlia*

              “Just bring your own meals” is kind of difficult when we’re talking about conferences where you have to travel.

            2. Anna*

              I find this “well obviously big conferences can’t accommodate *weird* dietary restrictions” attitude fascinating, when it’s in the same thread as a bunch of people talking about how they have to go without eating for long periods of time when conferences don’t provide food they can eat. Like, the barriers stopping, say, vegetarians from “just bringing their own meals” are the same for people with allergies.

              A lot of conferences don’t *let you* bring in outside food. Some conference centers or companies try to charge you for the “provided meal” even if you cannot safely eat it. If there’s a meeting expected to happen during the meal or immediately before/after, there might not be time for a participant to go find a store or restaurant to prepare food that’s safe for them.

              Now, to be clear, accommodating allergies doesn’t always mean “caterer must personally prepare something everybody can eat.” Giving someone with a complex allergen a heads-up that they won’t be able to eat the provided food + a small stipend for ordering externally so they can obtain outside food to eat in the conference ahead of time would be a reasonable accommodation. But the conference center should absolutely accommodate complex food restrictions in the sense of “ensuring they have a way to eat while attending the conference.”

      9. General von Klinkerhoffen*

        There are several government organisations in the UK doing this as standard. It’s partly because it’s easier, I’m sure, but it’s also for ecological reasons.

        My youngest child’s school has at least one meat free day per week (I think it’s five in the three-week menu cycle). I’ve heard of some schools going fully meat free.

    4. I exist*

      on the opposite side, I was a vegan at a large conference in DC several years ago and the vegan option was always great and based on what some people said, better than the non-veg meals. Always sad the desserts weren’t considered, though.

      1. Upset-Vegan*

        At a plant science conference with 4k people the vegan option was two bags of potato chips and an apple. Why ask for dietary restrictions if you are going to ignore them?

      2. Weaponized Pumpkin*

        My university (in the 90s) was stuck in a time warp (midwest 50s) and had terrible, terrible food. Everything was glop out of a can and we had no alternatives, no grills or food court like most schools. A few years in, they piloted “specialty lines”, and my dorm got the vegetarian one. It was great! Because they had no industrial supply chain yet for it, everything was actually fresh — while the regular line was serving chef boyardee ravioli out of 10 gallon drums, we got the good stuff. The breads were heavenly. I ate vegetarian all year.

        2. Quill*

          My brother’s first college roommate was jewish, and the “hack” that my brother learned from him was that the kosher and halal stations at their university usually had better food.

    5. Prof*

      I just want to mention that the BEST conference food I ever had was one of those all-inclusive academic conferences in the UK, where every meal was provided by the event, and it was also all vegan. As a non-vegan with a deep love of dairy I was pretty skeptical, but the food was delicious! 10/10 conference food experience.

    6. Unlucky in Lunch*

      Earlier this year I was at a conference for environmental professionals who work in California. You’d think that, in this field and location in particular, the organizers would have estimated a pretty high percentage of vegetarians.

      You would be wrong. At lunch the first day the conference organizers had apparently told the venue that they would need about 30 vegetarian lunches for a conference of 600 people. I ended up with a plate that contained only a handful of mashed potatoes, while the luckier vegetarians got mashed potatoes with a small piece of tofu.

      My company’s CEO and I skipped the next session to buy lunch in the hotel pub.

      1. Birdle*

        At a California environmental conference it would probably less paperwork if you asked people if they ate meat.

        1. That's 'Senior Engineer Mate' to you.*

          These days that applies to most things. One IT user group I attend they last surveyed members a few years ago and everyone was happy to have vegetarian food at meetings and conferences. The most recent announcement had a tiny note at the end saying “if anyone wants non-vegetarian food please contact the organisers”. They definitely cate to my no-beans vegetarian diet so I haven’t really paid attention.

    7. Lucy*

      I once attended a training event and the vegan lunch was a potato “burger” (mashed potato pattie in a bun, no salad/sauce) with boiled potatoes and a side of chips. Quadruple carb fun times!

      1. Frickityfrack*

        I feel vaguely better about my employer’s annual bbq thing. A few years ago, the only mains were hot dogs and burgers, and everyone acted like it was crazy that I might not want to haul myself on a 10 minute walk in August heat to eat the world’s worst salad (iceberg, grated carrots, tomatoes that I have to pick off). Last year, they swore they had a “vegan” option – it was an impossible patty and non-vegan buns (and sides with no ingredient info and no one could tell me what was in them). I can’t wait to see what happens next week.

        But I guess at least no one is like, “Hey you people eat potatoes, right? Here are ALL OF THEM,” so I got that going for me.

      2. Quite anon*

        Was the potato “burger” at least fried on each side to make it delicious? or was it a literal glob of mashed potato.

    8. RC*

      Conference in Paris! France! in the near-beforetimes, they had a “banquet” dinner on the last day. Price was fixed at 50 euros, no wiggle room. For those 50 euros I got essentially naked spaghetti noodles, with I’d guess maybe 1/4 of a carrot grated in. I’m still salty (heh) about that.

      On the other side, I had some AMAZING dining at a summer school in Kiruna, Sweden. Like actually thoughtfully-composed and delicious vegetarian entrees. I guess if you’re in polar night for half the year, you want to make people happy with food. Would recommend.

    9. LowBloodSugar*

      My favorite is when the conference says “vegan options!” and the vegan option is a side of brussel sprouts. What?

      I also received a lunch box with normal Mayo and a butter cookie. Box was labeled Vegan when they really meant dairy free.

      1. RC*

        My “favorite” is when they ruin the brussels sprouts option with bacon bits… or the deviled eggs with salmon, or… sigh.

    10. TurnedMeIntoANewt*

      The caterers for our wedding tried to pull stuff like this with us, after saying that we wanted a vegetarian menu. The “very special”vegetarian dish was “the vegetable pyramid”. This was plain “roasted” (clearly squished into a pan so steamed really) vegetables in a pile on a plate next to a bit of plain rice. It was also the sole vegan, gluten free, sodium free, allergy free, fat free, texture free option. Luckily, I’d been to one of their events before (they were inhouse to the venue) so I said no dice and we had a lovely buffet.

    11. Bethany*

      My office always provides vegetarian options when they cater lunch, but they’re not separate or labelled. It’s up to the vegetarians to magically know what is in each sandwich/wrap (without opening it up and looking inside, since that is gross), or to know whether the croissant has ham inside or if whether the quiche has bacon in it.

      In one particularly egregious example there were little pies (I live in Australia, so pie = savoury filling), some of which had a plain top and some of which had a little mushroom on the top. Everyone assumed that the mushroom ones were mushroom pies….nope, same beef pie, just with a mushroom on top for decoration.

      I work in the environmental space, so we have a LOT of vegetarians. Just make two different trays!

    12. Laura*

      I had a variant of the common “no, or no useful vegan options” on a student convention back in the early 90s:

      The convention took place on campus on a long holiday weekend. Every food outlet on campus was closed, none of the few eateries within walking distance served lunch, and for most days the shops were closed.

      Catering was done on-site (probably DIY, not by a company) and was vegan. Which makes sense: It’s inexpensive, unlikely to poison anyone when done in less-than-optimal conditions, and suits vegans, vegetarians, lactose intolerants, and many people who follow religious food rules.

      Unfortunately whoever did the food planning regarded “vegan” as “standard plate, minus animal products, minus carbs”. So, not only no potatoes, no pasta, no rice, no bread, and not even tofu, but portions were about the size of a small salad.

      No one complained about the quality of the food, but I have never encountered so many hangry people in one place.

    13. ClaireW*

      Hah I had the opposite issue – went to a conference in Berlin, every provided meal option (for breakfast and lunch each of the 3 days) was vegan and at least one was gluten free. Great idea and perfect for most people because there were 2 or 3 options for each meal and nobody had to worry about not being able to eat anything. Except me… because I’m allergic to citrus fruit, and somehow every single lunch option included citrus (I assume lemon was squeezed over everything to keep it looking fresh). So my only lunch option every day was the childrens’ option from the daycare – cold tomato sauce on pasta (the same every day). I had a huge dinner at my hotel every night because it was so disappointing and non-filling.

      I think the vegan only meals idea was good in theory, but given we’d all provided allergy requests in advance I was pretty disappointed that there wasn’t one option I could have of the adults’ portion sizes.

    14. Hungry Vegetarian*

      I think it’s important to point out that conference food is often just meant to be fuel to get you through the meeting, survival meals. There are other times when you can try something new or more exciting—maybe even later that day on your own time. Many times I have been left without anything to eat at professional events because I was helping to host the event and couldn’t get to the food until it was mostly gone—including my vegetarian meal. It really stinks to be presenting and hosting when you haven’t eaten all day. Plus, many of these locations weren’t in veg-friendly cities where I could just pop out and grab a snack somewhere close by during a break. (I think that’s also something omnivores don’t always get.) I didn’t always get time for a break in that role. That being said, I have been saved by instant oatmeal packets many, many times!

  3. sequitur*

    This was university rather than work, but at a formal dinner where folks who ate fish got a fish course, as the only vegetarian at the event I was presented with AN ENTIRE CROWN OF MELON stuffed with frozen berries. And only given a fish knife to eat it with.

    1. ursula*

      Omg I had forgotten about this, but one time the “vegetarian option” was A Squash. It was a plate containing one (1) acorn squash with the top cut off and a fork. Unseasoned but for a light sprinking of, oh let’s say nutmeg, across the top. So steaming hot as to be untouchable for at least 10-15 minutes (must have been cooked top-on), so everyone else was done their meal by the time I was starting mine. Fortunately this became a conversation piece, even if it was a little embarrassing.

      1. Jack Russell Terrier*

        I would wonder if it was just shoved into the microwave and super-heated. I can tell that type of heat a mile off … .

      2. Anonintheuk*

        I was once served an artichoke. I’d eaten artichoke before, but cut up as an appetiser/on a pizza/whatever. not a whole thing.

        Initially I thought it was a table decoration

        1. Hosta*

          Artichoke that’s intact enough to look like a decoration is a terrible thing to eat in a formal group, especially if your portion size is small enough that they expect you to scrape the base off the leaves with your teeth.

          1. Tau*

            Yeah, my family sometimes does whole artichokes as a starter, and it’s yummy but NOT something for a formal dinner. Finger food! Sucking at the leaves! Dipping!

            …….ok, so I’m buying an artichoke and dip tomorrow.

    2. Charlotte Lucas*

      At an all-employee meeting that included a “catered meal” – really burgers & hotdogs served in an outdoor tent & clearly provided by our normal, awful cafeteria vendor, I ate a lettuce & mustard sandwich, because no vegetarian option or cheese was provided.

      Reader – If I named my state, your first thought would be “cheese.”

      1. Polar Vortex*

        I suspect I used to live in that state myself if I guessed correctly. Honestly surprised there was no cheese!! (Sadly not surprised there was no vegetarian option depending on what part of the state this happened in.)

      2. Chirpy*

        There are many times in The Cheese State where I have thought about the odd lack of cheese.

        While I am not a full-time vegetarian, I don’t eat a ton of meat, and I have a particularly low tolerance for hot dogs. I did once have only ketchup on a bun. (This was largely due to trying to not let kids notice I was eating something different, but why didn’t we have cheese as an option??)

        1. Cheese Glob*

          Not a work thing, but when I was younger my husbands family did a LOT of picnics, almost entirely with processed lunch meat. Yuck.

          I generally ate what my father in law called a “jam sandwich” —2 pieces of bread jammed together :) or 2 pieces of bread with Miracle Whip. Hot dog buns with ketchup worked, too. I just wanted t eat something without being called weird for not wanting lunch meat.

        2. Hosta*

          I, too, know the sadness of filling a bun with condiments and nothing else. Relish, ketchup, mustard and chopped raw onions doesn’t make for balanced flavor.

        3. Where’s the Orchestra?*

          Yeah – similar style cookout – sauerkraut and mustard on a bun. Please – we don’t all eat hot dogs, give us options.

      3. Quill*

        Granted I lived in one of that
        state’s most urban areas, but I’m really surprised at the lack of an attempt at a veggie brat (if this was 2010 or later) or at least a very cheesed up side.

    5. BubbleTea*

      I was the contributor of the undressed salad with a single cherry tomato, and your comment has reminded me of another experience in a different place. All the non-vegetarians had some kind of elaborately confectioned cake with meringue and jelly and chocolate. I got a bowl of sad fruit salad with precisely half a strawberry. I laughed so much I was crying. People at the table were taking photos, the contrast was so stark.

    6. Rob aka Mediancat*

      At a work event I went to, the hors d’oeuvres were awesome, the dessert delicious, and the salad fine. The vegetarian option was a plate of unsauced tortellini surrounded by oversteamed vegetables. I took two bites and pushed it away in disgust. An odd misstep.

    7. Rob aka Mediancat*

      I was at a work event and got a vegetarian man course consisting of a plate of unsauced tortellini surrounded by oversteamed vegetables. The dessert was delicious, the salad was fine, but I could only take a couple of bites of the main course before giving up.

    9. I Have RBF*

      At my last university job, they regularly had catered all hands, and asked if you were meat, vegan or vegetarian. That was all well and good, except about half of the people who specified vegetarian/vegan actually grabbed and ate the meat sandwiches.

      So I, who properly signed up for a meat sandwich, was stuck with a pathetic vegan sandwich thing that I could hardly eat, because it had a soy “meat substitute”, ie soybeans, which I am allergic to. I had to try to strip the tofu substance off and hope I didn’t miss too many crumbs, because the sides? All had soybean oil in either the dressing or as margarine.

      I was very hungry by the time it ended, and miserable, because apparently they put soy margarine on the sandwich, too. I was very angry, too, because I had ordered the right thing, but it got grabbed out from under me.

  4. Kelly*

    There was a recent veterinary conference that used to be AMAZING before they sold out. Last time they offered highly discounted registration (75% off) and it was a madhouse. Registration wasn’t working, people missed their prepaid extracurriculars and they RAN OUT OF FOOD at lunch. Absolute horror show.

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      Yeah, that’s sheer incompetence. I always make sure we have more food at our events than we think we’ll need. (Leftovers get donated or saved for future events as appropriate.) If you run out of food or don’t accommodate dietary requirements, you have badly failed Event Planning 101.

    2. noncommittal pseudonym*

      Oof. I had largely forgotten about something similar that happened. It was a large scientific conference, and they had some mixer event at a local natural history museum. You had to pay separately, and it was listed as having “light appetizers.” Apparently, there was some sort of massive miscommunication between the museum and the conference, because people who arrived early got food, but they ran out completely within the first 30 minutes into a 3-hour event. People who arrived later got nothing. I don’t know what happened, but it was like they planned for 1/10th of the people who paid for the event. The conference ended up apologizing profusely and refunding money.

      1. Artemesia*

        I learned the hard way that when organizers say ‘light lunch’ will be provided and the venue has said light appetizers to them — that people expecting an adequate small lunch will be getting 3 crackers and be very surly.

        1. Lynn*

          I have an event coming up that promises a “light breakfast.” I imagine that will be coffee, a bottle of OJ, and a box of grocery store donuts, and I will eat before I come.

      2. Tau*

        I went to one conference where they somehow calculated 1 sandwich per person for lunch, but neglected to mention to attendees that you weren’t supposed to take multiple. I was in the back half of the queue and got no food.

        Although I did give the organisers more leeway since this was a conference for and organised by PhD students, so none of them had any experience or really knew what they were doing. Still. Most people are multi-sandwich when it comes to lunch.

    3. The Starson Princess*

      There’s nothing worse than running out of food. Some years ago, our social committee was chaired but a young, newish employee who was tasked with organizing a catered lunch for the whole company of about 150 people with some speeches from management and games. She worked with the catering company and ordered 150 portions of lasagna and salad as a buffet, figuring that would be plenty as not everyone would eat. However, it turns out that the portions of lasagna were about 2” x 2”, completely minuscule, and they completely ran out before half the people had gone through the line. Chaos ensued as about 75 hangry people figured out they weren’t getting anything for lunch. Fortunately, our managing director is a pretty smart guy so he kicked off his speech announcing that he ordered pizza for everyone which quieted the mob down considerably. But for weeks afterword, the poor committee chair heard about that lasagna lunch and everyone’s profound disappointment in almost every meeting she was in – that may be the reason she left the company shortly afterwards. There’s nothing like free lunch to get people riled up.

      2. LifeBeforeCorona*

        Portion control can be really difficult. A box of rice or pasta will list a serving size as either 1/2 or 1 cup. Then the first people through the buffet line will pile the equivalent of 4 cups on their plate.

      3. dawbs*

        oh i worked/ planned an event where we order pizza for high schoolers and i said 2 slices until everyone had been throb and we RAN OUT.
        the (new) lead of catering (had to use their services- camps rules) was a nice guy but could not grasp my level of fury when i learned that when ordering, he said each pizza would be 12 slices, but day of they were cut into 8 slices…
        “we gave you the number of pizzas you ordered… what’s the problem? ”
        (everyone got fed. Boss & I ALWAYS made sure everyone got fed- this was one of a few times when we just went around rules and i drove off campus and trusted biss to make sure i got reimbursed from petty cash. i always got reimbursed but i think boss ate the cost a few times)

  5. Wordnerd*

    It’s not the most egregious, but a conference hotel lunch that had brownies and blondies for dessert – but both had nuts in them! Why????

      3. Rob aka Mediancat*

        Yes! For a period in college our dining hall decided all the desserts went better with walnuts: chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin cookies, sugar cookies, peanut butter cookies, brownies, rice krispie treats . . . pretty much everything but the Jello.

        2. Dragon_Dreamer*

          I’ve had an excellent walnut studded Jello, years ago, with a light white sauce. Sadly, the restaurant hasn’t made it in YEARS.

      4. TurnedMeIntoANewt*

        I didn’t realize there were so many of us. Nuts in brownies are very unpleasant even when I’ll happily eat those same nuts on their own.

        1. Lynn*

          A friend of mine just made me some date muffins with walnuts, and she put two halves on the top of each one, none inside. They got lightly toasted as they baked, and I got to experience them as their lovely selves, rather than as odd bits hiding in the muffins. I thought it was an excellent strategy.

      5. OMG, Bees!*

        Same. I love brownies without nuts, and used to buy them from a store that would only casually list the nuts. No allergy mention; on an ingredient list larger than your thumb, it would list nuts somewhere in the middle of the small font. But sometimes their brownies didn’t have nuts, so I would be surprised every time I bit in and found a nut!

    3. Tess McGill*

      Years ago my office wanted to have a going away party for me. Organizer asked me what type of cake I fancied. I said, “I really love chocolate cake, but I’m highly allergic to nuts.” On the day of the event, I walked into the conference room to find an enormous chocolate COVERED with nuts on all sides. WTH? I turned around and just walked out, went back to my desk and kept working. It was such a dysfunctional place to work and I am equally perplexed and amused to this day.

    4. Zoe*

      My mum can’t eat chocolate, which she deals with, it’s fine, except the amount of places that don’t offer a non-chocolate option for pudding is astounding!

      1. Jackalope*

        Yup! And if they DO have a non chocolate dessert it is usually (at least in the US) either: a fruit crisp, a slice of cheesecake, or crème brûlée. I’m not a fan of cheesecake (too rich), and I’m tired of fruit crisps by the point, so I usually only get dessert if it’s the crème brûlée (or the rare pie). I love going to Asian restaurants where they have a wider variety of desserts and most of them have no chocolate!

    5. .*

      And both have chocolate! White chocolate is still chocolate! Don’t offer two choices that are fairly similar.

      1. Libellulebelle*

        Blondies don’t typically have white chocolate, at least in my experience. They are basically a chocolate chip cookie in bar form.

    6. LifeBeforeCorona*

      As a kitchen manager I had the authority to make the kitchen nut free and it was great. Most school boards and kid oriented events are nut free now as a standard.

  6. kjolis*

    A conference I went to in March had its closing party on St. Patrick’s Day. The food at the party was Irish themed – baked potatoes and boiled vegetables. Since it was the kind of party where you mingle, finger foods would’ve been best, but if you were going to consume a baked potato, you had to sit down to eat it, and a packet party at a museum does not have much in the way of seating.

    1. Irish Teacher*

      Hmmm, I’m actually trying to think now about what one could use for Irish themed finger food. Crisps are the obvious one (until recently, our crisps were such a big thing that a theme park was named for them!).

      And ooh, cocktail sausages would work.

      1. Distracted Procrastinator*

        so many things work if you put them in a pastry shell. like little corned beef hand pies and other meat pie fillings. you could do potato skins with colcannon. savory fish tarts. sausage rolls. little cabbage rolls. so many things. Just about anything can be shrunk and put on a stick.

        2. Bee*

          I used to go to an annual conference party that was LEGENDARY for its mashed potato bar. They served it in martini glasses for a festive air and had a dozen different topping options, and everyone got really excited about it, and it’s also a nice substantial food for an open-bar party that starts before dinner. Genuinely a perfect cocktail party snack!

          1. Allison K*

            Was it for writers? If so, we were at the same conference and I also loved the mashed potato martinis!

          3. Lily*

            “They served it in martini glasses for a festive air and had a dozen different topping options”
            This sounds delightful and fun!

          4. Joielle*

            I’m in the early stages of planning a big conference for next summer and I’m putting this on the list! This would be amazing for the opening reception. Thanks for the idea!

          5. Librarian the Ninth*

            This is slightly off-topic as it was a wedding and not a work event, but this reminds me of what a friend of mine served at her reception- Shrimp and grits, but the caterers used an ice cream scoop to portion the grits into wine glasses and hung the shrimp on the edge of the glasses. A martini glass would have been a much more practical shape, but luckily no one broke any of those glasses.

      2. The Prettiest Curse*

        Please tell me about the theme park named after a brand of crisps, I’ve never heard of it and now I’m intrigued!

        1. Irish Teacher*

          It’s just changed its name to “Emerald Park,” but up to…a few months ago? It was called Tayto Park, after a brand of crisps so well known in Ireland that “tayto” is used to mean “crisp” in the same way Kleenix gets used for tissues. Mr. Tayto, the logo from the crisps featured prominently.

          2. Blahblahblah*

            And Emerald is an Irish confectionary brand, lest anyone think the theme park is no longer named after a snack.

          3. The Prettiest Curse*

            Mr Tayto is the most Irish-looking brand mascot ever! He looks so welcoming and potato-y (potato-esque?)

      3. Richard Hershberger*

        Irish themed finger food: Do we include modern Ireland, or restrict it to the leprechaun-infested Ireland of the imagination? Because I have learned, from an unhealthy habit of watching the Try Channel on YouTube, about the spice bag, a traditional Irish finger food since the 2010s, typically sold as take out from Chinese restaurants. Per Wikipedia:

        Typically, a spice bag consists of deep-fried salt and chilli chips, salt and chilli chicken (usually shredded, occasionally balls/wings),[6] red and green peppers, sliced chili peppers, fried onions, and a variety of spices.[7] A vegetarian or vegan option is often available, in which deep fried tofu takes the place of the shredded chicken.[8] It is sometimes accompanied by a tub of curry sauce.

      4. Resident Catholicville, U.S.A.*

        As an actual Irish person, you probably have the perspective of knowing actual Irish food, whereas in America, we generally opt in for “Things we think are Irish and/or are green.” In retail, I once had a woman ask me if I thought the wasabi peas from Japan would work for a St. Patrick’s Day themed party she was having and she was highly displeased when I said no. (She bought them anyway. Shows me, I guess?)

      5. Clewgarnet*

        And they’re the best crisps in Europe! (Used to work for a crisps company – I have sampled crisps throughout Europe, and Tayto are absolutely the best.)

    2. SW*

      Kholis, we were at the same conference? in PA? Because yes, I remember wondering where in the world to sit to tackle my huge potato bar plate. There were also people walking around passing finger foods in addition to the wine bar and potato bar.

    3. princesspwn*

      I was at that conference too! I enjoyed the food, but the line was bad because building a baked potato takes a long time… and yes, NOT suitable for mingling.

      1. Kjolis*

        When I filled out the post-conference survey, I gave positive reviews on everything but wrote that baked potatoes at a crowded party were perhaps not the wisest move.

    4. LibraryIT*

      I think I was also at the same conference (or a few conferences had the same potato bar/museum/St. Patrick’s Day combo). A baked potato bar is a great option for a conference since it is super customizable for a whole lot of dietary needs. It is not a great option for mingling while standing!

      1. Kjolis*

        Yeah it would’ve been a great idea for one of those vendor lunches. I’d happily listen to a sales pitch for an hour if I could build my own baked potato beforehand.

  7. TotesMaGoats*

    At a farewell dinner at a private dinner club, served undercooked chicken breast. Those who got fish also got an undercooked fish item. And this was a super exclusive, old home with history photos, no sign on the door exclusive place.

    1. Charlie*

      OldJob used to hold regular department strategy away days at a nearby hotel where the food was legendarily awful. It was picked every year as it was the only venue near the office. Never mind that most staff didn’t live near the office, but lived in a medium-sized city about 45 minutes away. Not sure why we couldn’t have gone to a venue there, but anyway. One year the buffet was a sea of beige – breaded or battered everything (but soggy rather than crispy). Not a vegetable in sight. My gluten-free colleague couldn’t eat a thing, so she complained – she had alerted the venue in advance – and she ended up with a delicious-looking grilled chicken salad! Nobody could concentrate in the afternoon sessions due to lunchtime carb- and fat-heavy foods and there was so much general moaning that department away days were stopped indefinitely. That was a win, at least.

      1. Artemesia*

        On a Russian river boat cruise, the vegetarians and me, the onion sensitive, were well catered for. So I happily ate a broiled chicken breast and she what looked like a fancy sushi roll (vegetarian though) at a table of disgruntled shipmates eating grade school cafeteria mystery meat.

        Sometimes the vegetarian food is better. But it doesn’t make up for the times they are stuck with plain lettuce.

    2. Liane*

      I did my coop ed internships (late 1980s) at our city water department’s main lab. They had a catered barbeque chicken lunch for a retiring Production Operator. Delicious, until one of my pieces turned out to be very underdone. No problem, stuff happens; set it aside, get another. When it was also undercooked, I told one of the managers and decided I was done with the entree and it was dessert time.

    3. Richard Hershberger*

      Per my (extremely limited) experience with private clubs, bad-to-mediocre food is par for the course. The food is not the attraction.

  8. Healthcare Manager*

    Vegan here.

    I was served chicken because it’s ‘gluten free’.
    Another time I was forgotten about and they rushed and brought out a sandwich… that was frozen inside

    1. AfT*

      Celiac here! I often get offered vegan food that is not safe for me, because people seem DEEPLY confused about the difference between gluten free and vegan, when they are such completely different concepts. Why… does this happen?

        1. Massive Dynamic*

          Solidarity. Am vegan, and I think I live on gluten some days. But my goodness there are so, so many fantastic vegan + GF dishes that can be made that it boggles the mind why a caterer or any other food service professional would get one side right and fail on the other end.

        2. TurnedMeIntoANewt*

          I workin food manufacturing and all of our products are vegan and gluten free, but our restrictions around those and allergens* are very intense. Even people who work only in the office and never enter the production floor have to follow the rules.

          *Fun fact, major allergens vary around the world. We sell internationally and I learned that peaches and tomatoes are allergens in South Korea. It is also how I learned that “shellfish” in the US does not include mollusks (e.g. oysters and clams).

        3. Boof*

          I really, really try not to be judgy but I do not understand the fad for eliminating gluten outside of actual celiac disease. It’s a perfectly good plant protein! Some people are really allergic, but I do not understand why some people think it is just “healthier” to eliminate if there’s no specific sensitivity to it. I suppose it makes more options available to those with celiac disease, though, so that’s cool.

          1. Anna*

            Fwiw, as someone with celiac, I hear an awful lot more about “those silly dieters that ask for gluten-free stuff because they think it’s healthier” a lot more than I actually *see* them. The vast majority of gluten-free resources are indeed intended and used by people with celiac and gluten sensitivity, it’s just more common than people expect.

            Mostly saying cause while I don’t mind people talking generally about how gluten by itself for most people is not dangerous (there’s a lot of bad diet advice out there!). . . sometimes people extend that attitude to assuming anyone ordering gluten-free is on a “fad” diet and therefore wouldn’t notice or be impacted by cross-contamination, and that causes issues. It’s safer to just assume any specific person eating gluten-free might indeed have a medical reason for it (and to at least ask if cross-contamination protocols etc. is needed if you’re the one making/serving the food).

            1. TurnedMeIntoANewt*

              I know three such people (don’t eat gluten because it is “bad”) and they never shut up about it.

        4. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

          Before I became a vegetarian, I’d still need to avoid both soy and a specific vegetable. A surprising number of times, the immediate reply would be to hand me their vegan and gluten-free menu, despite both of the things I was avoiding being gluten-free plants.

          It’s like people only can handle the concept of one special diet.

        5. Nannerdoodle*

          I think a lot of people just lump “dietary restrictions” in the same category. I can’t eat gluten, and I’ve gotten a ton of weird things in at work events.

          At an old job, I organized our yearly conference, and when I was sending the buffet food choices (with markings next to which ones were GF/Veg/Vegan/Kosher/Halal and making sure we had choices that fit in multiple of the above categories together so everyone could at least eat SOMETHING), the person who had previously organized said she’d never even thought about choosing things that fit those options. It hurt my soul.

      2. ScruffyInternHerder*

        I frequently am offered either the gluten free menu, or hear “but its gluten free!”….in response to my milk allergy. That’s at least sort of in line with vegan, but even then, not all vegan food would meet muster (because was the kitchen careful to not create cross contact with allergens?).

        I’ve come to the conclusion that for those who don’t have to deal with any of these issues, they’re lucky enough to remain clueless and that’s all we’re seeing. Sometimes yes, incompetence does reach the level of malice, but its rare.

        1. Julian*

          I once worked for a large corp that was great about allergens…. if you were a customer/guest. I went to the employee cafeteria and asked if they had any gluten free bread. The guy thought for a second and said “We have whole wheat?”

          I ate from the vending machine that day

        2. Kiwi*

          My egg and nut allergy has often been met with people thinking I can’t have cheese or gluten. Or they just forget. Honestly at this point I don’t trust event foods to have something to eat so I bring my own – too many conferences and weddings where I was just going hungry or trying to snack on sides.

          1. Purple Cat*

            OMG, the number of times I had the following conversation
            Me: Son has a dairy allergy
            Them: Can he have eggs?

            WHAT?!?

            2. No Longer a Meeting Planner*

              I once got yelled at by a dairy free participant because of COURSE they can not have eggs (I just requested dairy free from the caterer and it was eggs– I should have confirmed on both sides, but…)

            3. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

              A lot of people will put a bit of milk or heavy cream in their scrambled eggs or omelets, and some people add cheese, so maybe that’s part of the confusion? You’d think catering would just omit the dairy to make it easier on people…or maybe they’re concerned because they cook the eggs with butter?

              1. Quite anon*

                Also some people thing eggs = dairy because eggs are with the dairy in the grocery store.

            4. Distracted Procrastinator*

              It probably has to do with the most well known difference between being vegan and vegetarian being eggs and dairy. People conflate them now when it comes to special diets.

        3. DrFresh*

          Or “it doesn’t have egg in it.” For some reason, when I ask for dairy free, it always ends up conflated with eggs. For this reason, I always bring a sandwich to make sure I have something to eat.

          1. AngryOctopus*

            I blame the American habit of putting eggs in the dairy case. I KNOW eggs are not dairy, but half the time my mind goes to them being in the dairy case and just smashes it all together into one category.
            To be fair, I’m not a professional caterer.

            1. General von Klinkerhoffen*

              They still get conflated in the UK where supermarket eggs are at room temperature (typically near bread or baking supplies).

              I blame the stupid food pyramid and the more recent stupid food circle.

          2. Minimal Pear*

            Yes, I’m allergic to dairy but I love eggs! Please, stop trying to take the eggs away from me!

        4. BubbleTea*

          I went to an event that specifically stated in its flyers that they had gluten free cakes “so everyone can enjoy them” Out of curiosity, I went to look and as I’d expected, there was not a single dairy-free item available.

        5. Powercycle*

          I’m lactose intolerant so I don’t eat as much dairy nowadays, and don’t always have lactaid/lactase pills with me if the mood strikes me. Because of that I’ve skipped on a few free pizza and free ice cream events at work and would go buy my own lunch/snack.
          My spouse is allergic to tree nuts, and one kid is allergic to peanuts. A lot of people just don’t know that those are two different allergies.

      3. Queen of the Introverts*

        Not work related but I was in the hospital once and was trying to order off a very bread-heavy menu. I only have a gluten allergy, not celiac, so I could have handled some wheat, but it was in my hospital record so I wasn’t allowed to order anything with gluten. They offered a hamburger without the bun. Great! I realized I should have been more specific when I uncovered my plate to reveal a single hamburger patty, all alone. No lettuce, onions, tomatoes, ketchup, mustard, nothing.

        1. anononon*

          I was in hospital a few years ago where they were trying to stabilise some strong anti-coagulant drugs. Said drugs contraindicated (badly – think haemorrhage) with quite a lot of foods, including (and especially) green veggies containing Vitamin K. For lunch one day I was presented with a spinach curry…

          1. I'm Just Here For The Cats!!*

            Makes me think of the time I was in the hospital. After 4 days of waiting and finally getting my gallbladder out (there were complications so they couldn’t do the surgery immediately) I was finally able to eat. The dietitian came to ask if I had any food allergies and I said no but I cannot have Splenda or other artificial sweeteners (not an allergy but it makes me very sick to my stomach and I didn’t want any other digestive tract issues). She was flummoxed and said, “well then you can’t have the lemonade!” I hadn’t asked for lemonade, didn’t want lemonade, or cared about lemonade. I wanted FOOD” She was just so confused and the way she said it was so short, like I was being problematic.

            1. LIZZIE*

              Reminds me of a hospital stay for pancreatitis. So when I was FINALLY allowed to eat, i still wasn’t feeling all that well. In their defense, the way the system worked, you had to order your meals in the am, and my dr. didn’t clear me to eat until after that.

              Mind you, I’m still queasy, and thinking toast, tea, yogurt. I got beef stroganoff. managed to eat a few noodles and the roll but the smell alone was enough to make me ill again.

          2. WheresMyPen*

            Reminds me of my sister in law who was in hospital about to give birth. She’d had gestational diabetes so had been on a low carb diet the whole pregnancy. At lunch time she asked the catering staff what she could eat and they suggested she eat a baked potato because ‘that’s healthy’.

            1. Observer*

              At lunch time she asked the catering staff what she could eat and they suggested she eat a baked potato because ‘that’s healthy’.

              This reminds me of the whole discussion about “healthy eating” in the comments on the post about whether or not a workplace should have a policy on “healthy eating”. (It’s linked up above in “You might like”)

              1. Anna*

                Oh my goodness, the “if it’s healthy for one person it must be equally healthy for everybody because everybody has the same dietary needs” mentality in some workspaces is just.

                I am not eating X because I think it is “healthy,” I am eating it because the other food offered will literally make me sick. I do not need people to explain to me “actually it’s a myth X is better for you -“ and the like – it is healthier for *me,* specifically, to eat, *because the other offered food will make me sick*.

            2. Mari*

              Oh geeze.

              When my kiddo was born, there was a bit of a baby boom on the ward – there were 35 moms and kiddos on Maternity my second night there (we were there four because I was a ‘medically complicated’ pregnancy).

              They served good food – it was fresh, it was nutritious, it even tasted good… But that night they served us all a really lovely seasoned and sauced broccoli and cauliflower mix. Would have been great – except cruciferous vegetables can cause gas in breastfeeding babies. I always figured it was a myth… but honestly, after that night, it’s not… 32 of those babies were starting to nurse, and every single one of them was brutally gassy that night and incredibly upset.

              To say the nurses were unhappy with the dietitian group would be a stunning understatement.

            3. Emmy Noether*

              That reminds me – last pregnancy I had gestational diabetes. My mom was entirely flummoxed how to feed me. Finally came up with “potato soup…?” I can report that my after-lunch measurement confirmed that this was not a great choice.

              Also, 99% of recipes and advice for diabetes are “low carb, low calories”. I was friggen pregnant, I *needed* the calories! My dietician was even worried that I got enough to eat after looking at my food journal. I started eating copious amounts of nut butters (high energy density + feels like desert even though it has almost no sugar). Even better with berries, which have surprisingly little sugar.

          3. Hannah Lee*

            A friend of mine was in the hospital, in ICU for weeks, much of that time on a respirator and immobilized after a serious car accident. The day they took her respirator tube out, food services brought her her first meal … a whole apple. Not sliced, not applesauce, a whole red delicious (but not really) apple.

            Because they didn’t want her to have anything too heavy after not eating for a while.

            At the time she was barely able to deal with small ice chips or sipping from a straw between her throat being irritated by the tube and not having being able to use her mouth or arms at all for nearly a month. I’m not even sure she had the strength to hold the apple at her mouth and bite it, much less chew and swallow it.

            She was so happy when her mom showed up later with a cup of pastina en brodo (little star pasta in chicken broth) and helped her eat it.

          4. Observer*

            Said drugs contraindicated (badly – think haemorrhage) with quite a lot of foods, including (and especially) green veggies containing Vitamin K

            That’s a level of incompetence that is scary.

        2. Spencer Hastings*

          Even as someone who does eat bread, one of my pet peeves is when you get a hamburger somewhere (or any other sandwich, really) and it’s just meat and bread, and maybe cheese. I’m always like “if I’d known that that’s what they meant, I’d have concluded it wasn’t worth it!”

          1. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

            That’s actually how I prefer it! I don’t mind having the other stuff as options/on the side, but I don’t want watery tomato juice or pickle flavor or onion flavor or secret sauce already on my cheeseburger/sandwich.

          2. Powercycle*

            The main reason I avoid eating sandwiches almost anywhere is because most places will slather on too much mayo or other condiments making the bread all soggy by the time it’s in front of you to eat. (Also, I am just not a fan of mayo in general.)

        3. J!*

          I had a hospital stay where they kept bringing me sugar free jello and diet juice, even though I told them sugar substitutes give me migraines without fail. It’s not technically an “allergy” but you would think hospitals would be better about that sort of thing!

          1. starsaphire*

            I always have one hell of a time convincing the hospital dietitians of that.

            “You’re diabetic,” they all chorus.
            “Sugar substitutes give me migraines,” I reply.
            “But you’re diabetic. You can’t have sugar.”
            “I don’t WANT sugar. I want whole milk/yogurt/whatever. It’s the lowfat stuff that has all the added sugar.”
            “But you’re diabetic. Here, have this fat-free yogurt with Splenda.”

            By day three, my husband is usually smuggling me in steamed fish and curry veg from the Thai place.

            1. Tin Cormorant*

              Ugh, and the versions that have artificial sweetener instead of sugar always put way too much of it in there, as if every single person has the palate of someone who’s been drinking sodas like water their entire life. It doesn’t need to be that sweet!

              1. AngryOctopus*

                I have thrown away so many yogurts because I didn’t pay enough attention when buying them, and then I take one taste at lunch and can taste the artificial sweetener, and into the trash it goes. I don’t need the GI migraine, thanks.
                (Once had awful GI migraines for like 3 months and finally realized that it’s because the fiber supplement I had to swap to had sucralose in it. That taught me once and for all to read labels on EVERYTHING).

                1. Artemesia*

                  Me too — artificial sweeteners also make me sick and you have to be really careful to read labels and it is easy to end up accidentally grabbing the yogurt full of that junk which is sitting next to the yogurt you think you are getting.

                2. AngryOctopus*

                  I always see the flavor and think “oohhh, that sounds GOOD!!!” and then I grab it without reading. No no no! Read the label! Read it!!!

              2. Elizabeth*

                Thought I was so smart, replacing my sugar with stevia on our lunch order iced teas. Did you know stevia is related to the ragweed family? Cuz I didn’t.

                I drank ragweed juice for months and couldn’t figure out why everything itched all the time.

                2. Artemesia*

                  I am so glad to learn this as Stevia is a product I have not tried and might be tempted to.

                3. Minimal Pear*

                  …you may have just solved my Itchy Mystery. Unfortunately, I have to keep using the supplements with stevia in them, but at least I know now.

                4. Weaponized Pumpkin*

                  I had no idea! I already avoid stevia along with all sugar replacements, but it does show up sometimes and now I know to be extra vigilant (or at least not surprised when I get itchy)

                5. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

                  …omg, I’m so glad I haven’t tried Stevia. I have terrible ragweed allergies.

                  Thank you for telling us!!

                6. Powercycle*

                  I can tolerate most artificial sweeteners just fine, but not stevia. I don’t like the taste, and I don’t feel great after consuming it.

                7. Elizabeth*

                  I feel so much better that I’m not alone in this!

                  Avoid it if you’re in the birch or ragweed allergy families, it’s perfidious.

            3. DataSci*

              Ugh! Plain full fat yogurt is delicious, why do people have to take out the fat and dump in sweetener? I blame the 1990s.

              1. They Don’t Make Sunday*

                I was just thinking today about the moment in the late 90s when “low-fat nuts” debuted. That was peak 90s and in hindsight a sign of the end. Not long after, Atkins was everywhere.

          2. pally*

            I thought there was something wrong with me as I get headaches (wouldn’t class them as migraines) when I consume sugar substitutes. Never met anyone else who did.

            Allergy or not, you’d think folks would avoid providing foods that cause another person a migraine.

            1. Wondercootie*

              Until this thread, I had never heard of so many other people who had this! I know it’s not technically an allergy, but my doc started listing it as an allergy on my chart because that’s the only way people pay attention to it even in hospital or pharmacy.

            2. JustEm*

              it’s a super common migraine trigger! (I’m a person with chronic migraines, and also a physician who specializes in headache disorders)

        4. She of Many Hats*

          The number of stories of people with significant dietary needs who can’t safely eat when hospitalized amazes me. And most of the restrictions aren’t weird: low salt, GF, diabetic, etc.

          2. Guacamole Bob*

            Though some of these get more complicated! My son has type 1 diabetes, and the number of medical professionals who know a little about type 2 and basically nothing about type 1 but kind of assume the needs are the same is incredibly frustrating!

            Sure, it’s a bit easier to manage his blood sugar if he eats lower carb, but he’s not on any kind of “diabetic” meal plan.

            1. Humble Schoolmarm*

              Ugh, the amount of times I’ve had to explain that giving up all carbs would mean I have to completely change my insulin regime (with life-threatening hypoglycemia if I get it wrong) and get a completely blank look for my troubles.

              1. Guacamole Bob*

                Just in the last week we’ve had an ophthalmologist who asked what his typical fasting blood sugar was and whether he was still on insulin, and a dentist who asked whether we’d checked his A1C today. Sigh.

                2. Nightengale*

                  From an ophthalmologist to me, type 1

                  Do you check your blood sugar?
                  Yes
                  What was it?
                  What was it when? When I woke this AM? Before lunch? 10 minutes ago in your waiting room? I’ve checked it 3 times today already. . .

                  For awhile my insulin pump supply company would refuse to refill my supplies until I told them my most recent blood sugar. Because one random number is going to change whether or not I can keep using my pump?

          3. Panicked*

            As a person with Celiac disease, I was told by my local hospital that I would need to have food brought in because they couldn’t accommodate my gluten free diet. You can bet I disputed my hospital bill when meal service was listed on it!

            1. ferrina*

              Our local hospital sometimes recommends the local pizza place as an alternative to the hospital cafeteria. The cafeteria is…..a hospital cafeteria. The pizza place is well known for catering to a lot of different dietary restrictions, and for having fresh local ingredients. Pizza place is definitely the better option (the hospital doesn’t bill for it, though).

            2. AfT*

              I have thankfully not needed a hospital stay yet, but I’ve also been warned by LOTS of fellow Celiacs that hospitals will not only likely not have food I can safely eat, but try to feed me things that are not safe for Celiacs (despite it being right there on my record).

          4. Nightengale*

            I was admitted to the hospital with new type 1 diabetes and everything had sugar. Officially I was ordered a diet low in refined carbohydrates and “no added sugars.” I kept being brought white bread, sweetened fruit cups and sugar for my tea. And juice. So much juice. Once the food was in my room, food services wasn’t allowed to take it back.

            Hospital juice comes in these squat plastic cylinders with flat foil tops and so I started stacking the juices into towers and various configurations like a kid would with building blocks. Every medical person who came into the room looked at the increasingly tall juice constructions in horror – “you aren’t going to drink all that are you?!” They kept trying to recommunicate the food order with dietary services – who just kept sending up the juices.

            The whole thing was made funnier by the fact that I was a medical student at that same hospital and knew a bunch of the people caring for me.

        5. Lindsay*

          I once ordered a burger at a popular fast food restaurant, and said “ketchup, mustard, and pickles only.” (I detest mayo and I wasn’t sure if it came on this burger). They brought me a bun with literally just ketchup, mustard, and pickles. No meat. I guess I should have been more specific, haha!

          1. slashgirl*

            I’ve been asked at a fast food place, when I ordered a cheeseburger and wanted just ketchup on it, if I wanted the cheese.*sigh* Yes, I’m going to order a cheeseburger, which costs more and then NOT get the cheese. At least they assumed I wanted the burger.

            1. AngryOctopus*

              There is a subset of people out there who INSIST on having a “cheeseburger with out the cheese. NOT A HAMBURGER.” It’s fascinating.

              1. Enough*

                Well, when they put cheese on every burger except the smallest that’s the only way to order it.

                1. Artemesia*

                  This. M y favorite burger place only has cheeseburgers, so I have to order the tpe of cheeseburger I want without cheese.

              2. Dahlia*

                I’ve had to do that at our local place a couple times. Once there was a sale ONLY on cheeseburgers so it was cheaper and like I’m gonna do that.

                The other time, the girl on the till did not believe me that double burgers existed in their system? The way she managed to ring it up was to add a patty to a single burger, which was significantly more expensive than just the normal double burger. No matter how I argued it, she didn’t get it. She did understand “double cheeseburger no cheese no mustard” though.

                Don’t ask me.

              3. The New Wanderer*

                It’s definitely a no-win situation. I’ve had to order “cheeseburger without cheese” at a place where “hamburger” did not appear on the menu. Several times I was brought a cheeseburger with cheese, sent it back, and had it come back with the partially melted remnants of cheese marking where they had just peeled it off. We stopped eating there.

                I’m always pleasantly surprised when I order a burger or sandwich a particular way and it comes out the way I asked. But in my experience there’s no completely successful way to special order something.

              4. Never Boring*

                I usually order burgers that way because the percentage of times I end up with melted Kraft American cheese slices on my burger after specifically ordering a HAMBURGER because I detest American cheese is nearly 100%.

            2. Chirpy*

              I used to work at a burger chain. The number of people who order “plain cheeseburger” when they mean “hamburger” is SIGNIFICANT. So you always have to clarify, and then the people who wanted a meat-and-cheese-only burger get really upset about “how dumb you are”, so there’s no way to win.

        6. Elizabeth West*

          When I was in the hospital, I asked for the sweet potato one meal. I expected a sweet potato. Instead, I got several small cubes — about five or six — of a dark orange sweet-potato-ish…something. It was gross.

        7. nonprofit llama groomer*

          This reminds me a bit of when I was in the hospital 21 years ago after having been unexpectedly admitted and induced prior to birth, nothing to eat for 36+ hours of labor because at least then, that was the protocol for moms in labor, then a c-section followed by nothing but a liquid diet for another 24 hours.

          I was so HUNGRY and I was finally going to get a meal! They brought me a plastic cloche. I opened the cloche and found a hamburger that looked like those old Wendy’s “Where’s the Beef” burgers and the fries were cold and limp. I started crying.

          My mom and dad had just arrived and were keeping me company while my husband ran home for a shower and to take care of the dog. My dad was a hero and ran and got me a lovely turkey sandwich at one of the cafes within the hospital.

          I was so envious of all my friends who gave birth in cities with multiple options for birth so there was competition. They got to order fantastic meals for two after birth with accommodations for their partners.

          My daughter is completely worth it, but darn, that was a horrible example of hospital food.

      4. word nerd*

        Whenever my husband (who is vegan) orders a special meal on an airline, it also seems to be gluten free. I assume this is because the airline can then use the same meal to meet gluten-free and vegan requirements. But yeah, since it is pretty difficult to cook a meal for both my vegan husband and my paleo-ish mother-in-law with celiac disease and soy allergy, I appreciate that they are not at all the same thing…

        1. londonedit*

          Similarly, especially with the rise in veganism and the cost of living crisis, pubs and restaurants here have started just offering one vegan option. Which totally makes sense, because it’s cheaper and easier to have one option that anyone who doesn’t eat meat can have, rather than two or three vegetarian options plus one vegan. But it’s annoying, as a vegetarian but not a vegan, that most of the time now if I go out to the pub the only thing on the menu I can have is likely to be a vegan chilli or a vegan curry. And instead of a veggie burger, it’ll be a vegan one with fake cheese. Of course, I can always ask for real cheese instead, but it does feel like we’re back to being shoved to the bottom of the menu as an afterthought.

          1. how sad*

            How do you think most vegans feel when the vegan option is a salad? Vegan chili sounds like a welcome change from soggy iceburg lettuce.

      5. Healthcare Manager*

        It baffles me too.

        Depending where I am, I don’t say I’m vegan, I say ‘I don’t eat animals or their products’ and list them. Seems to help a bit to not be confused with gluten free.

      6. R*

        Saaaaame! I have no objection to eating vegan if it’s easier to do both special diets in one meal, but they are so very NOT the same thing. Drives me nuts when people conflate the two.

      7. Not Elizabeth*

        It happens all the time! I ask if something is vegan and they tell me about what’s gluten free. I love gluten! Bring on the gluten! I think they just have a vague “hippy dippy diet” space in their brains and it’s all lumped together there.

        1. Artemesia*

          One of the common vegan options in vegetarian restaurants is seitan which is basically fried gluten.

        3. Observer*

          My daughter’s allergic to nuts and often offered the gluten-free bread!

          Yeah, I can’t handle wheat, but I still get very cautious about “gluten free” stuff, because I have even more trouble with potatoes. And the only food at least as common in gluten free foods as nuts it potatoes. And since one of my kids is actually allergic to nits, I am always on the alert when I see a new “gluten free” item.

          It’s crazy making.

        4. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

          Yeah, my FIL has a deadly allergy to cashews, and the number of vegetarian/vegan food substitutes that are now made with those…thankfully *he* isn’t also vegetarian/vegan, but at larger family gatherings where everyone brings a dish, he actually has to be careful to avoid the vegan/vegetarian substitute food options.

      9. Blue*

        They absolutely are not the same (I have an egg allergy and the vast majority of people seem to extrapolate that to a broader dairy allergy which is strange), but in my country, celiac’s and glutem-free is pretty rare and I’ve found that vegan/vegetarian restauarants at least are more likely to be aware of if their dishes have gluten or not.

        1. Zephy*

          I think it’s because the eggs are always right by the dairy section in the grocery store. Eggs aren’t dairy, but they sure hang out with dairy a lot.

      10. General von Klinkerhoffen*

        I think sometimes people can try to accommodate all dietary requirements in one dish to make catering easier, so eg if the default thing is lasagne then the alternative might be a chickpea curry that’s free of meat, dairy, gluten, and soya.

        The trouble is that you might get into the habit of “default dietary” and offer a completely unnecessary substitution (eg the main meal is naturally gluten free but the celiac guest has to have the “dietary” meal every single time).

        1. Mill Miker*

          I ran into that at a conference once. got sent to the “dietary restriction” buffet because of my tomato allergy. every dish there had tomatos on it. As did every dish on the main buffet (even the egg salad sandwich)

          1. Nina*

            (I have several friends who have wild allergies, and I’m vegetarian) It’s actually easier to reliably have one dish with no nuts, animal products, soy, tomatoes, MSG, cinnamon, melon, or artificial sweeteners (it’s a chickpea curry, you serve it with rice and ‘here are the gluten free poppadoms, here are the dairy free and vegan roti, here are the naan’, I’ve yet to meet anyone who’s allergic to rice) than try to juggle all those requirements across two dishes and risk dividing them up wrong and having someone go ‘but I’m allergic to cashews and dairy’.

      11. Lalaith*

        My dad and I are diabetic, and he does a keto diet, so my mom is always trying to find treats that both of us can eat. It’s amazing the number of times she’s asked for something sugar-free and/or low-carb and gotten the reply “no, but this is gluten-free”! Like… no. My dad will make recipes that contain just gluten, because that’s the part he *can* eat. It’s not nearly as egregious as confusing vegan/gluten-free (and as a near-vegetarian I know that pain as well), but still frustrating.

      12. Mainly Lurking (UK)*

        My sisters are Coeliac and they have been offered the pasta salad by caterers who seem to think it’s another word for vegetarian …

      14. Minimal Pear*

        I’m allergic to dairy and people CONSTANTLY interpret this as being gluten free. I’m not! I’ve tried going gluten free for my stomach issues and I got sicker! If anything, I actually NEED gluten.

      15. Anna*

        S a m e. I can eat meat and cheese. I cannot eat bread, or pasta, or salad w/ croutons, or soy sauce, or anything fried with other gluten-containing ingredients, etc. That said, at least “okay if you’re gluten-free here’s our whole grain vegan roll and our salad drenched in dressing with a wheat thickener” serves as a pretty good signal that’s a place that’s also has no clue how to deal with cross-contamination?

        (My best guess as to the “why” is a mixture of people not being aware that a lot of people asking for gluten-free have a medical need for it, and the existence of places that have a combined “gluten-free and vegan” option so they only have to make one alternative instead of two separate ones. But still. )

      16. Rose*

        I’m also regularly offered things that are whole wheat when I say I can’t eat gluten. I’ve told the same five people in my life “no, the wheat is literally the problem” about 30 times each to no avail. At a certain point I think it’s just laziness.

    2. londonedit*

      My sister gets this. She can’t eat gluten or dairy because of a medical issue (not coeliac) and she frequently gets well-meaning friends saying ‘I bought this [thing with pastry or bread] – you can eat it because it’s vegan, right?’ or ‘This has no eggs – it’s OK for you, isn’t it?’ She’s fine with eggs! She likes eggs! People seem deeply confused about the difference between no dairy and no eggs, especially – I’ve seen people in the US saying it makes vague sense to them at least because they’re all kept in the same fridges in the supermarket, but that doesn’t even work here because eggs aren’t refrigerated and are usually kept with the baking things like flour and sugar, far away from any dairy products! Eggs do not come from cows, people.

      1. Queen of the Introverts*

        Try having a gluten allergy AND an egg allergy. I miss brunch.

        How on earth do people not get the very simple distinction between vegan and gluten-free??? If they were the same thing, there wouldn’t be two different words!

        1. A Penguin!*

          I definitely understand the frustration with people not getting the difference, but I think your last sentence is a bit much. There are lots and lots of synonyms in the English language (and I presume in others).

          1. ThatGirl*

            That’s kind of nitpicky, isn’t it? yes, there are synonyms in the English language, but vegan and gluten-free are not among them.

        2. Radioactive Cyborg Llama*

          My sister! I can deal with the gluten/wheat but boy do I wish I could eat eggs.

        3. Charlotte Lucas*

          I think part of the confusion is branding. I now see so many things marked “gluten-free” that never had gluten. (Back in the 80s & 90s, you’d see the same with “cholesterol-free” marketing.)

          I am often amazed at how little people who don’t deal with special diets or interested in cooking actually know about food.

          1. DataSci*

            This is at least in part because of cross contamination risk. If they use the same production lines to process, say, rice and barley there’s a risk of cross-contamination that can be enough to cause a reaction. My niece has a severe wheat allergy and needs to check labels carefully for exactly this reason.

            1. AngryOctopus*

              This exactly. When a shampoo is advertised as ‘gluten free’ they’re not doing it to be trendy or because they think you’ll eat the shampoo. It’s because they are made with a gluten-free source for the protein derivatives which give the shampoo it’s advertised qualities (shine enhancing, smoothing, etc.). And some people with celiac are sensitive enough that inhaling the shampoo in the shower (say from a popped lather bubble) can cause issues. Also to be fair, celiac babies just might put shampoo in their mouths as well (hopefully only once before they learn).

              2. AfT*

                Also for shampoo, for Celiacs, our disease is triggered first and foremost when even trace amounts of gluten enter our digestive tract via our mouths, so anything gluten-y that might come in contact with our lips (even in passing as you wash it out in the shower) is an absolute no-go!

          2. Harried HR*

            I find it hysterical that Cider (English Alcoholic Apple Beverage) is marketed as Gluten Free…it NEVER had Gluten in it ?*%*

            1. Mari*

              But commercial cider is often produced by breweries – which means that the factories that it’s bottled/canned in are full of gluten (barley is brutal).

              If it’s labelled gluten-free, they’ve packaged it in a safe environment.

            2. AfT*

              Yeah, sadly, I’ve seen cider with barley malt added (for flavor?). It’s not as predictable as, say, wine whether cider is gf.

            3. Anna*

              It does sometimes, actually – people use wheat/malt based products for colorant sometimes, and that’s enough to cause problems if you have celiac. And if it’s processed in the same place they do beer (and a lot of companies that make cider do both), there’s a risk for cross-contamination with barley, which is again enough to cause problems for celiac.

              Seriously, there are a lot of foods that don’t *naturally* have gluten in them, but are so frequently manufactured with gluten-containing food that the standard medical advice is to not buy it unless the manufacturer can confirm they test that the gluten level is less than 20 ppm.

          3. Quite anon*

            It could mean it’s not produced in a facility that also handles gluten products, or it could also be a signal to people who… really don’t understand gluten, and have been asked to shop for someone who needs gluten free products.

      3. Emma*

        I think most of the confusion comes from the tradition that you get your eggs delivered by the milkman.

    3. I’m the Mrs.*

      Major conference in San Francisco, so you’d think that special diets would be a cinch. Nope: the vegan option was some lettuce, half an uncooked beet, and a lemon wedge. Because oil and vinegar aren’t cheap or widely available??? Though at least I actually got food, which is better than 50% of other conferences, no matter how inclusive the RSVP form seems to be.
      My wife organizes a small annual conference in her discipline and, though she’s not vegan herself, she ensures the vegan food is plentiful and excellent. She’s a treasure!

    4. ThatGirl*

      I have a coworker with celiac who takes it very seriously. She basically won’t eat anything at work events unless she’s vetted it thoroughly, and I don’t blame her … but also she is definitely not vegan.

      1. datamuse*

        I have a friend who actually stopped being vegetarian after their celiac diagnosis, because especially at the time (this was over a decade ago) a LOT of the vegetarian options at restaurants and such had wheat in them.

        1. That's 'Senior Engineer Mate' to you.*

          I had to start eating meat again when my geriatric gut decided that gluten wasn’t a good idea any more. Also soy and most beans. I did a whole lot of research before deciding that it just isn’t reasonable to have both my mandatory food restrictions *and* voluntarily not eat meat. Luckily I live in Australia so kangaroo is an option (I was vegetarian for environmental reasons).

          But conferences etc I just assume I’m not going to be eating their food unless there’s solid evidence to the contrary beforehand. I don’t want to miss presentations or mingling opportunities while my gut purges something it objects to.

      2. Bronze Betty*

        I have a friend who, due to a medical condition, cannot tolerate gluten or dairy (seriously–she could die). She either 1) eats before any event such as conferences, weddings, etc., or 2) brings her own food.

        She loves Mexican restaurants because there are lots of choices for her–and those of us joining her.

        2. Mari*

          My former department admin had celiacs, a dairy allergy and Type 1 diabetes. I can honestly say, I have NEVER, before or since, worked in a place where food at events was handled better. I swear, when she called in catering, they were terrific. When anyone else did…. eh…. not so much?

  9. NYCRedhead*

    At a business meeting at a private club, I ordered a glass of lemonade and received a glass of lemon juice. Nothing like a cool refreshing mouthful of acid!

      2. The Other Katie*

        One time my partner ordered a martini at a posh airport bar and a few minutes later received… a martini glass of ice water. This was swiftly followed by an annoyed bartender, coming to the table to retrieve the glass he’d been chilling before the young and enthusiastic waiter grabbed it off the bar and served it.

      1. Tau*

        Especially since you’re expecting lemonade! I sometimes drink water with a bit of lemon juice and no sugar, but at least I know what I’m letting myself in for, you know?

  10. Marigold*

    My ex took the minutes for a monthly board meeting. The board chair always made a big fuss about bringing food for everyone, but it was always comically too little. The board is 12 people, plus 2-3 attending staff. I don’t remember every example, but the worst were the time it was 3 croissants from a nice bakery, and when “pizza party day” was two personal pizzas. For 15+ people. She would always make a big deal of how lucky everyone was to have such nice treats and slice out the tiny portions herself.

    3. Dovasary Balitang*

      Two personal pizzas as in… eight slices? For 15+ people?

      What, was she a big fan of Suzanne Collins?

    4. Jinni*

      I’ve seen women do this under the guise of keeping portions down. After all a muffin and bagel can be quartered.

      1. 2 Cents*

        I mean, they’re not going to eat more than a quarter muffin, so why should you? Gotta watch the figure! (I say this as a hungry woman who eats the whole muffin.)

          1. DataSci*

            Depends on the muffins! Regular muffin tin sized ones, absolutely, but I’ve seen some massive muffins at bakeries that are easily three times that size.

            1. AnonORama*

              Totally! I’m not much of a dieter, but I try not to eat any muffins bigger than my head.

      2. Laura*

        I was a a youth camp where we did some construction work (because resons) and all the slight teenaged girls you wouldn’t trust to handle a shovel or carry wooden beams were sent to run the kitchen. It took only one breakfast (two slices of toast and one egg per person) and one lunch (two potatos and half a herring) to trigger a revolution.

    5. Ruth*

      In my family, this is about the worst sin one could commit. If you don’t have at least 2 days of leftovers to send home with people, you messed up. Just reading about someone else failing so terribly is making me anxious!

    6. 2 Cents*

      I had a friend who did this. She was just “never hungry” so meeting at her house for a meal meant ample pregaming lest she decide, after a few hours of hanging out, that she “wasn’t hungry” for the planned meal.

      3. ferrina*

        Two of my close relatives don’t really eat much- they tend to go six hours between meals, then eat an apple and are fine.
        I eat like a hobbit. Regular snacks every couple hours, and regular meals.

        We’ve traveled together a few times, and it’s a bad combo. They never hold to meals and complain about how I’m inconveniencing them by requiring three meals a day (I don’t even ask about elevenses!).

        1. Middle Aged Lady*

          My BFF is like this and she gets frustrated with me, my hubs and her husband for our need for meals. She calls us ‘the stomachs.’ We have learned to carry snacks so as not to cut into her sight seeing time, and she has learned that part of our joy on a vacation is nice leisurely restaurant meals.

        2. MaineCat*

          This is why it’s so hard to travel with most people. Spouse and I can’t handle more than breakfast and dinner at home and on vacation, but we do have good sized meals for both. We tried doing lunch a few times to be able to try more local foods, and even with trying to undereat at the other meals it was just too much food! But I’d never want to make a friend starve, so fortunately we don’t travel with other people…

      4. Zephy*

        Wait, she would invite people over expressly for dinner, then decide not to even make (or order, whatever) said meal because she wasn’t hungry? Girl what the hell, serve your guests! Did you think “dinner” was a synonym for “chatting and board games”?

      5. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

        …that breaks my brain.

        Also, I would just never meet at this person’s house for a meal after the first time this happened. I get too hangry for that.

    7. Sloanicota*

      Oh man, you just reminded me of all the many meetings I’ve been to where staff is required to attend, it’s over several hours, and they’re not allowed to eat the meal because it’s for the Board. I can’t “snack on almonds” if I’m the notetaker for a meeting that runs 4-8PM. Let all the attendees eat the danged food!

      1. Squidhead*

        My MIL really does eat like a bird and has no. idea. what counts as a “normal” serving of something. Fortunately she always has many snacks on the table too but dinner for 6 will be, like, a 9″ square mac & cheese and a salad that fits in a cereal bowl. She’s genuinely satisfied with 1/4 cup of mac and cheese. Eaten at 5pm.

    9. OMG, Bees!*

      One company I worked at as a contractor would provide food for meetings. Initially, this was for everyone, but after someone complained when food ran out, they changed it to food for employees (and not contractors or vendors) instead.

    2. Juicebox Hero*

      Oh, good god, I have a severe phobia of wasps/ hornets/ bees/ yellowjackets/ pick your favorite stinging hymenopteran insect/ and my reaction would have been very loud and very undignified and would probably have culminated in a trip to the ER to get my stomach pumped in case I ingested any wasp molecules.

    3. whistle*

      Honestly, this happens with lettuce. Even when it’s washed, there are sometimes bugs that don’t get rinsed out. I was a cook for years, washed all the lettuce that I used, and I probably had two customer over that time find a bug in the salad. It can’t be avoided 100%.

        1. Cheesesteak in Paradise*

          Lettuce from my CSA has earwigs and slugs in it pretty much every single time. Just have to do an immersion wash rather than a rinse.

        3. AnonORama*

          Ha, I bought farmer’s market greens recently that lit up because they had a firefly! I let the bug outside and decided against eating the greens, but it was actually kind of charming for a “bug in food” story.

      2. Observer*

        Even when it’s washed, there are sometimes bugs that don’t get rinsed out.

        That’s why you put it into salt water or diluted vinegar for a couple of minutes.

        Personally it’s also one of the reasons I prefer almost any type of lettuce to iceberg – most other variety either have loos(ish) leaves or the leaves can be separate easily. Iceberg is much more like closed cabbage and hard to separate. It’s really hard to check.

        1. BubbleTea*

          Doesn’t this just mean that you’ve got dead insects in your salad? I’d prefer live ones, tbh. Then I can evict them and they’re still alive, everyone wins.

          1. Observer*

            Doesn’t this just mean that you’ve got dead insects in your salad?

            Nope. It means that you can actually wash those critters off.

      3. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

        This is why I pay close attention to whether or not the prebagged salad I buy is stamped kosher. While not a complete guarantee of zero insects, it does guarantee that an entire system was in place to try really hard to not have insects.

    4. Yay! I’m a llama again!*

      You just reminded me that when I started my proper career job and was out for a meal with my new managers and colleagues, I found a TINY (ex) caterpillar in my salad. I wasn’t that bothered, these things happen, I don’t think the chef went out and found one and added it for extra protein! But the people I was with were furious, and I never understood why!

  12. Blanked on my AAM posting name*

    Not bad food, but adjacent: many years ago I attended a conference in a very famous London hotel (you would almost certainly know the name even if you’ve never been to the UK). As I sat down to eat, a mouse ran across the floor and under the buffet table, and the maitre d’ firmly informed us all that we hadn’t seen a thing. I decided to get a sandwich from a nearby convenience store instead.

    1. Rosie*

      Ha, on a work trip in Paris once me and three colleagues stopped into the bar for a nightcap. The men went to order, me and the other woman found some seats. A few minutes later the men returned, pale to the gills, with four LARGE whiskies. The drinks were free, they said. Why, we said.
      The door to the kitchen was open, they said. It was like Ratatouille in there, they said.

      I did not eat any of the cooked breakfast the next morning.

      1. Chocolate Teapot*

        I picked up the book Hotel Babylon at a second hand book stall and the anonymous author (who worked in a number of posh top London hotels) says that rats are quite common in the older hotels such as Claridges and the Savoy.

  13. throwaway*

    the one i’ve encountered a few times is plenty of “cold drink” options but all the drinks are room temp. and there’s no ice option. i can excuse room temp water, but room temp soda is actively unpleasant to drink! idk why more places don’t think that through.

    1. Llama Llama*

      I worked in an accounting department of 20 or so people. Due to year end close we had to work New Years. They promised to provide us lunch. It turned out to be 2 x-large pizzas to serve 20 of us. To make it worse we had to work until 9PM with no dinner. I had a half slice of pizza for lunch and was sooo hangry by 9.

    2. TortallyHareBrained*

      I went to a conference that had a networking event with the opposite experience last year. We were given drink tickets to get alcoholic beverages or sodas at a very crowded bar, but the water available (with no lines) was in large barrels that had clearly been sitting in the sun all day. It was a frustrating experience, especially as I don’t drink alcohol.

    3. Honey Badger*

      Room temp soda. The bane of my existence! Worse when the only options are some lemon lime knockoff soda. That never tastes good warm!

    6. Harper*

      I haaaaate this!! When I prepare food or drinks for other people, I always try to anticipate what they will and won’t like, and prepare accordingly (cold drinks, plenty of napkins, bread not smashed, etc.). I’ve run into plenty of people who treat this kind of task like a a horrible imposition, and put forth the bare minimum effort. Drives me crazy.

  14. SDS*

    Y’all either need an event planner, or you need to fire the current one and hire somebody better!! Food is one of my favorite things – I would never book something without a BEO explicitly laying all of this out, including breaks. And I would especially never take a group of people (colleagues, customers, etc) somewhere that didn’t have rave food reviews!!

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      As a professional event planner, I have been to or heard of so many events that had incredibly basic things wrong, (including food) that could have been avoided by hiring even a minimally competent planner. People think that planning and coordinating events is easy, right up until the point that they have to plan one!

      1. SDS*

        “It must be so fun planning parties all day!”
        -everyone whose entire event experience is planning one 4-year old’s birthday party

        1. UKLu*

          Bit harsh… kids birthday parties are a nightmare, particularly for 4 year olds. Adults don’t know whether to stay or leave… then you don’t know if its socially acceptable to serve/drink wine or tea/coffee (regardless that there is not enough wine in the world to get through any kids party) Random, uninvited siblings appear out of nowhere, messing up the numbers for catering. Some child will inevitably fall off the bouncy castle and scream the place down. The whole event will leave you deaf for a week or so. It costs an absolute fortune to host, yet for some reason its traditional to present all attendees with party bags of swag as some sort of thank you for gracing your child with their presence – then the uninvited siblings are crying because there weren’t enough party bags for them to have one.

          If you can successfully plan and subsequently endure a 4th birthday party, you can probably do anything you put your mind to!

          1. I'm not really here*

            Not really? That’s kind of the equivalent of saying you’ve made a really nice dinner for family one time so therefore you can be a professional chef?

    2. I went to school with only 1 Jennifer*

      For everyone else who doesn’t know, I have done the search: BEO stands for “Banquet Event Order”.

    3. Half April Ludgate, Half Leslie Knope*

      Seriously – corporate event planner here and I’m always on top of food allergies, etc. and making sure my caterer’s friendly meals are substantial and interesting!

    4. OMG, Bees!*

      Sometimes the planning gets really screwed up (this is the closest tangent I can find for this story).

      Weeks of emailing with a client that was opening a new location in Boston for me to come in and do work confirmed they would be ready. But when I got there, they didn’t have power to the part of the building I would be working in. So, every day I was there, I would check in if there was anything I could do, which would be no, then run around the city as a tourist. A paid vacation for a week.

      Only problem was the client required me to stay at a particular hotel (they paid for), which was didn’t have an available room on Wednesday, so that night I had to crash at the apartment of a friend of a friend of a friend I met at a wedding the weekend before.

    5. Bridget*

      I work in hotel event management and I’m about to send this thread to my coworkers! Some of this stuff is crazy. Although of course, there’s only so much we as the hotel can do if people don’t tell us about their attendees’ dietary restrictions ahead of time. My chef would always make 2-3 veg entrees just in case since we would pretty often have a surprise vegetarian/vegan or two.

  15. Anne On Innity*

    A few years ago at a training session I was served a half portion of lunch (chicken legs on white rice) because “I don’t need as much food as the men.” I was a super-active athlete at the time doing a really physical job. To be fair though, think the food made people sick.

      1. Taura*

        I’ve heard of it being an option – there are several bbq and Mexican places in my town that used to have a “ladies’ lunch” meal that was a smaller portion of the main and fewer sides – but I’ve never just seen it assigned to someone like that!

        1. Tin Cormorant*

          Oh, I’d love to see more of that, though obviously minus the gendered part.

          I’m so tired of American portion sizes being determined by what some 6-foot-tall football player wants for dinner, to the point where my husband and I usually need to split a meal in order to be able to finish it all, which really feels like a rude thing to do to the restaurant. I actively look for restaurants that offer smaller entree portions so we can each order something different, but it’s pretty rare to find.

          1. Clisby*

            I do, too. When I was growing up (coastal SC) seafood restaurants would often offer “large” and “small” platters of food. There was no child’s menu or senior menu, just the 2 different plate sizes for regular food. My mother always got the small plate.

          2. Elizabeth West*

            I physically cannot eat that much food. I will be miserable if I push it past my body’s telling me “Hey, hold up, the hiatal hernia can’t handle this, dingaling!” (not that it stops me sometimes, but then I pay for it)

          3. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

            I used to eat someplace that had a 2-3-4 menu, where they had a menu page with a list of 10-15 options and for a certain price you could pick any 2 options for your meal, for a higher price any 3, and for an again higher price you could pick any 4. It was a nice way to scale portions and adapt to various food needs. Made it easy for me as a vegetarian to go out with my small-portions grandma and have us each get something we wanted to eat.

          1. Random Bystander*

            Well, that at least makes sense–I know my mom certainly eats a lot less than she did 20ish years ago when she was the age I am now.

      2. Kate*

        One reason I stopped attending the “women’s lunches” at my professional conferences (interest groups started by women in a male-dominated field) is because the menus are always, but only 100% of the time, salad with grilled chicken and then chocolate cake. I just can’t with the gender-stereotyped food plus I resent paying hotel prices for a salad!

        1. Palliser*

          I run women’s group (and allies) lunches for my professional association, and it is a point of pride that we always have really good food. The last one we did was at a BBQ place. And I always insist that we have a specialty cocktail because at our regular events it’s alway beer and wine. Everyone gets so excited over a mimosa. Give the people mimoas, darn it!

          I 100% feel you on

          1. Palliser*

            I 100% feel you on the terrible salad and for some reason flourless chocolate cake or fresh fruit option.

            1. I Have RBF*

              Oh, god, I’ve been to those. Entrees assuming everyone was on some weird diet, like skimpy salad with a couple small slices of dry chicken breast and really tiny deserts. I estimated the total calories at one to be about 450 for the meal. I had to go get lunch afterwards.

      3. lurkyloo*

        I recently went for brunch and ordered a mimosa and was offered the ‘MANmosa’ as an option. I’m sorry, WUT did you call that?! *sparks fly off the top of my head*
        Have you thought of perhaps…y’know…NOT gendering size?

        1. Hlao-roo*

          I have only ever heard of a “man-mosa” as Miller High Life (because it’s the “champagne of beers”) and orange juice. Which is also ridiculous because beer and champagne shouldn’t be gendered. Gendering the size of a drink seems worse to me somehow :\

        2. Salsa Your Face*

          In a family friendly bar/restaurant in our area, we overheard a guy ordering two Shirley Temples for his kids, one male, one female. A bystander chimed in and said “you should have ordered 1 Shirley Temple and 1 Shark Attack?” The first guy was like “wait, what’s a Shark Attack?” and the bystander said “it’s the same thing, but with the name changed so boys can drink it!”

          2. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

            I’m a girl and now I really want a Shark Attack, because that sounds like a much more fun name for a drink. And also because I love sharks.

            But this is also just so silly. Drinks are drinks! And it’s probably the same people who complain about having to use/remember others’ pronouns that insist on gendering these drinks!

            2. Nobby Nobbs*

              As a kid, the seafood restaurant that served a “Shirley Shark” was the highlight of my annual vacation. It was mix-it-yourself, with the grenadine served in a plastic shark toy you got to take home. Fantastic, and not the least bit gendered.

    3. Magenta*

      Wow!
      Where was this and who decided it? The training company? The restaurant?
      Some restaurants near me do a standard and small portion, the small portion is for children, or adults with a smaller option, but the standard portion is the default and even if more women than men order the smaller one it isn’t advertised that way.

      1. Pastor Petty Labelle*

        option to order small or large is great. Deciding for the person is not so much.

        Good grief, how sexist can you get?

        1. mli25*

          My husband loves half portions, especially when travelling. He almost never eats the entire meal and brings home leftovers. Having the ability to order less (and pay a bit less) is really great when leftovers aren’t an option (usually no way to store AND reheat said food)

  16. And while we’re at it…*

    The last conference I attended was in 2019. It was a large conference (10,000+). I was a first time attendee of this particular conference so I had no idea what to expect.

    The first day, they released us for lunch, all at the same time. As you can imagine, it was chaos. They only planned for 30 minutes for lunch and ran out of food within minutes. To make matters worse, the food could be best described as unidentifiable slop. Serious, I didn’t know what it was supposed to be Luckily, there were several places to eat within walking distance, so I ate lunch out every day of the conference.

    Also, they did not serve any coffee or tea. None. The conference was located in a heavily Mormon part of the U.S., so I assumed it was because of that. There were no coffee shops within walking distance either. I guess attendees complained, because on the last day of the conference, the organizers hired a coffee truck to sit out front. If you were an attendee, you were given a free (tiny) cup of coffee.

    1. AngryOctopus*

      I was at an offsite company meeting once where they took away the coffee/tea/water after lunch! We were meeting until 4! Luckily our office manager noticed and went and made them bring it all back. But who does that??

      1. JustaTech*

        I went to a really fancy scientific conference once that took away the coffee during the presentation sessions so there was no way to warm up your cup of coffee that had gone stone cold in the first 3 minutes of a 3 hour session.
        They also didn’t provide lunch with the idea that the junior scientists would invite the senior scientists out to lunch. As though we could afford to do that, or were all brave enough to talk to Dr Big Heckin’ Deal.

        1. AngryOctopus*

          My conference in Oct only offers breakfast, but 1-makes it VERY clear that you’re on your own for other meals and 2-is being held in an area where you can’t throw a stone w/out hitting at least 5 restaurants, at least 3 of which will have fast lunch options for you. So there’s that. They better keep the coffee around during the talks though.

    2. Dinwar*

      “The conference was located in a heavily Mormon part of the U.S., so I assumed it was because of that.”

      I’ve been to the Salt Lake City sessions of the Geological Society of America convention and was able to find plenty of coffee, tea, and alcohol (geologists are know for drinking). So I don’t buy that as an excuse for a second.

      1. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

        Seriously–my Mormon neighbors have a coffee maker. Not for them, but for guests (at least, that’s what they’ve told us, not that I’m about to judge anyone for deciding they want to have coffee regardless of what their religion says). I think maybe your conference was just being cheap.

      2. Searching*

        Even Utah County (south of SLC and the home of Brigham Young University) now has coffee shops! That certainly wasn’t always the case. I remember going to a 7 a.m. meeting in Provo once many years ago – not a single coffee shop to be found. Plus: not only did our hosts not serve us coffee, we weren’t even offered as much as a glass of water! Guess they figured the negotiation would be short and sweet if we were parched…

    3. Gumby*

      I was at a conference that was held on a college campus (in the summer, no classes in session). Great! Cafeteria is used to serving crowds. Except, apparently, not all at the same time during our 1 hour lunch break. Some people barely got in the door with 5 minutes to spare. The next time that conference was held? Separate assigned meal times and longer meal breaks. It went so much better.

    4. yes, they're hungry*

      I used to attend and volunteer for a (non-professional) convention and every year, we’d go around to the local restaurants to introduce our organization, and let them know our dates and our expected attendance.

      Every year, every restaurant in walking distance was shuttered by halfway through the second day, in spite of specific warnings.

  17. Irish Teacher*

    Not really bad or anything, but kinda…ridiculous. I have to attend a marking conference each year before marking the state exams and in the early years, they used have the most delicious doughnuts and pastries along with tea and coffee for our breaktime.

    Then the recession hit in and they cut back majorly and this time, along with the tea and coffee, they had a couple of saucers of Penguin bars. I doubt there were more than 20 bars in total and there would have been 80-100 people at the conference.

    1. Dr Wizard, PhD*

      I feel like ticking off a whole bunch of teachers who are about to collectively decide the futures of the rising generation is a deeply unwise move.

  18. Moo*

    My husband is allergic to onions. Which are in literally everything, apparently. Every time his office does a catered lunch it’s from an Italian place. He stays away from Italian food because of possible onions in everything. He’s asked the organizers if they can order elsewhere, even sandwiches or something, and they say “but *everyone* likes Italian!” as if he’s a crazy person. And then they ask him (with attitude) why he can’t just eat the salad. Which has onions in it.

    He’s stopped attending those catered lunches to avoid the glares he gets for only eating rolls.

    1. Vanilla lattes are the best*

      I am also highly allergic to onions (seriously, I will die if I eat them) and work lunches can be so problematic for me. I feel his pain.

      1. Moo*

        The sheer number of people who think he’s making his allergy up……So frustrating! Sympathy commiseration!

        1. Vanilla lattes are the best*

          Same! If I had a dollar for every time someone thought I was making it up, I would be rich. Its definitely a tough allergy to have.

          1. Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est*

            Sympathies to you both. I lose it when I’m told “no one’s allergic to mushrooms; just eat them.”

            1. Charlotte Lucas*

              I’m not allergic, but I just can’t eat them. My body doesn’t trust them.

              So many people dislike mushrooms that I am always surprised when it’s the only veg option. Like having liver be the only meat option.

            2. ferrina*

              “No one’s allergic to mushrooms……the ones that claim they are keep dying. They’re so dramatic!”
              /s

            3. General von Klinkerhoffen*

              OH MY GOD THIS

              “can’t you just pick them out?”

              I can, but the full body reaction will be the same and it isn’t pretty. Will you catch me when I pass out?

            4. Anony*

              Mushroom-allergic vegetarian here! I have had a LOT of side salads and rolls at work events (I’m not vegan or gluten-free or picky at all, but I imagine it would be even harder if any of those were true).

            5. Clewgarnet*

              It drives me up the wall when people don’t know what their fake meat is made of! Quorn is made of mushrooms so, unless you can tell me absolutely for sure what your fake meat is, I’m not risking it.

    2. datamuse*

      I had a thankfully mild childhood allergy to them which faded as I got older and I can eat them now, but…yes! They are in everything (and my mother IS Italian).

      1. Usually Lurking*

        I can’t eat onions – not an allergy like anaphylactic reaction, but several days of digestive distress that I try to avoid at all costs. It is HARD to avoid. For years, my go-to options were cheese-based – Mac and cheese rarely has onions (but sometimes does). Now I can’t tolerate dairy either and it makes eating anywhere but home a real challenge. People sort of understand the dairy thing (though a lot of confusion with gluten/grain free or not understanding that butter is dairy), but asking about onions always confused people and I generally avoid all sauces and broths unless it’s a place with an actual allergen menu.

        1. Hawk*

          Me too! Thanks, IBS! I carry a card in my wallet that lists everything I can’t have in both English and Spanish (I live in an area with a high Spanish-speaking population). Work meals are usually the worst challenge because the people in charge of food go for the cheapest option (often it’s pizza).

        2. Chidi has a stomach ache*

          I feel this. I’m on a low-FODMAP diet for a digestive disorder and onions and garlic seem to be one of triggers. I’m so sad (many foods I love are garlic heavy), and also I feel like I will never be able to eat at a conference ever again.

          I was visiting my parents a couple of weekends ago and they were trying to work around my dietary needs but finding it hard (I brought food because of this, but they insisted that we all eat the same thing). They kept saying “oh my gosh, garlic is in everything!” Yep, well aware, Mom.

          1. Lizcase*

            I also follow a (modified) low FODMAP diet, with an onion reaction bad enough that my doctor said to treat it as an an allergy.

            if you are just starting out: it does get a lot easier.

            My husband cooks everything from scratch for me. my mother has figured it out, mostly. But I have relatives who just cannot seem to comprehend that all I need is a list of ingredients. And spices and herbs are fine as long as there is no onion or garlic. (this I say in response to folks who say the food I eat must be bland w/o onions or garlic)

            For a buffet, I generally look for ham, cheese (if you can handle lactose), veggies (no dip!) and fruit as safe options. For any restaurant, I research the menu before hand. For catered meals at work, I usually stick to my own food.

            BTW: garlic infused olive oil is a godsend. and if you like mushrooms: oyster mushrooms are super low in mannitol. There is so solution for onions :( It’s been 7 years since I had onions (by choice, not accidental).

            1. Moo*

              I remember the first few holidays with my family my husband got sick because people “forgot” that he was allergic despite multiple reminders, or they thought it wasn’t that bad. One Thanksgiving at my aunt’s house, she made a separate stuffing without onions specially for him, then stuffed the turkey with the onion stuffing. Not realizing what had happened, he ate the turkey……… That was not a pleasant evening :P She felt so bad, she didn’t even think about it! Thankfully we’ve all adjusted over the last 14 years and he’s been able to eat with us all for the most part :)

        3. Worldwalker*

          I had a similar problem — Beano helped some, but eating onions gave me a day+ of digestive distress, and eating onions in the quantity I consider sufficient would probably have made me explode. Than I landed in the hospital for something unrelated, and was on major IV antibiotics for a week. Afterwards, my onion problem was gone. And I’m a lot better with beans. Obviously something has changed in my intestinal flora. I can now eat onions.

        4. Artemesia*

          Onions make me sick and it is a constant battle to find things to eat in some restaurants.

          Oddly I had no trouble in Russia where the only vegetables available seem to be potatoes, onions and cabbage. But every restaurant I would go to would make up a beef stroganof without the onions. (and Georgian food tends to be grilled meats so I could get them to leave the big slab of raw onion off, or if they didn’t understand, I could lift it off.

          In the US it is common for restaurants to throw raw chopped red onions into everything including salads, and on hot dishes and meats. I can lift an onion ring off a salad, but when they chop it up fine, I just can’t eat it.

          1. Moo*

            We’ve found after much trial and error that if it’s a chunk of onion on the very top of a salad, he can pick off that onion and the lettuce it was sitting on and be ok. But if it’s on a burger, where the food is hot and that onion has had time to meld, they have to remake it. It sucks when restaurants forget.

    3. nm*

      I have a coworker who is allergic to basil and she literally cannot count the number of times she tells caterers this, and they bring her a vegan or gluten free dish that actually DOES contain basil.

    4. a tester, not a developer*

      I’m not allergic to onions, but they give me… tummy trouble. People stopped bugging me about not eating the catered lunch after I brought the afternoon thunder one day.

      1. Moo*

        If it wasn’t so upsetting to my husband I’d suggest he do this! But then I have to deal with it at night…and he’s so uncomfortable and in pain so…definitely not worth it.

    5. KittyGhost*

      I’m low FODMAP (so intolerance to garlic and onion) and onion really is in everything! Your husband’s team are being massive jerks about this.

      1. Moo*

        Agreed. I’ve sent him the AAM archives on this subject and he tried some of them but of course they didn’t work.

    6. GoldenHandcuffs*

      I have a friend that is also very allergic to onions. They’re literally in everything. She brings her own with her everywhere she goes because she never knows when she’ll get “onioned”.

    7. Minimal Pear*

      Uuuuugh, sorry to all Italians (I swear I have Italian friends!) but Italian is the WORST for me with my dietary restrictions. Although I’ve heard that restaurants that are actually IN Italy are great about allergies and varied options.

      1. Moo*

        Hard for me to adjust to, too! Haha. When we first started dating and he told me about it, I had to learn how to cut onions completely out of my cooking. It was tough! I love onions (and Italian food)! But we’ve figured out the things I like that he doesn’t that are onion-essentials so when I cook those I make him something else.

      2. General von Klinkerhoffen*

        The whole EU (+ UK as we were still in when this came into force, and we have since strengthened our national law on the subject) has strong allergy legislation.

        There are fourteen common allergens that have to be on labels by law (including gluten and milk but also crustaceans and sesame) but also you have to know exactly what is in your dishes so allergic customers can be kept safe.

        1. Minimal Pear*

          Yeah, when I was in Scotland I got ADDICTED to the dairy-free baked goods at Sainsbury’s. They were delicious!

    8. Cat*

      They really are in everything. I don’t have an allergy, but I have GERD, onions (and chocolate) are my worst triggers, and it can take days to heal from eating them, so I try to avoid them entirely. It is so hard to eat out!

    9. Spearmint*

      Ugh, I find this very relatable, except for me it’s tomatoes rather than onions. Tomatoes are so common, especially in Italian and Mexican food (which is unfortunate as I love tomato-free versions of both, but sometimes restaurants won’t have many/any tomato-free options).

      Since the allergy developed in college, is mild, and allergies to tomatoes aren’t common, many people in my life were skeptical it was real. That included my girlfriend at the time and many of my fiends. They accommodated my preferences anyway, but I could tell they thought I was being anxious. I developed a real complex about telling people about it for years afterward, and only recently have started doing so. Luckily most adults are kinder about this sort of thing than college students, but it still sucks because tomatoes are so common, especially in popular foods like tacos and pizza.

      1. Iain C*

        Italian food seems synonymous with tomatoes… but they’re relatively modern in Europe! Did they just look wistfully at their pasta? Live off Carbonara? (now I am hungry)

    11. Yikes Stripes*

      I guess I’d make their heads explode because I loathe most Italian American food – and I don’t care for onions!

      1. Yikes Stripes*

        That said, the list of things I am allergic to is extensive and weird: Bananas, raspberries, avocados, cashews, pears, kiwi fruit, and seaweed. Everything but the seaweed is related to my (extremely bad) latex allergy, and *nobody ever believes me*. Like, I literally almost died because someone decided that I wasn’t *really* allergic to raspberries and told me that the salad was dressed with a balsamic dressing and deliberately neglected to tell me that it was a raspberry one to prove that I was lying. Thank god for epi-pens!

  19. AnonForThis*

    Once upon a time, there were about 12 hungry college interns at an event specifically meant to onboard and welcome them. There were like 6 large pizzas to feed them and no other food provided. Not only were there absolutely no pizzas that didn’t have meat, but every single pizza *specifically had pork on it*. There were at least 4 people present who couldn’t eat any of the food available. Thankfully the entire event was only an hour or two long, but still, way to make the new interns feel welcomed!

    1. Silver Robin*

      Oh my goodness that reminds me of an event at grad school where they hired a food business that came out of the business school’s incubator. Love to see the support! Except it was all pulled pork. In a global affairs program where it is common to get Muslim students (and Jewish ones! Hi!). It just seemed really obvious that nobody thought it through. I met another Jewish student there who was stricter than I am and he told me he just generally picks at the fruit… poor guy.

    2. starsaphire*

      What is it with the pork obsession, anyway? I swear, my work cafeteria’s food options are almost always pork-based.

      I do a lot of door dashing at work. *sigh*

      1. datamuse*

        Because it’s relatively cheap, I’m guessing? But even that doesn’t make sense because so is chicken, which doesn’t come with nearly as many cultural or religious restrictions.

      2. nm*

        For real, I’m on a committee that does the food orders for certain work events and I’m always like “get a chicken option. We have soooo many Hindus who don’t eat beef and Muslims and Jews who don’t eat pork, who do want a meat dish.” And certain people on the committee are constantly like “but let’s switch it up and get something with pork or beef!”

        2. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

          I mean, if they want to switch it up, maybe try a lamb option? Or a fish option?
          But yeah, chicken or turkey is probably going to be the safest meat option overall.

    3. Yes And*

      I had a boss who did this at a working dinner – 3 pizzas for 6 people, all with peppers and olives. That’s what he liked on his pizza, and it never remotely crossed his mind that other people might not. (I’m allergic to peppers.)

      1. pally*

        Peppers and olives?

        Gah!!

        I didn’t think any pizza could be worse than the olives only pizza ex-company would order for the employees EVERY SINGLE TIME they treated us to pizza.

        I stand corrected.

        And since I was on swing shift, that olive-only pizza was cold by the time we got in. They wouldn’t even do a second order for swing shift. Told us to just microwave the leftovers from first shift.

        (no, there was no night shift)

      3. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

        People like that (who can’t even stop to think that maybe other people like other things) are the worst. And should never, ever be in charge of group food purchasing.

    4. Manders*

      At the yearly department “welcome” event for new students/faculty, they only ever served BBQ (we are in the south). Even the green beans have pork in them. My poor boss could only eat the rolls because he was vegetarian. The department has changed a lot since then (it’s no longer “pale, stale and male,” as we always joked), thankfully.

    5. Salsa Your Face*

      I worked at a company that provided catered lunches for clients. And since I worked directly with clients in full day workshops, the lunches were for me too. I grew up kosher and don’t eat pork or shellfish, which the people who ordered the food well knew. One day I got to work and saw that the menu for the day was pork chops, greens (cooked with ham, presumably,) and loaded mashed potatoes (so, bacon.) I went to the person who ordered the food and asked what the fuck. She called the caterer and came back to me and said “good news, they can throw in a portion of chicken saltimbocca for you!” I’ll never forget the look on her face when I informed her that chicken saltimbocca has pork in it too.

      I’m pretty sure I ate pretzels for lunch that day.

  20. Be Gneiss*

    Mandatory holiday party at ex-job:
    It was catered by the school cafeteria (we were not affiliated with the school in any way, it was just a way to get food for cheap), and we had baked chicken, mashed potatoes, and green beans, all of the quality you’d expect from a high school cafeteria. You could have your choice of tap water (no ice), coffee, or instant hot cider from a powered mix. Dessert was foil-wrapped holiday chocolates from the dollar store, while the owner’s gave speeches about their record-breaking profits.

    2. Resident Catholicville, U.S.A.*

      At my last job, the holiday party in 2000 was cancelled because of Covid. My boss- not the President of the company- had the idea to give all of us bonuses based on the cost of the party divided by the number of attendees. When we all found out how much per person the holiday party was, given with that we normally got a third of that in a cash bonus in an envelope, while being a company owned by a half a billion dollar parent company…let’s just say that there was a bit of grumbling. While the holiday party was awfully nice, it was a bit of a slap in the face, considering I didn’t get a raise my first year there (no room in the budget) and then again the second year during Covid (justified by the pandemic, when we had record profits).

  21. Alexiiiiiiiiii5*

    at an event I once volunteered for my gluten allergy wasn’t properly communicated. so I was so hungry I started dipping applesauce in chips. they also didn’t have gluten free communion which I felt obligated to take so the priest very hastily blessed some Fritos for me. they did get me better food the second day.

    1. Helewise*

      I’m so sorry you experienced this, but sanctified Fritos has to be one of the best things I’ve ever heard.

    2. Tinkerbell*

      Okay, the holy Fritos sounds awesome and I’m so glad the priest was willing to be flexible for you!

  22. Tinkerbell*

    Diabetes organization meeting at the local hospital (and thus the hospital was catering it). The only food offered was full-sugar lemonade, sugar cookies, and cupcakes.

    1. NotRealAnonForThis*

      Similar hospital dietary department fail: complete and utter inability to accommodate sick kid’s food allergies over a month long stay. The lead RD actually got involved early on because I’d taken one look at what was available and noped right out; they were concerned I was just “one of those crazy moms” and no, she has documented “this will kill her” allergies. Took the lead RD less than a minute to determine that I was not incorrect.

      Color me not at all surprised that the catering for a diabetes org involved nothing but sugar.

      1. Artemesia*

        the one time I was hospitalized I could not get onion free main dishes. Y ou’d think hospitals would have dieticians and food services used to catering to dietary needs.

        1. NotRealAnonForThis*

          Pretty sure that most hospital food service is contracted out and warmed up in plastic, at least locally. A number of them don’t really have “full kitchens” anymore, more of a modified “warm things up and assemble things” kitchens.

          I did ask the same question of the lead dietician. She agreed it was frustrating (probably massively so for her department, honestly).

        2. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

          Nope. I have several friends who are nurses, one of whom is constantly making fun on FB of the latest hospital food they’ve encountered because it’s just that bad. They have no say in anything about it, other than trying to catch the egregious allergy/etc. foods before it gets to patients.

          1. Monty*

            I was hospitalized for emergency surgery this year and, because I was wait-listed for the OR, I couldn’t eat anything except the occasional ice chip. Before I left, my nurse insisted I eat a plate of powdered eggs to demonstrate I hadn’t developed a surgical complication. When I started gagging, she actually asked “Is it your stomach or your mouth that’s saying no?”

    3. Jamie Starr*

      To be fair, in my personal experience people with T1 diabetes don’t have to be as mindful of sugar. They have bolus insulin whether they eat a salad or a pint of ice cream – just in different doses. It’s people with T2 who generally have to be more careful about sugar.

      1. WellRed*

        Person with type 1 here. So, yeah, it’s not that simple and PWD are not any more of a homogeneous lump than any other group of eaters. And I am appalled at the tone deafness of this catering.

      2. ThatGirl*

        It’s still bad form to serve a lot of high-carb/high sugar foods to people with diabetes. “Just take more insulin” isn’t really a great long-term solution. Source: close friend with T1D

        1. Jamie Starr*

          I never said was a long term solution. I was pointing out that people with T1 have to bolus regardless of how much sugar there is. My spouse has T1 and it annoys me and them to no end when people chastise them for eating sweets because diabetes. So your source has their opinion and my source has a different one.

          1. Guacamole Bob*

            I have a kid with T1, and I’d be annoyed if the catering skipped dessert “because people with diabetes can’t eat sugar.” But I’d also be very annoyed at only sugar, because lots of people with Type 1 do prefer to at least balance sugary treats with some protein, or might not want to eat tons of sugar at that specific moment if their blood sugar is already high, or if they’re going out for ice cream after the session, or whatever.

          2. ThatGirl*

            I didn’t say T1D people can’t eat sweets. I was just agreeing that serving nothing but sugary foods at a diabetes-themed event (or really, any event) isn’t the best idea.

          3. Humble Schoolmarm*

            T1D person here (33 years this month). Like your husband, I’m not a fan of being told off for eating sweets, but having no yummy sweet things is more of an annoyance, whereas the other extreme could throw my blood off for days if I wasn’t very careful. If I was served a full sized glass of sugared lemonade, a sugar cookie and a cupcake, I would have to bolus more than my whole day of usual short acting to cover it, which I could do, but I would want to save that for a special food occasion, not a poorly planned meeting. I also find things like salads and sandwiches fairly easy to carb count, where as lemonade (sugar to taste) and cupcakes (thin skim of frosting vs 1/3 of the total hight is buttercream) are anyone’s guess. The other problem is that I would likely get on a nasty cycle because I would be thirsty because of the high blood, so I would have to drink more lemonade, which would put my blood up more. Argh.

          4. Observer*

            So your source has their opinion and my source has a different one.

            No. Because your issue is not relevant here. Sure, no one should be telling your spouse what to eat – presumably they are a competent adult and they know what they can / cannot handle.

            But it’s still true that for many T1 diabetics, the amount of sugar they consume still makes a difference. Thus for a group *catering to diabetics* to have *only* high sugar foods is waaaay tone deaf.

            1. Jamie Starr*

              I didn’t say the amount of sugar people with T1 consume doesn’t make a difference. I said in my experience,they don’t have to be as mindful as people who have T2.

              This comment section has a really terrible habit of reading what they think is written instead of what is actually written, and then nitpicking it to death. It must be exhausting to be around every day IRL.

              1. Observer*

                I said in my experience,they don’t have to be as mindful as people who have T2.

                And that’s still not relevant. The point is that the amount of sugar *still* matters. And it’s pretty bad for this to be ignored in this context.

      3. I went to school with only 1 Jennifer*

        What is “bolus insulin”? Is this the insulin pump I’ve heard of?

        2. Guacamole Bob*

          Type 1 diabetics need to get insulin in two ways. The first is a baseline level of insulin just for being alive, regardless of what they eat. That’s sometimes administered once a day as a shot in a long-acting form and sometimes given by their insulin pump throughout the day. They also need to give insulin to enable their bodies to process the carbohydrates in all the food they eat, at roughly the time they eat it and in an amount related to how many carbs are in the food – that’s called bolus insulin and can be administered by giving shots at mealtimes through the day or by using an insulin pump.

          1. Guacamole Bob*

            I know much less about Type 2, but I believe that Type 2 diabetics who are on insulin are more likely to be on only the long-acting insulin and not need to bolus for each meal, and to be encouraged to eat lower carb or in ways that are less likely to spike blood sugar.

        3. M. from P.*

          Nope, “bolus” means a single (additional) dose, in this context a dose of short-acting insulin taken to “cover” a meal.
          An insulin pump is a device that administers insulin continuously via a small needle but you can also program it to deliver an additional dose/bolus.

    4. CL*

      My diabetic parent regularly gets served regular (full corn syrup) soda when in the hospital as a patient. Even worse, parent doesn’t like to complain so will drink it!

      1. KateM*

        My child was in hospital during his birthday with “some combination of rash-causing virus and a generally allergic child”, and then they served him for dinner some kind of potato salad full with common allergens.

    5. Lily Potter*

      Good Lord. Talk about tone-deaf! I’m an unrepentant carnivore so you’d think I wouldn’t have an issue finding food at events. However, I’m also a low-carb eater – which means often that I can often eat JUST the meat and almost nothing else. Sometimes a salad if I’m willing to eat it dry, or with vinegar/oil if that’s offered (there’s a ton of sugar in most salad dressings). Vegetable sides are often high carb (potatoes/carrots/peas/sweet potatoes), most fruit is high carb, and obviously bread/rice is out. I’ve gotten box lunches where I’ve been able to pick off the meat and cheese from the sandwich, and that’s it. I’ve learned to just make the best of things, not make a big deal of it, and raid my snack drawer like a madwoman when I get home or to the hotel!

    6. Indolent Libertine*

      So basically everyone who was there who wasn’t T1 was going to walk out having increased their risk for becoming T2? Was this event sponsored by an insulin drug marketer, by any chance?

  23. Erinwithans*

    I had a (terrible) boss at a small startup who was vegan. Occasionally he’d read a management book and decide to Do Management, which also was pretty uniformly terrible, though also short lived. One year he decided to take everyone and our +1s out to dinner for the holidays. Mandatory attendance.

    He took us to a 100% raw vegan place. I have nothing against it, and honestly the food was tasty, but it was bizarre – they kept advertising their dishes as things like “Lobster Tail” (half a papaya with some cayenne on it), or “Pizza with goat cheese and pepperoni” (dried nut-paste cracker with more nut paste and radish slices). Portions were also quite small, half a papaya aside. My “Loaded Potato Skin” appetizer was half an avocado with salted dried flakes of eggplant on it.

    We all ate an appetizer, entree, and dessert, and we were all so hungry that afterwards we ditched our boss and went out to pizza. At least the cocktails were amazing.

    1. ThatGirl*

      That’s….special. I have a few close friends who are vegan and they love their (fully cooked) junk food just like anyone else.

    2. Erin*

      I’m allergic to nuts and most raw fruits and vegetables. I can’t imagine a worse place to try and find a meal I could eat than a raw vegan restaurant.

    3. Massive Dynamic*

      Bwahahaha that’s so weird. I’m vegan and if I order a loaded potato, there damn well better be a potato as the base of it.

    4. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

      That would be so stressful for me! I could probably eat quite a few things there, and some of them are probably things I’d actually enjoy, but I need the names for things to be what I’m actually get getting so I can order things that I’m not allergic to and otherwise able to eat. I’m the kind of vegetarian who wants to appreciate the food I’m actually eating rather than approximate the food I’ve chosen not to eat, for the most part.

  24. Bend & Snap*

    My worst story is a Friday night holiday party with one round of *light* apps (at dinnertime) and an open martini bar. People got blackout drunk whether they meant to or not. Nobody could look at each other the following Monday.

    Highlights: One guy withdrew the max from an ATM and gave it to a stranger. A male supervisor patted a female staffer on the butt. There were martini races. I got a piggyback ride from the IT guy to another bar. Underage interns were served. There was a conference call the next day to try to piece everything together.

    And that is the last time we had an event with almost no food.

    2. Pastor Petty Labelle*

      My law school does this for the alumni holiday party EVERY YEAR. It’s early evening, so right after work when everyone is hungry. And its apps and DESSERTS. So think not a lot of food and a ton of sweet stuff. on an empty stomach. I asked the organizer one year why there was no actual food. The answer was they thought everyone would enjoy a treat. I stopped going.

  25. Tangerine Thief*

    Conference worker at a fancy hotel in my youth. Management said they would provide pizza to those who helped clear down after a late running conference.

    14 of us stayed late to pack up, clear down the 4 rooms and presentation halls and turn it around for the wedding the next day.

    They did indeed provide pizza.

    One.

    Just one.

    We split slices with someone’s pen knife and had to provide our own drinks as the food and sodas were for ‘attendees only’.

    Cool.

    Did not volunteer to stay twice.

  26. FALL YALL*

    Finally, my time to shine! While you’re going to get a lot of stories about folks giving minimal effort, I have a story of someone in our meetings dept. giving maximum effort and absolutely borking it. This was at a professional association, late 2000s. Food TV was ascendant and hubris was on the menu in kitchens across the world. We were going to DC for our annual lobbying visit with members, and had booked a sit-down kickoff dinner at the hotel conference center for the night before.

    The meetings person in charge of the food was actually a very thoughtful, nice person who liked to mix things up meeting to meeting instead of just repeating what we did year over year. And she was caught up in the food tv hype, as was the culinary director of the hotel we stayed at. She knew I was a food lover, and she excitedly let me know that we’d be getting not just ANY hotel conference dinner, but a fresh seasonal menu that our group would be the first to try.

    Wine was opened, salads and bread were picked at, and then came the MAIN EVENT: Caramel Chicken. Like, hotel chicken breast with a caramel glaze/sauce. And green beans/squash/pumpkin. The entire thing was like getting slapped in the face with an MLM-sourced bath bomb. IT’S FALL, Y’ALL feels like a personal threat to this very day.

    (Footnote: the keynote speaker of that kickoff dinner was a young Tucker Carlson. Twist!)

    1. I should really pick a name*

      Maybe I’m missing something, but I’m not actually seeing the problem. Caramel chicken sounds interesting.

        1. FALL YALL*

          I’m sure there was a good way to do it. This was basically those cubes of baking caramel, rendered down with spices that I’m choosing to believe was not a Bath & Body Works potpourri bag. Add the veg to it and it was like if you were trying to describe Fall to an alien made only of taste buds, but you were yelling too loud.

          I also thought it sounded interesting. Once.

          1. Hlao-roo*

            it was like if you were trying to describe Fall to an alien made only of taste buds, but you were yelling too loud

            Thank you for this description! The idea of caramel chicken with sides of green beans, pumpkin, and squash sounds delicious… if it were prepared with a normal level of flavor. But at “drown your tongue in the flavors of fall!” level, I would also be put off the idea of caramel chicken forever.

          2. daeranilen*

            Yeah, I love sweet sauces and marinades, but typically you render down the sweet things with savory ingredients to create a more complex, layered flavor that enhances the meat. That’s very different from essentially drowning some chicken in the mix-ins for a Starbucks latte.

      2. ThatGirl*

        Meh. I don’t like sweet sauces on my meat and caramel is nothing but sugar and cream. Sounds gross to me.

      3. Jane*

        Caramel chicken is actually a thing in Vietnamese cooking! It’s “caramelized” in that you reduce coconut water/fish sauce/palm sugar/probably some aromatics I’m forgetting down into a sweet-savory sauce.

        1. Emily Dickinson*

          I made fish like this once. I thought it was delicious but my husband asked me not to make it ever again. He couldn’t get over the pungency of the fish sauce being reduced.

        2. Armchair Analyst*

          I have also seen and had a maple syrup curry from that geographical region. yum! but yes, complex. not just sweet.

    2. MsM*

      Having eaten my fair share of DC hotel conference meals, I am not at all surprised that “culinary innovation” = “let’s do something slightly different to the chicken and green beans.” (An MLM bath bomb meal is hilarious, though. At least secondhand. I’m sure it wasn’t fun to eat.)

  27. existential_crisis*

    I went to the largest professional conference in my industry, and there were two box lunch options: regular and allergy-free/vegan. The regular lunch was a large sub sandwich loaded with meat and cheese, served with chips and a cookie. The combined allergy/vegan lunch was such an afterthought that most of the catering staff didn’t know (a) there even was a second option, or (b) where to find them.
    When they did find it, it was a tiny box of undressed salad with three strips of cold grilled zucchini on it and a brownie. I’ve had larger side salads at restaurants! I skipped the rest of the conference lunches and got takeout instead.

    1. Radioactive Cyborg Llama*

      Argh, that would make me nuts. I’m hypoglycemic and neither of those would work for me (even if I ate wheat, which I also don’t). And why remove the chips from the alternate option? I think I’d try to snag one of each and make it a salad with meat and chips.

      1. existential_crisis*

        I have celiac-level sensitivity though, so anything that came in contact with bread is off limits. Every year I’ve been to the conference, the allergy/vegan lunch is awful, and I complain on the follow up survey. Haven’t seen any improvements yet though!

    2. Observer*

      and there were two box lunch options: regular and allergy-free/vegan

      That is a clear sign that the alternative is going to be pathetic – if you are LUCKY.

      And, guess what? The “allergy free” version wasn’t definitively allergy free, even assuming it was a “flourless” (and egg free) version. Because it is definitely possible to be allergic to chocolate – even if you limit yourself to “classic” IgE mediated reactions.

  28. AfT*

    I have Celiac Disease, so not only does my food need to be gluten free, but I need to be extremely confident before putting it in my mouth that there was no cross contamination with gluten at any stage in the prep process, or I will be very, very sick for maybe even a few consecutive weeks. I bring my own food to conferences, and I definitely get some *looks* putting it on a plate and eating at the same table as others.

    1. Panicked*

      The looks I can handle, the questions/comments I cannot.

      “You’re so thin, you don’t need to diet!” I’m not *on* a diet; this is the food that keeps me healthy.

      “What, is this food not good enough?” It looks delicious and I wish I had a meal I didn’t have to cook over the meal I brought.

      “Oh, just have to be special, don’t we?” Yes, yes we do.

      or my favorite “What happens if you eat something with gluten?” You really REALLY don’t want to know.

      1. AfT*

        Or “oh, my aunt has Celiac Disease but she still eats bread/fixed it with yoga/has a mild form”. Arghhhhhhhhh

      2. That's 'Senior Engineer Mate' to you.*

        What happens?

        Nurses in intensive care singing happy birthday around a hospital bed after my girlfriend stupidly ate a “certified gluten free” muffin for her birthday when we were on holiday. She got a special birthday ride in an ambulance and everything!

        I initially thought a special birthday bonfire would be nice but she didn’t think a special birthday spending the night in jail for arson was a good idea.

    2. time_ebbs*

      I also have celiac and I hate dealing with convention security at places that restrict outside food. Even if I confirm ahead of time that I can bring food, it’s fifty-fifty if the security person at the door is going to give me trouble.

      There’s also just general carelessness that drives me nuts. I had a work meeting ages ago that provided safe gluten free food but decided to mix all the leftovers on a single platter after the meeting. The person who did it was surprised I didn’t eat any of the food as a snack later. At another job, the potluck organizer took a bunch of things out of their safe containers and put them on shared platters (like all of the cookies people brought on one platter) so now the gluten free food was contaminated. And this happened even after I labelled the stuff I brought and indicated it should be separate! Potlucks in general are rough because people can get so annoying about lack of participation.

      1. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

        On a related note, garnishes are a mistake. I’m allergic to peppers, and someone I am often at conventions with is allergic to strawberries. I have a very hard time not losing my entire shit when there’s an entire pan of an otherwise-safe food that I can’t eat because some jackass thought the potatoes looked a little beige and decided to carve a pepper and stick it in the pan for color. Strawberries seem to be like this, but for sweet foods, in the minds of these same people.

        They will also helpfully “fix” the eggs I special-ordered with no paprika before bringing them out of the kitchen.

        1. Mack*

          Maybe they should garnish only with ingredients already included in the dish? It could also be a way to signal a non-obvious allergen. Cheesy mashed potatoes could have little cheese dinosaurs on top, for example.

  29. DisneyChannelThis*

    Old job – cakes all the time. They finally listened to feedback that too much cake was happening (people on diets, people on sugar restrictions, vegans etc left out too). Didn’t provide alternatives but at least stopped being so pushy with cakes (won’t you have a piece?? It’s really good! I know you said you didn’t want a piece but I stuck a plate with a piece on your desk anyway). No more cake for months, then at the annual picnic, they brought out not 1 not 2 but 7 cakes!!! One for each month.

    1. desk platypus*

      I have so many cakes at my job too! All the birthdays, congratulations on getting accepted to a certain program, anniversaries, it’s National Chocolate Cake Day (no joke), etc. About 90% of the time they aren’t even good cakes but you’re judged for not socializing. This past three months alone probably had 10 cakes. A new director said we’ll have one big cake event for all departments at the end of the month for all birthdays. I thought that would save me but no. People still do individual birthdays PLUS the monthly cake.

  30. Dom*

    I’m vegetarian myself and have had a few bad experiences, though I’ve also been in position to organise things like work pizza orders a few times (mostly when babysitting interns or graduate applicants). My rule of thumb is that at least a quarter of the food should be vegetarian, probably a bit more depending on how varied the veggie options are, because you don’t want the veggie options to run out and you also don’t want the non-vegetarian people to feel policed if they go for a slice of margarita pizza and are told it’s just for vegetarians.

    Between people who are vegetarian, people who have religious dietary requirements, people trying to eat healthier, etc. there’s usually a fair few folks who prefer to pick the meat-free option.

    At the same time, though, not many non-vegans will go for vegan options (with a few exceptions like falafel).

    1. SpaceySteph*

      As a person who doesn’t eat pork for religious reasons, I do appreciate when there’s a non meat pizza option, but I also don’t like black olives so I hate veggie lovers pizza. Can never go wrong with a few basic cheese! It might not be anyone’s favorite but it is the most universally inoffensive.

      1. Tangerine Thief*

        I feel like it should be a rule to throw in 2-3 cheese pizzas (or whatever ratio works) and make sure the veggies only crew and limited diet people get first dibs at it.

        Always found that if you just left it as an option 1/2 the meat eaters would have a slice ‘just because’ even if there were 5-8 other pizzas they could eat.

        1. ecnaseener*

          With pizza, I’d just assume you need enough plain cheese pizza for almost everyone – don’t try to math out what percent of people who *can* eat the selected toppings will want them. Some of us are just picky and like our cheese pizza!

          1. Worldwalker*

            Exactly. There is no biological or dietary reason why I can’t eat a pizza with anchovies on it, but I will go hungry rather than eat it, because I absolutely can’t stand them. Just because I *can* eat anchovies doesn’t mean I will.

          2. Chirpy*

            This. Almost everyone will eat cheese pizza (barring allergies). If you run out of meat, meat eaters will eat cheese pizza. It does not work the other way around. Veggie pizza isn’t the way to go either, as some people will have issues with various vegetables/mushrooms.

            Always get a LOT of plain cheese pizza.

          3. Charlotte Lucas*

            Most people seem to grab at least one slice of the cheese pizza.

            I hate the veggie lover’s pizza. It is full of vegetables that I dislike, that don’t taste good on pizza, or that are a terrible combination of burnt & raw.

        2. Anna*

          I think people forget too that someone being able to eat some meats does not necessarily mean they can eat common pizza meats (pepperoni, sausage, and anchovies come to mind). Pepperoni in particular is much more likely to cause allergen or sensitivity problems than say, plain chicken, there are several religious restrictions against eating pork, and allergies with seafood are a thing.

          Like I’ve definitely seen a logical fallacy in this common section that “is not vegetarian = can eat the meat pizza (and therefore is being an ass for stealing the only food vegetarians can eat),” and that is. Not nearly as universally true as people seem to think.

      2. mlem*

        As a vegetarian, I once replied to a group poll by saying that I’d be fine with cheese or mushroom pizza, fully expecting to end up with cheese. Not only did they get both, but the mushroom pizza was surprisingly popular with everyone and tends to show up at all our pizza-ordering events! (My team’s management does a great job of ordering food in excess so that we usually have leftovers of everything, which are then happily handed out to whoever is willing to take them home. I’m lucky!)

      3. Jane*

        I’m an omnivore who could probably go full vegetarian if I wanted to (I’ll get a burger now and then as a treat-yourself meal, but when cooking at home I skew towards vegetarian because it’s cheaper) and I will ALWAYS take a plain cheese pizza over a veggie lover’s because I hate bell peppers. ><

        1. Worldwalker*

          I hate peppers and olives. I really like plain cheese pizza, and every time, those are always the first ones to go. Artichoke pizza is surprisingly good, though. (I don’t know who ordered *that*, but it was all that was left when I got to the pizza)

            1. Tau*

              Really? But spinach pizza is the best! Spinach and gorgonzola, spinach and ricotta, spinach and feta and sun-dried tomato, the list goes on.

              2. Dom*

                Check out a Fiorentina if you get the chance – it’s a rather unique pizza, with spinach and an egg on top! (It does also come with black olives and a few places will add anchovies, so watch out for that)

        2. Tau*

          I’m a vegetarian who loves bell peppers but doesn’t like sweetcorn on pizza, and veggie lover pizzas always seems to have sweetcorn…

          Putting on as many different vegetables as will fit seems like a recipe for a pizza nobody wants, honestly.

        3. Anna*

          I’m allergic to bell peppers! And have to avoid pepperoni unless they can provide a fairly detailed list of exactly what they made it with.

          Like I’m celiac so the point is generally moot (if I can eat *any* of the pizza, it’s probably a speciality made pizza). But of the classic pizza toppings that people generally order for groups, it’s not unusual for cheese to be the only one I can eat, despite the fact I’m not vegetarian.

    2. londonedit*

      Yeah, people frequently get this wrong. They assume vegetarians are a very small minority, so they order one veggie pizza, because who really eats vegetarian food, and nine meat ones. Then the meat-eaters go ‘ooh, that veggie pizza looks nice’ and take a slice along with their meaty one, and there’s nothing for the veggies.

      A couple of times when I’ve been to occasions where there’s a barbecue put on by a catering company, they’ve invited the veggies and vegans to go up first, which is a great idea because it makes sure they have their pick of the veggie options, and then the meat-eaters can have some only if there are leftovers. Otherwise the same thing happens – the meat-eaters think oh, cool, those salads and that halloumi and those grilled aubergines look nice, and they take them as extra sides without considering that they’re really meant to be someone’s main items.

      1. Artemesia*

        I do dinner parties where lots of my friends are vegetarian. We always have enough of the vegetarian mains for everyone even if there is also a meat main —

      2. ferrina*

        If I know halloumi is an option, I will absolutely go for the halloumi. It’s the Vegetarian’s gamble- will it be much nicer than the non-veg option, or will it be much worse? There is no in-between.

      3. Tin Cormorant*

        I enjoy eating meat but actually want to have a balanced diet that contains both meat and vegetables. (What a concept!) I’m often the one at any personal get-together saying “hey, can we include some kind of vegetables with that list of meats and carbs?”

        All too often, pizzas with meat on them ONLY have meat on them, and I end up feeling really gross from all the salt and fat without anything to balance it out. You bet I’d make half my slices veggie if it were available, or grab whatever vegetables are present if not. (Especially grilled eggplant, I LOVE eggplant and take every opportunity I can get to eat them, and would feel really sad if I had to stay away because they’re for someone else!)

      4. RagingADHD*

        Right? I have heard people who are in charge of group orders complain about having to “hide” the one measly veggie pizza so that the vegetarians can have some, and act like omnivores aren’t supposed to eat anything but all-meat, all the time.

        Like, have you considered that maybe you should order more of the thing everyone likes, and less of the thing that only some people like, instead of treating the most popular option as if it’s just an accommodation for the outliers?

    3. Thin Mints didn't make me thin*

      When it’s me, I order one pepperoni, one cheese and one veggie, or for a larger group multiples in that proportion.

    4. Single Parent Barbie*

      I am not vegan, but am picky about the meat I consume. Basically, anywhere outside of my house, chicken breast is a no go. Also some suspect ground beef products, and I don’t care for pork. (I used to joke I could be a vegetarian but I like a good steak to much) So while I am not vegetarian I do tend to avoid meat when at business meals simply because meat is so easy to make unappetizing. So thanks for recognizing the non vegans eating vegan

      1. Tin Cormorant*

        I LOVE beef, and salmon, but otherwise I could easily give up the rest and be a vegetarian. I love dark green leafy things and broccoli more than I like chicken or pork or any shellfish. I suspect my borderline anemia convinced my taste buds that things high in iron are amazingly delicious and I should eat as much of them as possible. I buy beef chuck in bulk and make soup or stew almost every week. But when it comes to catered food, the meat options rarely taste good, and I’d happily eat vegetarian if that just suddenly became the default everywhere for some reason.

    5. WantonSeedStitch*

      Yeah, I’m an omnivore, but I LOVE vegetables, and when someone else is doing the work of preparing varied and tasty vegetable dishes, I will often choose meatless options just because I like them. But if there isn’t much that doesn’t have meat in it, I will refrain from taking meatless stuff because I don’t want someone who doesn’t eat meat at all to have to go without.

    6. nora*

      I’m neither vegetarian nor vegan but I am Israeli and I will almost always order falafel if it’s an option.

  31. SpaceySteph*

    Its not really terrible food (actually this cafeteria had surprisingly decent food) but I used to visit a vendor site that had a fish option every day at lunch, and it made the whole floor smell like fish for a couple hours of cooking and then lunch service. Imagine someone microwaving fish in your break room except on a mass-produced scale.
    A few times I went there early in pregnancies and it was a real struggle not to hurl as soon as the fumes hit me.

    1. BettyF*

      Ugh, I would hate working somewhere with a constant food smell no matter what it was! It would be worse to smell it for hours before lunch.

  32. Be Gneiss*

    Not a work conference, but a couple years ago I had jury duty and our lunches were the same as the jail. The *pineapple* cobbler with a cinnamon-granola topping was pretty noteworthy. We reached a verdict on the case faster than we reached an agreement on exactly what fruit was in the dessert.

    1. Numbat*

      I wonder if they provide bad food to encourage you to reach agreement quickly and not stick around…

    2. Southern Bell Pepe le P.U.*

      Took my son’s cub scout troop to our local police station. turns out people in the jail/holding cell (not a long-term prison) get meals from our local gourmand – Maison des Waffles! Waffle House!

      We did not tell the kids that- did not want to encourage any delinquency!

  33. Potato*

    I am always shocked at how little my organization’s conferences consider not just vegetarians and vegans, but also folks with religious dietary restrictions. I was at a conference last week where there was a heavy hor d’oeuvres situation that was supposed to be “dinner” for attendees, so we had all been told we couldn’t expense a separate meal—the only vegan and the only kosher item was celery/carrot sticks and hummus.

    At a conference last year, there was a banquet dinner, where the main meal was an option of steak and green beans or fish and carrots. They clearly didn’t know what to do for the vegetarians/vegans, so they all got served a plate with just the green beans and the carrot sides from the other two meal options.

    Why people are so puzzled by the concept of having a full meal without meat is beyond my comprehension.

      1. AngryOctopus*

        Yeah “I was not actually provided a MEAL, thus I am expensing this. Don’t make me fight you till the heat death of the universe”.

    3. WellRed*

      What is with this trend of appetizers or charcuterie as dinner for attendees? I’ve experienced it once if twice myself.

    4. Honey Badger*

      I’m amazed at the lack of planning and the confusion around non omnivore diets! My company does a great job accommodating all of them regardless of if it’s a group potluck or a large corp level event. We have people ensuring that everyone has a variety of selections and can get a full meal. We have one person who has several allergies and even she gets a good meal so she doesn’t have to bring her own food.

      1. Elle*

        I went to a conference last year that did an incredibly good lunch. The venue has gone entirely meat free, and the lunch was a (very mild) thai vegetable green curry with rice – so gluten, dairy, egg free, vegan, vegetarian. They also dished up when you got there – so it was totally possible to control your portion size .

    5. LemonToast*

      That occurred at an employee service awards dinner I recently attended. One of my staff hit 25 years, so I went to support him. The food was just overall “not good,” but then the vegetarian meal was laughable. Like, the main meal was grilled chicken on mashed potatoes with some green beans, so for the veg people they just left off the chicken. Which was probably a good thing for them, as I got the meal with the chicken, and it was pink inside. I did not eat much at that dinner.

  34. R*

    At a recent conference, they asked for dietary requirements up front, which gave me a very false sense of security that my GF needs would be taken care of. But breakfast was pastries, fruit and yoghurt. When I asked for a GF alternative to the pastries, day 1 I was given a GF muffin, day 2 I was told fruit was GF, and day 3 I didn’t even bother. Because sorry not sorry, fruit is a snack, not a meal. The good news is, the terrible food was a great topic for conversation. My kosher and vegan coworkers were equally unhappy.

    1. mlem*

      I was sent to an internal “leadership” training (10+ years into holding a senior title; we were scraping for trainings to put on my record). The sign-up specifically asked about dietary requirements … that were entirely ignored. The gluten-free attendee and my vegetarian self were unimpressed. (The organizer sent us over to the employee cafeteria in the next room and told the chef to give us whatever we wanted, so it did get resolved, but it feels like an extra degree of insult to be asked-and-ignored than simply ignored.)

    2. Worldwalker*

      I’ve had conference pastries that tasted like they were leftovers from a previous conference … about a week previous. And all they had was fruit and pastries. Oh, wait, there were bagels — I’d forgotten, possibly because I’d mistaken them for lawnmower tires; they had the same texture, though less taste. I ate the slightly underripe fruit.

    3. Head sheep counter*

      Wait… yogurt and fruit is… a breakfast… at least for a conference. Who wants funky stale pastries? They are always gross.

      1. R*

        Nope, not an adequate breakfast for people that engage in physical activity before sitting at a conference all day. The thing is, it’s neither difficult nor expensive to provide vegan/GF oatmeal. Cheerios, cornflakes, rice krispies. All GF, all easy to provide. They just couldn’t be bothered to think it through. Even rice cakes could have been provided as an alternative to the nasty pastries.

        1. Rachel morgan*

          None of those you suggested are actually GF except the rice cakes.

          Cheerios are not gluten free. Neither are rice krispies. Those name brands are NOT GF at all. Cheerios have issues with cross contamination, and rice krispies are malted, which is barley, which is not GF. Regular Kellog’s corn flakes are not GF either, due to malt flavoring, which is again, barley.

  35. Reality Check*

    In my industry, the sales people are almost entirely men and the service people entirely women. They normally had a retreat for the sales team which involved meat on the grill, plenty of sides, booze, skeet shooting. At the boss’s house.

    When someone suggested they do a retreat for the service team, we got a conference room that was cold enough to perform surgery, ice water to drink, and hard candies to eat. No activities, just sit and listen to speakers. SIGH

    (the situation has since been corrected)

  36. WellRed*

    It’s not that the food was so bad (though I find food truck food mediocre) but the execution. Conference with a food truck day for one lunch. In a small unshaded parking lot across the street. 100 degrees and windy. It was like eating in a furnace (or hair dryer). So windy you had to clutch utensils and napkins and chip bags lest they blow away under the blinding, burning sun. Droves of people bringing the food back into the convention center. Which didn’t want outside food brought in.

    1. Admin of Sys*

      Ooh, yeah. I’ve been at a place that through food trucks were the way to go and didn’t account for, you know, weather. We had pouring rain once, and also only 2 food trucks for like 100 people, so it took a solid hour to get the food.

      1. Dahlia*

        If you want me to eat outside, you’re also going to have to deal with me being soaked in sweat. It’s just going to happen.

  37. DisneyChannelThis*

    Different job, lot of people were vegan. A lot of people were Hindu and not eating beef/cow. Small subset of different people were not eating pork for religious reasons too. The meeting was catered with BBQ style food. Side salad and corn on cob was what most people ended up eating. The smell was awful and lingered too.

    1. Really?!*

      I have a boss who is tone deaf like this. I have new co-workers are vegan and vegetarian for religious reasons. I live in the Southeastern United States. My boss always recommends BBQ for catered lunch. When someone says they don’t eat meat, she asks that chicken be provided as well. Problem solved.

      My coworkers have eaten French fries and iceberg lettuce for lunch.

      1. Watry*

        At an old job I had a coworker who said she was vegetarian. As she ate a chicken sandwich. It turned out what she meant was she didn’t eat beef or pork. I can’t believe there are multiple people who believe chicken (and/or fish/other seafood) isn’t meat.

      2. Galadriel's Garden*

        Man, that’s *extra* frustrating given how many BBQ places by me do smoked and shredded jackfruit as a meat alternative! There are other things that can be BBQ’d, people!

      3. Salsa Your Face*

        I had a colleague like this. Unfortunately she was responsible for ordering catering for client workshops. We’d ask them for food restrictions ahead of time, and when she saw “vegetarian” she would intentionally order fish for them. Because fish isn’t meat. She insisted over and over again that fish isn’t meat, and wouldn’t hear otherwise. After one too many angry, hungry clients, she was forced to start submitting her menus for approval before placing orders.

  38. Ann Onymous*

    Once went to a conference that included a lunch with assigned seating. Most people were seated with the people they’d come to the conference with, but everyone with any sort of dietary restriction was seated together at the closest table to the kitchen. This was definitely done for the convenience of the waitstaff and not the safety of the people with food restrictions, because my nut-free meal contained meat, dairy, and gluten and the vegetarian, gluten-free, and dairy-free meals of others at the table contained nuts. Also, since we were a bunch of strangers seated together on the basis of dietary restrictions, that became the primary topic of conversation. I’m glad I was able to get a nut-free meal, but feeling isolated and singled out was not great.

  39. Unkempt Flatware*

    I moved to a new state and stayed in my same industry. My last conference in my home state had great food, provided fruit, cheeses, and nuts during breaks and passing periods, and was just lovely. I show up to the same conference in the new state and they have steering-wheel sized pretzels and fake cheese to dip it in during our passing periods. No tables. No plates. No cutlery. Just adults walking around holding greasy pretzels and dipping them into a plastic cup of cheez while fumbling all their swag they’re carrying around. The next passing period were bowls of King Size candy bars as snacks. Todo, we were not in Colorado anymore.

    2. OfOtherWorlds*

      I love giant soft pretzels, though I eat mine plain. And providing king size candy bars rather than bite size ones is uncommonly generous. The organizers of the conference in your new state probably spent more $$$ on food than the Colorado organizers spent on “fruit, cheeses, and nuts”. Different regions of the United States have different tastes, and negative comparisons of your new state to your old state will not help you make friends in your new home.

      1. They Don’t Make Sunday*

        The vibe I got from Unkempt Flatware’s comment was more about strange/thoughtless planning than some kind of food as culture-war stand-in thing. The pretzels were hard to wrangle in a meet-and-greet situation where people were also already carrying a lot of stuff, there were no tables where you could put anything down, and the dang things were hard to dip in the tiny cups. Then the next time it wa something totally different—shelf-stable dessert, basically, so, yes, not a logistical challenge like the last snack but to an attendee it feels out of left field and you start to wonder how much thought anyone put into this thing.

  40. Skippy*

    I went to a women’s leadership conference where the food was all “diet” foods: lowfat yogurt, 100 calorie snack packs, etc. Lunch was a salad — with or without grilled chicken — and some sort of sorbet for dessert.

    I’m all for having nutritious options, but this had the feel of “ladies are always on a diet, am I right?”

        1. datamuse*

          And in my experience low-fat things tend to have a lot of added sugar to make up for the lack of flavor and everything ends up being nauseatingly sweet. (This is one of my pet peeves in general.)

          3. Anon for this*

            yeah, I would have no objection to low calorie or low carb catering if the food was whole foods rather than diet alternatives full of aspartame and guar gum.

    3. Honey Badger*

      I am so tired of the meals for women centric events being geared towards ‘diet’ food! I do NOT want a salad for lunch! I want a sandwich with chips! I want a big plate of pasta with meat sauce! I want beef. Give me the fried food! Bring on the fries! For breakfast, I want bacon and sausage and eggs and toast with tons of butter. I do not want yoghurt or fruit. Or….granola. Or low fat anything.

      1. Nobby Nobbs*

        I am of the firm opinion that yogurt, granola, and fruit are a nice supplement to a well-rounded breakfast. They are not a meal.

    4. JustMe*

      ughhhhhh I once worked somewhere that was like this. One person on staff was a part-time nutritionist (she eventually quit to go full time), someone else had an MPH and was obsessed with health/fitness (to the point where instead of saying, “Let’s park that thought for a minute” she’d go “Let’s put it on the bike rack” because, you know, that’s an active form of transport) and everyone else tended to be very health conscious. It’s like–great, we should be healthy, that’s a wonderful thing. But when people around the watercooler start talking about “Wanting to change the narrative around beans” or “How much more satisfying it is to put coconut oil on popcorn instead of butter” it gets grating.

    5. LemonToast*

      That is gross. There have been several times where I’ve been at restaurants with a lot of male colleagues, and if anyone orders a salad, it gets delivered to me. Despite the fact that I pretty much never order salad at restaurants, because I usually want a hot meal.

    6. Nobby Nobbs*

      I’d be chewing the tables an hour before the next break! Give me food that sticks to the damn ribs, please.

  41. Hangry manager*

    My work (pre-pandemic) had twice yearly mandatory “fun” events. There was always catered food and they always assured me (vegetarian since I was 10) that there would be non-meat options. Dear reader, the non-meat options were fish. Every time. Despite me brining up that fish isn’t vegetarian in every planning meeting.
    I started bringing food in my purse.

      1. DisneyChannelThis*

        I’ve noticed this happening more in areas with large Catholic populations. They do no meat fridays and eat fish instead during lunches in their lent. So they then think fish isn’t a meat when making vegetarian options.

        2. AngryOctopus*

          Throw them for a loop and ask for beaver. Beaver was classified as fish at one point by Catholics because “they live in water”.

        3. Artemesia*

          Justice Scalia was notorious for making the point that because Catholics like himself didn’t eat meat on Friday during lent that meant fish was not meat. That may account for some of his ideology driven interpretations of Constitutional law.

        4. bishbah*

          My office used to do a chili-cookoff event each year in early March, always on a Friday (coinciding with our local rodeo kickoff). Vegetarian submissions would win most years because none of the Lent-observant Catholics or Anglicans, the Hindus, or the vegetarians on staff would taste/judge the entries with beef.

    2. Alexiiiiiiiiii5*

      ugh that’s the worst. not work related but once a waitress proudly told my father their pancakes had no wheat flour, only white flour, which my sibbling is very much allergic too. they didn’t get pancakes. I feel your pain .

      1. mlem*

        My friends were assured that the broccoli-cheddar soup at a restaurant was vegetarian. “So it doesn’t have chicken stock?” they asked, skeptical. The waitress conceded that, no, it did have chicken stock — but no *meat*, so it’s vegetarian!

      2. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

        And irony of ironies, buckwheat flour? Is not actually a wheat flour. I know this because my best friends’ daughter has celiac, and one of the things I can easily whip up for her to eat without worrying about cross-contamination when they come visit are galettes/crepes (most recipes call for adding regular flour, but you can definitely just use all buckwheat).

      3. Salsa Your Face*

        I don’t know if they still do this anymore, but years ago at Qdoba they would ask you if you wanted a “wheat or flour tortilla.” The little vein above my eye would throb as I tried not to burst out screaming that both options are made with wheat flour.

    3. ferrina*

      I’ve met vegetarians that are fine with fish, and some that are don’t eat fish. I always double check with them (including a relative who has been vegetarian for years…their exact diet has changes every 1-3 years, and I have ADHD, so overcommunicating is the best option)

      1. The Unspeakable Queen Lisa*

        No, you haven’t. You have met people who claimed they were vegetarian, but were not. They were pescatarian. I agree that communicating saves a lot of trouble, but be clear that fish is *not* vegetarian.

        And these folks are actively making it harder for real vegetarians by adding to the confusion.

  42. NewJobNewGal*

    I was at an employee appreciation event at a big fancy event space. My co-worker requested a gluten free meal ahead of time. Our company NEVER accommodated her dietary needs so this was a big moment for her because she would finally be included.
    They served us beautiful plates of food for our main course with colorful side dishes thoughtfully arranged into works of art.
    My co-worker’s plate had a blanched chicken breast. That was it. Just a pathetic naked chicken breast on a plate. No spices, no garnish. The pale blob actually slid around the plate when they plopped it down in front of her.
    It was so heartbreaking to see that I had to hold back tears. It was like a cruel, bullying joke that everyone at the table was forced to participate in.

    1. ElinorD*

      I felt this.
      I attended a conference where meals were arranged but we had to pay for it ourselves ahead of time (i’m in public education – we don’t get anything covered unless a tech or textbook company is sponsoring). I’m celiac. I figured they were getting boxes sandwiches, and figured I’d get a salad. Well, I got a handful of raw spinach and a packet of dressing.
      For $20. Those sandwiches looked amazing.
      Most of the attendees didn’t show so they tried to get me to take extra piles of raw spinach but had a whole bag at home already.
      There’s another story about my eating an entire head of cauliflower but that was a family dinner.
      I’m sorry for your coworker but I have been there.

    2. Trisha*

      I feel bad for your co-worker but I would have loved that.

      I suffer from IBS which is often exacerbated by attending events and such (any amount of travel, different water, change in sleep patterns, etc.) and have had my gallbladder removed so there’s a number of foods that are no goes for me and I can also only tolerate a small amount of leafy greens or fried foods (once every 3 days seems fine, more than that and it just runs right through). The first year I attended our 3 day management conference we were all asked if we had any special dietary concerns for lunch. Not wanting to tell people that I have uncontrolled gas, bloating, bathroom issues, etc. I was trying to find a polite way to describe what I needed so I put in a request for “plain” food (i.e. plain chicken, baked potato, plain rice, meat and cheese sandwich). I was assured that the food would be fine and there was no need for a special meal because the buffet will have plenty of “plain” choices.

      For lunch the first day, it was Indian food. Lentils, chickpeas, curry spices, dark green veggies, etc. I ended up having a bit of salad (which was so not enough and no protein). I brought it up to the organizer who said she would see about something plain for tomorrow and then was told, “oh tomorrow’s buffet has lots of plain choices, sorry about today.” The second day was Greek food – loads of onions, garlic, fennel, etc. Again, some salad and I ate some of the chicken (it was pretty heavily seasoned and marinated but I had to eat something). I spent a bunch of time excusing myself from the after activities because 2 days of salad did not agree with me…. I gave up for day 3 since it was a partial day and just grabbed something on my way to the train station.

      The next year, I put in that I would bring my own meals and would put in for reimbursement separately (the way it worked with any meeting was we paid and then were reimbursed afterwards based on our per diems) so basically I just told them to plan for 1 person less for lunch. The organizers weren’t happy because after all last year they had ensured that I would have the plain foods that I asked for !?! I picked up some groceries, kept them in my mini fridge and it was fine. The kicker was it ended up being the exact same menu as the year before so I was super glad I noped out of that situation.

  43. Melissa*

    I was working as a school nurse, and the kids were at a large camp-type center for a field trip. There was a big communal meal, and they announced “everyone with dietary restrictions can go get their meals from window B.” But the problem was, they had made no distinctions among “restrictions”— what they were serving was vegetarian and nut-free, but one of my charges had a life-threatening sesame allergy. When I asked whether the french fries were cooked with sesame oil, the answer was “I don’t think so….”

    1. Ann Onymous*

      Asking about allergens is definitely not a guarantee. Times my (fortunately not life-threatening) peanut allergy has been triggered:
      – The cookies didn’t contain peanuts…just peanut butter.
      – There was no peanut butter in the cake…just in the frosting.

      1. Galadriel's Garden*

        Holy crapola, I had that exact same situation happen with the cookie + peanut butter combo! My manager at the time had ordered catering for lunch and remembered to mention someone in the group had a peanut allergy…so they gave us a big ol’ cookie platter, with peanut butter chocolate chip cookies just mixed on in with everything else. Mercifully my peanut allergy is also not life-threatening, but I took two bites of this cookie and did that slow chew as my brain caught up to my body being like “DANGER WILL ROBINSON! DANGER!” I had to take a Benadryl complete with subsequent Benadryl nap and lost out on two post-lunch hours…good times.

      2. Jaunty Banana Hat I*

        Pretty sure a similar “no peanuts, just peanut butter” killed a guy in Texas not that long ago.

    2. ABC123*

      Wow!

      In all seriousness though, if a kid has food allergies that bad, shouldn’t it be on the parents to either (1) Not sign the permission slip and let their kid go to an unknown situation like that or (2) give the kid something to brown bag from home, maybe making special arrangments with the venue beforehand?

      1. NotRealAnonForThis*

        So here’s a glimpse at what really happens as an allergy parent, and why I teach my child to advocate for themself:

        Sign permission slip. Discuss medically required food restrictions with people in charge. Assurances all around, look, we even have a school nurse directly handling things for your child! More emails and phone calls, day of.

        And then things go absolutely sideways and the people who were in charge and discussing things with you have failed, even if its just by forgetting to flag things in the front line, and your kid doesn’t eat. And from that point out, you’re most likely changing how things are handled, and you’re more likely just packing them something. That comes with its own challenges as a lot of places get wonky about “outside food”.

        There’s a solid trend here in just about any post here from someone with food restrictions – people fail you, consistently, when it comes to food. And its why my child has no problem asking questions, and has already at least once explained that “as there’s no provided meal that is safe for me to eat due to my food allergies, the “no outside food” is not something I’m abiding by; please call my parents if there are further questions” on a field trip.

    3. Rara Avis*

      Took kids to an event at a school that had braggy allergen awareness posters all over their cafeteria. They served us muffins with hidden nuts, unlabeled. When my allergic kid started to react, and I brought it to the attention of the cafeteria staff, they shrugged. You would think a basic job requirement would be not putting kids’ lives in danger.

  44. ApocalypseHow*

    I work for a nonprofit and we were staffing a gala fundraiser, which was very different from our normal work duties and outside of normal work hours. Staff wasn’t going to get a table, but we were promised dinner in our “green room.” The main dish for the staff dinner turned out to be a pasta dish that was spicy to the point where it was inedible for some people. (I ate it, but I’ve got a high tolerance for spice.) When we found out that the food served at the gala was excellent, the stark contrast in quality really offended my coworkers. We know that we were there to work and the food budget needed to focus on the people who were paying to be at the event, but the whole thing made us feel disrespected on a night where we were working very hard for our organization.

    1. AngryOctopus*

      I had the opposite once. I volunteered at a ‘Star Wars’ themed gala at a museum, to celebrate the opening of the Star Wars exhibit. The twist was that after appetizer hour, the Empire “took over” the museum, and we had to evacuate the guests to transport to take them to a safe ship (and dinner). Because they knew how to cater, there were TONS of appetizers left over, from Wolfgang Puck. Everything was so so good, plus I got to eat surrounded by jawas and sand people and storm troopers, all of whom were lovely.

  45. Hiring Mgr*

    Around 10 years ago I was on an annual awards work trip to Costa Rica. Out of about 100 people total, 50 got food poisoning from something in the hotel and were out of commission for a couple of days

  46. Loose Socks*

    I went to an HR Conference. The theme was Self-Care, and one of the main topics was ADA. They completely forgot to accommodate dietary restrictions. I am allergic to nuts and melons, and severely lactose intolerant. I couldn’t eat at least half of each meal, and there were a couple that I couldn’t eat at all.

    2. Where’s the Orchestra?*

      Lol – I was the All seafood conference up in the examples: that one was a three day conference on religious, allergy, and disability accommodations. But also – no accommodations for allergies or religious food restrictions among the participants.

  47. Turanga Leela*

    At almost every conference I’ve been to, they put out tea in the morning and then don’t restock all day. The tea drinkers (me included) drink all the caffeinated tea during the morning sessions. At the afternoon break, they put out fresh coffee… and the herbal tea left over from the morning. I always wind up buying tea at Starbucks in the afternoons.

    1. CR*

      Yes! As someone who doesn’t drink coffee I feel like the tea drinkers always get ripped off or forgotten about at these things. I appreciate it when conferences put some effort into it and it’s not just a few pathetic bags of Lipton.

      1. exoboist1*

        Except in Britain! The UK conferences I’ve been to take their tea seriously, like we’re on par with the coffee brigade. It’s lovely.

        1. The Prettiest Curse*

          Agreed, if I didn’t have a constant supply of both tea and coffee all day at our annual conference, there would be trouble!

        2. Zelda*

          Once upon a time, I worked in the US Midwest for a large multi-national with “British” in its name. We had awesome tea options provided right along with the coffee in every break room. *wistful*

      2. Artemesia*

        I long ago learned to carry tea bags since people who don’t drink tea have this odd idea that a few mint tea bags or some bizarro herbal colation count as ‘providing tea.’

        1. IHaveKittens*

          Same here. I have never drunk coffee and I carry my excellent tea bags with me all the time. And don’t give me microwaved water! I can always tell.

    2. Shiba Dad*

      I was just at a two-day conference that had a continental breakfast the second day. They provided coffee, juice and water. No tea.

    3. Distracted Procrastinator*

      as an herbal tea drinker, I just pack a teabag in my purse because the herbal option is always some really bad peppermint or a bitter chamomile. It’s never worth drinking.

      But then I just count on plain water to drink nearly everywhere I go. I don’t drink soda, coffee, or drinks with sugar in them, or iced tea. I just know I’m in a small minority and have no expectations of being accommodated, however, it’s really frustrating when they don’t have water or all they have are warm, mini water bottles that have like two swallows in them.

      1. DataSci*

        Oh, those tiny mini water bottles! Just give me somewhere to fill up my emotional support water bottle with COLD water and I’m good.

        1. Worldwalker*

          Yeah, what’s with those mini water bottles? They’re only marginally cheaper than full-sized water bottles — you can get a whole case of normal ones for a few bucks at Costco — and they hold less than a red cup.

          1. ferrina*

            They fit really nicely into lunch boxes (if you happen to have an elementary schooler who may or may not remember their water bottle)

    4. Pretty as a Princess*

      Oh and don’t forget when they don’t refill the hot water because it’s not empty, and you wind up with a lukewarm cup of water trying to steep your tea.

      I carry good teabags in my work bag because it’s so rare IME that non-coffee drinkers are accommodated. When someone does actually pay attention to tea drinkers, I make a point of finding someone on the event team and thanking them.

      1. Jackalope*

        My other pet peeve with this is when they use a hot water container that has previously held coffee. There’s nothing that is quite the same type of awful as tea made with super weak coffee flavored water.

  48. Msspel*

    One time I was organizing a workshop in Tunisia and picking out a catering package. I have some French and Arabic but I’m lazy so I referred to the venue’s translated English menu. I will never forget the delight I felt when I saw they offered “mini salty mouth” as an afternoon snack. I made sure we selected that option, and if I recall, the savory small bites in question were very tasty.

  49. J*

    This was about 15 years ago, and didn’t happen directly to me. My work was hosting a delegation from Saudi Arabia, all observant Muslims. I was an admin assistant and was charged with arranging a lunch on their last day. I picked a local restaurant I liked that I knew had a lot of different options and could cover most dietary needs.

    At the end of the meal, one woman pulled me aside and explained that they were SO grateful I had found the restaurant, as they had been eating nothing but chicken salad sandwiches all week – no one else had thought to ensure more than one halal option! She was thrilled to get to eat fish and chips.

    1. Southern Bell Pepe le P.U.*

      that is so kind and thoughtful of you! and yes smart and aware and you took the time to do that!

  50. CJCregg*

    I worked for a very large municipal agency in a big city notorious for being…well…terrible in all the ways. The agency was constantly putting out fires, was always in the press (for the wrong reasons), and morale among staff was low. There was never an iota of staff appreciation in any way – I worked there for ten years. Except there was the famous “Ice Cream Social.” One summer, we moved into a new building. It was all very “you get what you get and you don’t get upset.” We moved to save money, not because we were doing so well. It was very matter of fact. We moved and kept working. Someone, I will never know who, had the bright idea of doing a “Staff Appreciation / Welcome to the New Building Ice Cream Social.” This was unheard of. Someone MADE FLYERS. People were excited! There were going to be toppings! We all gathered at 3 pm in our large conference room. Yep, there were toppings, but no ice cream. All the anticipatory joy was sucked out of the room. Everyone hung out for an hour waiting for the ice cream (that was ordered by someone?) and didn’t arrive. Finally, after about 90 minutes, someone ran down to Duane Reade and just bought random pints for the people who decided to stick around. #neverforget

    2. Honey Badger*

      That sounds like the ‘ice cream social’ we had here. Now, normally my company provides this stuff for free so that’s the baseline setting for all of us. Spoiled? Yes! Absolutely. So when they advertised ice cream social in the cafeteria and then didn’t staff it well and didn’t say a word about it not being free until you got to the front of the line…finally, it didn’t go over well! Plus, they wouldn’t take cards or dining funds attached to our IDs, just cash. It threw people for a loop! Totally mismanaged, miscommunicated, and missed the mark!

  51. PsychicMuppet*

    The last conference I went to had almost no food at all. The sessions started early and went straight through lunch, but there was no food provided at all–not even snacks. The conference was at a hotel and since there were no breaks for lunch, grab-and-go was the only option, so the lines at the two little cafes were always insanely long throughout the day. Looking back, it’s kind of funny. Everyone was hangry and being snippy to each other.

  52. Harper*

    At every single catered event I’ve ever attended where “roasted potatoes” are on the menu, they are never actually roasted. They are cut into chunks and barely cooked in a small amount of liquid with no seasonings. They’re so hard and dry in the middle that they stick in your throat. There’s no crunch, no herby crust, no hint of caramelization. And yet every time, I still manage to hope for actual roasted potatoes, and end up disappointed. How can so many professional cooks not know how to roast a potato? It’s baffling.

    1. BettyF*

      I really like the ones that have been sitting in the chafing dish for like an hour, because at that point they have been cooked through and usually have a nice crunchy coating to them!

    2. ABC123*

      Probably because, depending on time of day, labor laws and venue, the “professional cooks” are likely 16-25 year olds making near minimum wage; like a fancy fast food.

  53. The Prettiest Curse*

    This fortunately didn’t happen because I squelched the idea, but last year one of the caterers we approached to quote for our annual conference was a local Italian place known for their great pizza and sandwiches. (We’ve used them for smaller events in the past.) So when I asked for a quote for lunch for 400+ people, I was expecting them to quote to provide sandwiches. Nope, they quoted to provide pizza.

    My boss was considering the idea till I pounted out that all the executives and academics who attend our event might not be thrilled to eat tepid thin-crust pizza off a paper plate – not to mention the massive potential for staining the both the venue’s carpet and peoples’ clothes! (It’s a buffet-style lunch, not sit-down.) And that’s before you even get into the possibility of people getting annoyed that specific toppings have run out!

    The kitchen at our event venue is fairly small and there’s definitely no pizza oven, so I have no idea how they would have kept that quantity of pizza warm and fresh. We’re restricted to choosing caterers from a small list, so maybe they were providing an unrealistic quote because they didn’t want to do the event – but I’m used to caterers saying no to me, so it’s not like they were going to hurt my feelings. The whole thing was very strange and I’m glad we went with another caterer.

    If anyone has ever been to a conference that did buffet pizza lunch, please tell because I’d be fascinated to hear what it was like!

    2. NeedRain*

      My brother & his spouse did pizza buffet for their wedding- ordered from three different local places to get all the favorites. But it was a lot smaller than 400+ people so they didn’t worry to much about keeping it hot over time.

      1. The Prettiest Curse*

        I do think that pizza is much more viable for smaller events, because there’s a lot less potential for things to go wrong!

    3. Warrior Princess Xena*

      Not a conference, but a close friend’s wedding did pizza. They hired caterers who brought their mobile oven along and did 3 varieties of pizza on the spot. It went onto the buffet table piping hot and crispy.

      1. The Prettiest Curse*

        I’m seeing a trend that everyone in this thread who had pizza at a sit-down dinner had pizza that was fine and people who had it at conferences generally did not – which is what I suspected! Pizza would just not work for my event because we have to keep the buffet lunch out for around 90 minutes, and there’s no possible way to keep a huge amount of pizza hot and fresh for that long. Events where you can serve directly to a table just don’t have that problem.

    4. Monty*

      My department recently hosted an event at the same time and down the hall from another department. The events ran from 12:30-2:30 and people were dropping in and out to mingle and snack. Our catering order was so popular that there was nothing at all left except for a few sad olives and half a tub of garlic mayo. The other department ordered pizza and it went immediately tepid and just sat at room temperature for 2 hours. I’m pretty sure a few people from the event down the hall came through our buffet line to graze. Most of my organizing team went entirely without food and was starving by the end of our event, whereas the other department had oodles left over. Because they are lovely people, albeit a bit misguided in catering matters, they offered us the remaining pizza. We know where the kitchen with the toaster oven is, so we had a delicious pizza lunch by taking turns heating up our slices.

    5. NothingIsLittle*

      I work in local government and am required to find 3 quotes for services, maybe the pizza place thought they were doing you a favor by quoting you even though they didn’t want it? We had a vendor very kindly do the same once.

  54. Pumpkin Spice Oyster Rice*

    My coworker at a small university was a little batty but very kind. We had a department potluck and she made a rice dish that smelled…interesting. I don’t know what she originally thought she was making but she said she just substituted where she could. The ingredients: lemon (okay), rice (fine), garlic (sure), fish stock (where is this going), peanut-butter (not bad but getting concerned), oysters (hit the pause button), spaghettios (frozen in terror), leeks, (why though), and PUMPKIN SPICE. I asked her why the pumpkin spice and she said “it’s the same thing as turmeric, right?”

    Everyone took some and found trash can in other parts of the building. When she saw the empty dish she said “oh darn! Looks like it was a crowd pleaser and I don’t remember how I made it!”

    1. Ms. Hagrid Frizzle*

      Oh. My. God.

      I don’t know that I’ve ever had a stronger visceral reaction to reading a “recipe” >.<

    3. exoboist1*

      Love your play by play of reactions. I was right there with you. Yowza!
      Some people shouldn’t really be allowed to cook.

    4. Manders*

      Thank you for this. I have tears streaming down my face from the PUMPKIN SPICE! LOL!
      Reminds me a bit of Rachel’s trifle (raspberries, ladyfingers, beef sauteed with peas and onions).

    6. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

      That went from odd to unsalvageable somewhere around the spaghettios. Fish stock and peanut butter is an odd combo, but a meal with both fish sauce and peanut sauce is good so I’m willing to believe there was a pathway through that far as long as the rest was both spiced and selected carefully, but there’s just no reason to put spaghettios in that dish unless you have lost a bet, and pumpkin spice is not a sufficient spice blend either (although salvageable if you don’t add too much and you add enough other spices with it, I suppose – cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves are all things that I’ll put in some savory dishes, and none of them seem like an absolute no-go for something with fish and peanut notes).

      I’m struggling to think of any dish that would be better with spaghettios added, really. They’re already a food all on their own, and best kept that way with maybe a cut-up hot dog added if you’re fancy.

  55. EL*

    I was working on a trial several years ago. The judge gave us very short lunch breaks so, one day, we had a build-your-own-sandwich platter delivered to the courthouse. I was a little late getting to our break room and by the time I got there, my only option (as the sole vegetarian in the group) was a mustard sandwich. Which is exactly what it sounds like – two slices of bread with mustard in between. No cheese, no lettuce, no tomato. Suffice to say, my stomach was growling loud enough for the jury to hear it by mid-afternoon!

    1. Mack*

      That sounds terrible! When I was a juror last year, we had generous lunch breaks where we could leave the building and return with takeout from any of a few dozen local restaurants and if we didn’t want to leave the building there was a person appointed to accommodate us (food, beverages, etc) so we’d be comfortable. Jury duty is important, we shouldn’t be distracted by hunger.

  56. Long time listener, first time caller*

    I went to a conference that provided boxed lunches on the last day. The meat option was a turkey sandwich, a bag of chips and a cookie, the vegetarian option was a bag of chips and a cookie, and the vegan option was just a bag of chips.

    3. Zelda*

      When I was just out of college, I finally had my own place and started to host my friends. On one occasion, I had the brilliant idea that I could make chili with my usual recipe and just serve out the portion for J, the lone vegetarian among us, before stirring in the browned ground beef. Well, it turns out that the beef is about half the volume of the dish. So what J got was all the chile pepper spread out over only half the chili; his mouth about exploded.

      Thus, I learned: one does not produce satisfying meals, be they vegetarian, gluten-free, dairy-free, or other, by starting with a satisfying meal and then subtracting stuff.

  57. Don't Call Me That*

    Two years ago at our annual all-company conference, the caterers mixed up the labels on the pork and turkey stations. They looked similar enough (and somehow both tasted bland enough) that not everyone noticed at the time. This *was* noticed by our Muslim coworkers, who of course realized immediately on taking a bite that the turkey was not, in fact, poultry. It was awful, and they were rightfully very upset.
    Our Operations Manager made a big deal about it with the caterers, they and we deeply apologized to our colleagues, and our organization vowed we wouldn’t return to that company/hotel again. What a mess.

    1. Observer*

      Our Operations Manager made a big deal about it with the caterers, they and we deeply apologized to our colleagues, and our organization vowed we wouldn’t return to that company/hotel again.

      I’m glad to hear that.

    2. BubbleTea*

      I got some vegetarian soup from Pret a Manger that turned out to contain chicken. When we complained, the manager checked the other tubs and confirmed that yes, all the soups labelled vegetarian did in fact contain chicken. And DIDN’T REMOVE THEM FROM THE DOSPLAY. This was not long after two people had died from mislabelled food bought from Pret, so we were astonished by how blase they were. My ex, who had paid for our food, complained to the head office and received a sizeable gift card as compensation, which was spent on drinks because I will never again trust their food.

  58. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

    Went on a professional team building event. The hosts of the event had evidently hired the lowest cost catering available.

    The chicken inside the nuggets was still pink, the scampi smelt like my first year undergraduate microbiology lab and I’m pretty sure the cheese in the sandwiches was well on its way to sentience.

  59. Holly*

    One training event with a very hyped ‘breakfast’ being provided … of coffee and bacon rolls. No other option.
    One all-day Trade Show with coffee, toast and bacon.
    Presumably the visitors got to leave and find other food, but I was working a stall on my own, so couldn’t leave the hall. And it was a 12 hr day.
    I don’t eat meat. Caffeine and starch only means a very wired Holly.

    1. Heather*

      Not a conference but in 2020 I was a poll worker on Election Day.

      They told us that lunch would be provided for workers, so I brought some snacks but not a full meal. Lunch was 3 Jimmy John sandwiches that the site manager cut up into tiny pieces for all ~15 of us to share. We each got about 3 bites of a sandwich.

      They also didn’t tell those of us stationed outside that there were chairs available but that’s another story.

  60. Ms. Hagrid Frizzle*

    We had a joint board meeting with our fundraising group and internal team and provided lunch from our facility catering services. They somehow managed to give us soggy sandwiches and flavorless pasta salad. Both of which were positively loaded with red onions (and one of the team big wigs is famously anti-onion to the point that there was no excuse for the internal catering team to not know).

    Plus, rather than get the fresh baked goods and coffee we were promised, we were given prepackaged cookies and a pitcher of lemonade.

  61. EasternPhoebe*

    Once I had to order lunch for a meeting. I was instructed to buy fancy sandwiches from a specific place, so I did, making sure to get extras so that staff could graze afterwards. Well, the sandwiches were tiny, probably 200 calories a piece. Maybe. They had so little substance it was bizarre. (And they were so expensive!!) Meeting attendees kept going back to get more food because it was simply not enough for human survival. We ended up wiping the sandwich platters clean, and after the meeting I went out to get myself more food, while vowing to never order the fancy sandwiches again.

  62. Melody*

    I worked in Amish country for many years. Almost every event was catered by Amish restaurants and it’s a LOT of starches accompanied by bland chicken and soggy green beans.

    On the up side… there’s also a lot of pie.

    1. ThatGirl*

      Oh man the Amish restaurant food I’ve had has been delicious! Great fried chicken, pot roast, etc – but definitely heavy on the starch.

      Mmm. Pie.

  63. Parcae*

    My organization was hosting an annual event as part of a larger conference. We didn’t do this sort of thing very often and certainly didn’t have an official event planner, but since all the food had to be catered through the hotel anyway, how bad could it go? At the advice of the catering staff, we selected the “heavy appetizers” option and gave them the number of attendees for our ticketed event.

    The night of, guests arrived and started oohing and aahing at the admittedly tasty-looking food. Success! The apps were served buffet style, so everyone went through the line and put a few items on the tiny plates provided. Maybe some people were especially… enthusiastic about sampling the treats, but it’s not like anyone was shoveling a whole buffet tray into their tote bag.

    …well, either our guests were especially hungry or the hotel miscalculated, because we ran entirely out of food before half the people even arrived. It was utterly humiliating. Years later, people would still talk about the Year There Was No Food.

    1. Alianne*

      The two attorneys I paralegal for go to an obligatory all-day conference (9am–5pm) every winter, and they always bring back food horror stories. This happened one year, the food offered was a lot of appetizer-type stuff (mini-quiches in the morning, finger sandwiches in the afternoon) and a conference room of bored and hungry lawyers finished everything by 1:30pm. Another year, they had seafood offerings, and at least they had *some* alternate options for the non-seafood crowd, but apparently the overall fragrance for the rest of the conference in a big crowded room was…not the best.

    2. Artemesia*

      We had that happen at a conference with a dessert buffet of tiny desserts. they had apparently calculated 3 per head, but didn’t announce that and so only the first half of the line got any as those in the line first piled their plates with 10 or 12 desserts. This was a profession committed to social justice.

      1. Gumby*

        Three tiny desserts per person seems maybe a little low. Obviously if someone said that 3/person was the plan I’d stick to it. Or if I saw things running out. (Though I might also assume there were replacement trays waiting in the wings.) But I figure these are each around 1 cubic inch in size. I’m imagining something the size of a Lindt Lindor chocolate. One or maybe two bites each. 10-12 sounds like on the high side of reasonable, but 4 or 5 wouldn’t even make me blink. Chances are I could make my own of whatever they served for dinner fairly easily but I’m definitely letting the professionals make the fancy petit fours and macarons so when those are on offer I’ll want to try a few.

        1. It’s Suzy now*

          Especially if there are a lot of different kinds. I wouldn’t take 6 mini strawberry tarts but if there are 4 flavors of tart and two kinds of truffles, yea, I might take one if each if I wasn’t warned of a shortage,

  64. Annalyn*

    Conference food is brutal for vegetarians. I was recently at one that served heavy hor d’oeuvres as a meal. The first tray that came out was smoked salmon, which was no big deal. I assumed they wouldn’t lead with a vegetarian option. But then it was bacon wrapped dates. And then ham. The trays kept coming until finally one single pathetic tray of diced beets on a toothpick came around. If you’re only going to have *one* vegetarian option, it should not be diced beets! Vegetarianism is common enough now that you’d think they’d be able to craft at least one popular vegetarian option. Then again, in the very rare instance when the vegetarian option is actually good, there isn’t ever enough of it because they never account for the fact that meat eaters might also want to enjoy the occasional meatless dish as well!

    1. datamuse*

      This is one of those things that always puzzles me. It’s like, in addition to vegetarian options clearly being an afterthought, caterers also assume that meat-eaters will want meat in EVERYTHING. As several comments here have shown that’s not the case!

      1. Worldwalker*

        I’ve seen some wedding horror stories where someone (usually an entitled parent) threw fits because the wedding couple chose to have vegetarian food (frequently because they *were* vegetarians) and the person pitching a fit claimed that because of this, there was nothing they could eat. And one where someone who was part of a group that had round-robin dinner parties insisting that since they prepared a vegetarian option for the vegetarian couple in the group, those people should prepare a meat dish for them. Yes, there apparently *are* people out there who have to have meat in every dish, at every meal, and can’t eat anything without meat in it.

        I totally don’t get it. I love chocolate more than life itself, but I wouldn’t want chocolate in every single dessert I ate, let alone in every possible dish at a meal! (a world with no cherry pie … no raspberry/lemon cupcakes … no blueberry cobbler … that would be almost as bad as a world with no chocolate!)

    2. Iridescent Periwinkle*

      I would think, with today’s climate issues related to possible meat-related production, that any savvy caterer would try to focus less on meat-centered options. I myself tend to eat less meat for that reason (and it’s expensive), but I *know* that I am not alone in that.

    3. I Wish My Job Was Tables*

      That baffles me as well. I’m a meat eater who loves tofu and doesn’t like the taste of pork or beef, but the number of pork and beef based dishes offered by catering companies is baffling! Just a sea of beef options with a single veggie option that’s clearly an afterthought. My kingdom for a catering company that seasons vegetables!

    4. Honey Badger*

      I’m a meat eater but I don’t want it for every course and in everything. I love veggies! I love fruit! I’m happy to eat vegetarian hor d’oeuvers. In this day and age, I’m astounded at how many places struggle with vegetarian/veganism and gluten free options. There are so many tasty options for all three and they are a simple internet search away!

  65. Maple Leaf*

    I was at a 4-day conference where they were provide 3 meals/day to all attendees. I advised them in advance of an egg allergy so they made me a very special breakfast of half of a peeled avocado in a vacuum sealed back and nothing else! The silver lining is that the vacuum seal prevented the avocado from browning, however the organizer would not even let me get into the buffet line so I could have toast with the half avocado, let alone any of the fresh fruit, yogurt or bacon/sausage that were offered. I had a hunch my breakfast options would be limited and had pre-planned by brining some packaged food with me (ie protein bars, nuts, etc).

    1. ThatGirl*

      wtf, sounds like there were plenty of breakfast options you could have eaten. Not like you’d faint at the mere sight of an egg.

      1. Zelda*

        OTOH, maybe they knew their hygiene was crap and everything was cross-contaminated? Obviously, the correct way to deal with that is to fix the darn kitchen practices, but if all they care about is limiting their liability…

  66. J!*

    I once went to a weeklong training where they went the opposite direction and every meal was vegetarian based with vegan options for everyone. Which could have been fine except like 80% of the attendees were not vegetarians or used to a vegetarian diet, and every single lunch and dinner had a bean-based protein. The gastric distress was very real and everyone in the room was suffering. By Thursday a couple of guys did a burger speedrun on our 20 minute lunch break for the group because they couldn’t take any more beans.

    1. mli25*

      My (American, Jewish) best friend married an Indian man, who is Hindu, and I was a bridesmaid. Her wedding consisted of 5 days of events to cover the various traditions of both cultures, which was really fun. I am not the biggest fan of Indian food (like once a month is good for me) and there was no beef served for the entire 5 days. I skipped the last meal and promptly went elsewhere for a burger. More of a me thing than a fail by my friend.

  67. LizzyP*

    I have multiple food allergies and have attended quite a few conferences and events where the food options for me were… very disappointing. Reading everyone’s stories is making me feel so much better! I think conference organizers/caterers who haven’t experienced dietary restrictions don’t realize how isolating it feels to not have food to eat when everyone else does. I am loving the virtual options for conferences post-Covid, I can eat my own food!

  68. Whale I Never*

    I worked at a museum once that had an option bonding/training event at another museum, which fell during the week of Passover. Now I genuinely don’t expect accommodations for Passover, because the dietary rules are so complex and there are very few kosher-certified restaurants in my area. But the invitation specifically said there would be pizza AND a kosher-for-Passover option, so I didn’t bring my own food.

    Big mistake. The kosher option was just the salad from the same place that provided the pizza—you’ve all had this salad. Pure white chunks of iceberg lettuce, enormous wedges of underripe tomatoes, olives, pickled peppers, all uncomfortably warm from being transported on top of the pizza boxes. It wasn’t appetizing at all, on top of the fact that the one food I genuinely can’t stand even the residual taste of is olives, ON TOP OF the fact that the restaurant wasn’t kosher, so the salad was almost certainly prepared with treif utensils even if it didn’t technically contain leavened ingredients.

      1. SpaceySteph*

        Passover depends so strongly on your particular level of observance. Kitniyot or no? Ok if its an item that doesn’t include grain or are you concerned about trace contaminants or every item being certified KFP?

        Maybe if you think its coming from a kosher restaurant you figure its ok, but most kosher restaurants I know shut down for Pesach rather than try to kasher their whole restaurant to stay open for 4 days between the chagim.

    2. Another librarian*

      yeah, I went to a conference during Passover a few years ago and contacted the organizers in advance, explained that kosher is not the same as kosher for Passover, was assured that catering was prepared to provide for the 3 attendees who had expressed the need. Ib packed a box of matzo for snacks.

      And of course, when the server brought the special meal it was a kosher pre-packed meal with challah roll. I got directions to a supermarket and picked up a giant tub of yogurt and some cherry tomatoes and strawberries and a tin of macaroons and ate those for the next three days.

      1. Decima Dewey*

        My library system scheduled an All Staff Day during Passover one year. Organizers assured people who objected that everything would be, that they’d use a kosher caterer. Apparently they didn’t actually speak to any kosher caterer, or they’d have learned that all the kosher caterers in the city were closed that day.

    3. Henry Division*

      I had a 4-day Passover work trip last year, and I made sure to pack all my own food and go shopping for fruits and yogurt ASAP when I arrived. It was a pain but honestly it was kind of nice not to have to think about where I was going to get food every day since it was all pre-planned. God bless my co-worker who tried super hard to get me some KfP alcohol, but he had no idea where to even start with the food.

  69. arcya*

    I was at a conference last year where I think the venue started running out of food? I’m not sure, it wasn’t great to begin with but it got sillier and sillier. For breakfast on the second-to-last day there was a tray with “imported and domestic cheeses.” It was Kraft singles.

    One the final evening there was supposed to be a big dinner, and the food was getting so suspicious by that point I doordashed Chipotle to the parking lot out back and ate it like a raccoon by the dumpsters. I think my company must have understood because I expensed the Chipotle and no one ever complained that meals were supposed to be provided.

      2. arcya*

        They did! They tried to hide it by arranging them fancy on the platter, but I was raised lower-middle class in the midwest, of course I know a Kraft single at 20 yards. I took a picture and it lives on in the group chat hahaha

    2. many bells down*

      Oh man that reminds me of a convention I went to that offered a beer/wine/cocktail garden with “craft beer.” I love a good craft beer so I went over there to discover that it was all Bud, Coors, and Corona. I asked about the “craft beer” and they offered me a Heineken.

      1. Observer*

        Was this, by chance, the Fyre Festival?

        Nah. That was on an island, not access to DoorDash.

    4. Her Blondeness*

      To quote areya: ate it like a raccoon by the dumpsters.

      I laughed so loud I scared the dog!

    5. It’s Suzy now*

      I will be shocked if I don’t see this one in Alison’s roundup! “Raccoon by the dumpsters,” lol.

  70. desdemona*

    Not a conference, but a work lunch during a really grueling week. We were told the board was going to supply lunch on Friday. I knew we had a lot of weird allergies on our team and flagged this to several people, one of whom collected a list and shared it.

    Day comes, and the allergens list has been ignored. There’s veg, vegan, and regular options, and granted there’s salad and fruit salad for folks that technically met allergy needs. But the main meal is sandwiches, and the vegetarian option has an ingredient I’m allergic to. The meat option is slathered in cheese, so our 17 year old intern who’s been doing hard labor and DOES eat meat but is allergic to dairy, can’t have it.

    We still all had something we could eat, but the board standing there crowing about how much they appreciate us and patting themselves on the back for buying lunch contrasted heavily with “we couldn’t be bothered to make some special orders so everyone could have a sandwich”. Fruit salad is great and all, but not an ideal full lunch.

    1. NeedRain*

      Honestly, that “we clearly did not give any fs about what people need” attitude, combined with being told I should be thankful…. upsets me way more than just not being “appreciated” with free lunch at all.

      1. desdemona*

        Exactly. I would have been bummed by the lack of thought about allergies if it had been a surprise lunch, but at least they had vegetarian/vegan options.

        But the fact that we TRIED to tell them about the weird allergen combinations and nobody listened, then expected us to be Oh! So! Grateful! made it so much worse.

    2. londonedit*

      I had a similar problem with Christmas lunch at one company I worked for a few years ago. It was a very small company and the two senior staff members were very into their traditional long publishing lunches, so the two of them choosing where we’d be taken for our annual Christmas lunch was a Big Deal. We’d usually go to a restaurant run by friends of theirs, because then they could haggle them down on the price and choose what they wanted on the menu, etc. So we’d be presented with a set menu with two or three choices per course, and we’d choose what we wanted in advance of the day of the lunch. So far, so normal, except that the bosses would choose the options they most liked, and they’d often ‘forget’ that there were a couple of vegetarians in the office – or not pay close enough attention. One year every single menu item for both starters and mains included some sort of meat or fish – for example for mains you had the classic Christmas turkey, and the other options were something like roasted monkfish with chorizo, and pasta with tomato and anchovy sauce. When I and the other office vegetarian pointed this out, the bosses got all huffy and acted like we were being picky and ungrateful by asking for just one option that we’d actually be able to eat.

    3. That's 'Senior Engineer Mate' to you.*

      At one “compulsory fun event” I went to they did that. I had already annoyed management by whining about the food options and been told that I had to attend and enjoy it regardless.

      So I very carefully chose the least gut-offending things to eat. But I ate them. And my gut reacted in the lest offensive manner it knows how. By making farts. Many, many farts. Ranging from “did someone fart?” to “die, alien scum” level.

      I got sent home very soon after we got back to the office. I took the next day off sick and my team leader sounded happy not to have me in the office. Sadly the company did not learn from that but luckily I found a better job before the next event.

    4. desdemona*

      Coming back hours later to add:
      The allergens were not marked. So they had received the list, ignored it, and then didn’t tell us about it. They flagged meat vs vegetarian vs vegan. The ingredient I am allergic to that was on the sandwiches required me to take a sandwich, take it apart to check, find the ingredient, and throw most of the sandwich out, salvaging what I could that hadn’t been touching the offending item.

      1. That's 'Senior Engineer Mate' to you.*

        That’s really offensive. It’s one thing to not ask, or to get told and say “tell someone who cares”, but asking and half-arsing the response feels like a f-you. Often f-you in particular. “Yes, you with the allergy, I mean you”.

        Even though in reality it’s often just someone who’s busy and means well but either doesn’t have time to follow up in detail, or doesn’t know that they need to stand over the catering staff and watch them like a hawk. I’ve mostly been lucky with employers, one managing director said he’d rung at least 20 venues (in June!) for our Christmas Party looking for one that could cater for all of us. He already knew that “using their existing menu” was a requirement, he’d learned that the hard way before I started (IIRC a relative allergic to peanuts. Yeah, the “ambulance and intensive care” way of learning). But I learned this when he came out of his office with a huge grin going “I DID IT”… we were all happy, then and at Christmas!

        And the whole “pick bits out” rigmarole is so dicey even if you’re willing to do it. I know with my sensitivies (I’m not allergic, my microflora are!) some things are slow burners – I’ll eat it and think “this is fine” and then my gut starts rumbling and I don’t feel so good. Which is my cue to find the porcelain telephone and get ready for a long chat.

        1. desdemona*

          I think the key thing is – they didn’t ask, but several people flagged the allergies and sent it up the flagpole…and they ignored it. It was the combo of we tried + they ignored + they spent the entire lunch telling us how happy they were to be feeding us & expecting praise. They didn’t use a caterer exactly – they made big “catering” style orders from local places. So it wouldn’t have been super difficult to say “hey, sandwich place, we need a platter of ham, a platter of turkey, a platter of veg, but 1 ham with no cheese, and 1 veg with no onion” etc. I’ve had other people do that!
          I don’t know what the allergic-to-cheese intern did; I suppose he took the vegan salad options.

          I’m glad you’ve been lucky with your employers, and I love the director who started planning early in order to make sure everyone was accommodated!

  71. KateM*

    That’s drink rather than food, but I was once years ago to a conference-like thingy where we were served wine, and only wine, with each meal. I did manage to get tap water once by asking for it separately – there were no water glasses on table or anything like that. The straw that broke my back was the festive dinner of last day together with our students, where students got a half-litre bottle of a soft drink each, we adults were similarly given a whole unopened bottle of red wine per person – no other options.

    1. ThatGirl*

      Was this in France or something???

      I like wine, but I wouldn’t want to drink nothing but red wine for all of my meals, good gravy.

      1. Baby Yoda*

        Been to crab feasts like that, only beer. Ugh. You’re trapped when you need relief from the spicy Old Bay seasoning.

      2. KateM*

        I was once to a private party like that! And to make things worse, it was a sauna party where one has to drink a lot because of all that sweating, but I can squeeze at most one glass of beer into me during a whole evening, and the water was not drinkable.

    3. Beth*

      So, nothing for the recovering alcoholics, pregnant or nursing women, people with sulfite allergies or other sensitivities, people with medical issues or contraindicated medications, Muslims or or LDS or any other faith that forbids alcohol, etc. Not to mention people who just don’t like red wine (me) or who would rather not have wine with every meal (also me).

      1. Zelda*

        Or people with any darn sense– a decent rule of thumb is one glass of water for every alcoholic beverage, so you don’t get dehydrated from the diuretic effects of the alcohol. So even if you are drinking the wine, you still want other options in addition.

      4. KateM*

        Yeah, if I have to drink then red wine would be the best choice but I am not really a regular drinker. My colleague said afterwards, too, that he had drank his year’s norm in those three or four days.

  72. carbs please*

    Our vendor would take my department out for lunch every week for being loyal customers. One week we went to a fancy French restaurant that had opened by the office. There were signs on the table and all over the restaurant about their award winning bread rolls and generally praising and hyping up their amazing bread.

    Then the waiter brought out the bread baskets for our table, and we got less than 6 rolls for 12 people. One of the vendors flagged down the waiter to ask for more since everyone wanted to try this award winning bread. The waiter explained the restaurant only makes a certain amount of bread a day and they ration it so all customers can get some. The vendor said we are customers and half of us did not get bread. We eventually got more bread but is was so weird.

    2. Artemesia*

      I arranged a dinner at PF Chang for 30 students in a program I was managing. Had a decent budget and went in ahead of time to select items. They served one tray of 12 of each of the 3 appetizers I had selected and then spent the leftover money on horrible eggplant and cabbage dishes that apparently they had too much of in the kitchen. I was furious and alas didn’t figure out what was happening until too late. You order 3 appetizers for 30 people and you expect everyone gets at least one. Never been back to one of these restaurants since.

  73. Llama Llama*

    I worked in an accounting department of 20 or so people. Due to year end close we had to work New Years. They promised to provide us lunch. It turned out to be 2 x-large pizzas to serve 20 of us. To make it worse we had to work until 9PM with no dinner. I had a half slice of pizza for lunch and was sooo hangry by 9.

  74. didi*

    I was an admin briefly for a very prestigious academic fellowship program. I was in charge of overseeing the meals and snacks that the university’s catering staff brought and set up in the back of the conference room while the meeting was going on. The mid-morning break was always coffee, tea and whole fruit – apples, bananas etc. The bananas were usually really green and unripe and the apples were red delicious (which as you probably know are not delicious at all). So few people touched the fruit.

    One day instead of the usual fruit, there were pastries – muffins, danish etc. No one had told me anything about it – and in any case I wasn’t going to interfere with the union catering staff, so they laid the pastries out. The attendees were THRILLED. Either there were not enough pastries or the attendees pigged out, but in any case the pastries all disappeared.

    Turned out, the pastries were meant for another event and the catering staff had made a mistake. The next day the fruit was back and the attendees were PISSED. The catering cart showed up with the fruit for us, and the pastries on another shelf on the catering cart. The attendees tried to take pastries off the cart. The catering guy told them off. One fellowship guy in particular who was a high-ranking elected official in his state started bellowing about how important they all were and how the college food was so bad. I ran to get the director of the program because it was getting nasty.

    There ended up being a half-hour debate between the director and fellows about the sorry state of the college food. These fancy fellowship people were not having the watery scrambled eggs, dry turkey sandwiches, bland pasta salads and iceberg lettuce for one minute longer. There were budget and union issues and blah blah blah. As a 20-something broke admin, it was eye-opening to see this behavior.

    For the remainder of the fellowship, pastries were brought in for the mid-morning break and the fellows were allowed to leave campus for meals if they wanted to get something else, but they were not permitted to bring “outside food” to the meeting. A few sometimes took off for lunch, but most stayed because the crappy on-site meals at least were free.

    For the next class of fellows a few weeks later, the food went back to the crappy fruit etc and no one complained at all.

  75. Silver Robin*

    Not a conference, but COVID quarantine at grad school during the first year of COVID. When folks tested positive and/or were directly exposed, the university put those students in nearby hotels for their quarantine periods.

    We were given a survey to fill out about food preferences. Vegetarian and vegan were on there, but kosher/halal was missing. I called them about it and got a super surprised but generally supportive reaction. “We will absolutely be passing this on!” I ended up just going vegetarian and goodness…

    Breakfast was powdered eggs in some form, potatoes in some form, and pancake/waffle/similar. Lunch and dinner were on a weekly schedule, generally underflavored/barely seasoned and definitely already cold by the time it got to us (pretty sure they packed it in the cafeteria and then brought it to us). The amount of food was also so much, it felt like they were feeding a linebacker. I never finished any of the meals. It felt wasteful? But that is relatively minor, better more than enough than not enough.

  76. HailRobonia*

    I administer a summer-long series of professional training courses. Each course their is responsible for their in-class logistics such as am/pm refreshments. One time we had a participant complain on a Monday morning that the coffee was stale and cold. After looking into it, we discovered that week’s course team didn’t bother to order refreshments, and the coffee was left over from the previous week’s class. *insert vomit face emoji here*

  77. NeedRain*

    y’all attend conferences where they provide food? they don’t do that in my field that I’ve seen. Unfortunately it means that you’re trapped eating whatever’s for sale in the convention center if you don’t have a lot of time between sessions, which is like the airport in that it’s very expensive and often poor quality.

    1. datamuse*

      When I went to library conferences the trick was to figure out which vendors offered the best food options in return for listening to a pitch.

      (Alexander Street was the best, they always got legitimately interesting speakers and the product pitch was generally brief.)

      1. RetiredAcademicLibrarian*

        We lucked out at our library conferences – my subject area included one that had 3 publishers competing to fund our events. One of them sponsored a suite every year that was open all day and provided breakfast, lunch, snacks, sodas & bottled water, and computers for attendees. The other two sponsored evening parties with a lot of food and free drinks.

    2. Trippedamean*

      Conferences in my field don’t serve food either. At best, they’ll have some for sale but usually from vendors that already exist at the conference location. But I’ve taken a pretty circuitous route getting into my field and been to conferences for other fields because of that. The one conference I attended that actually served food was for a field that deals entirely with money – interpret that as you will.

  78. ZSD*

    This is my own fault for being ignorant, really, but it was at a conference and was one of the most disgusting mouthfuls of food I’ve ever had. (This was an academic conference when I was a first-year grad student.) The conference breakfast had bagels and what I thought was cream cheese with strips of cut up cherries in it. Since there wasn’t any plain cream cheese left, I took that.
    I took one bite and spat it out. I semi-politely asked the person next to me if they knew what was in this cream cheese. They explained that I had taken lox. Now, when I had read in books about people in New York eating bagels and lox, I had always used context clues and figured lox was a type of cheese. This person had to explain to me that it was salmon.
    (I hate fishy fish.)
    It suddenly dawned on me that lox was a Yiddish word that was cognate with German Lachs, i.e., salmon. I had never made this connection.

    1. Kali*

      Lox is pretty high-end for a conference and certainly not terrible food, even if you personally don’t like it. It’s also kosher and generally halal.

        1. Dahlia*

          Cut up and mixed into cream cheese, I can see it.

          Also if you’re expecting fruit and you get fish, it’s gonna be a surprise.

          1. BG*

            Yeah, I love lox and I love cherries, but if I think I’m putting cherries in my mouth, and it’s actually lox, that’s an unwelcome surprise!

    2. Clisby*

      Once, at a family wedding reception, my maybe-10-year-old nephew spotted what he *really* wanted on a buffet table, so he asked for a big slice. The server said, “Are you sure?” He said “yes.” The look of horror on his face when what he thought was cheesecake turned out to be brie was classic.

  79. ZSD*

    I may have mentioned this before, but when I was in elementary school, my dad’s company picnic served spoiled hamburgers. Every employee, and all their family members, got food poisoning.

  80. Blue Roses*

    I work for a huge organization (20,000+ employees) in a male dominated field. We have locations all over the country and hold an internal conference at the end of every year that about 5,000 employees attend. Last year, the food was really pretty good – it’s held at a resort people vacation at, so I think they have a better selection than hotels that basically only exist for conferences. Lunch was a hot buffet with probably 6-8 different hot entree and side dishes, plus a soup, salad, and dessert.

    We had a programmed “Women in [our male dominated industry]” luncheon with a panel on day 2 or 3 of the conference. While the men in the next room got a full out Chinese food buffet, we were all served a pretty small and pretty bland salad at the luncheon/panel attempting to address gender inequality.

    I convinced everyone at my table to walk to the next room to get food from the buffet line for all attendees, then return to the panel luncheon. It was truly bizarre, and our DEI director got involved.

    1. I Have RBF*

      I would have been mad enough to spit tacks. To get a gendered “diet” lunch because it was a “Women in ABC” thing would have made me see red. Yes, I’m fat, but I will go full rage on someone who presumes to assume I am on a diet that only eats small salads. (I like salad, but only certain kinds, it has to be fresh, and enough food so I won’t feel faint in an hour.)

  81. OhNoYouDidn't*

    My husband was at a conference and there were about 400 people in the room. During the mid-afternoon session, the organizers had the genius idea of handing out bags of chips and popcorn. These were individual, cellophane bags. My husband couldn’t concentrate on the speaker because all he heard was hundreds of people crinkling their bags and crunching on chips and popcorn. (On another note – Why do so many people take their first bit if chips with their mouths open???)

    2. AnonORama*

      When I took the bar exam, we couldn’t bring crunchy snacks, and we couldn’t have snacks in any bag other than a clear plastic Ziploc. (The latter was probably to prevent cheating, which I wouldn’t have thought of, but people are resourceful.)

      So of course the woman next to me — who’s already told me she’s taking the exam for the fourth time — whips out a king-size bag of Cool Ranch Doritos! Between the crinkling and the crunching, it was like a wall of noise in the otherwise deathly silent room. The Dorito smell didn’t help, either. Thankfully the proctor came over and told her to save it for the break, and she didn’t complain.

      (I passed. I didn’t get her name, and I couldn’t look up “Dorito Girl” on the pass list, so I have no idea if she did. Hopefully she isn’t still taking it 20 years later!)

  82. TJ*

    At one of our monthly meetings at a previous job we were told that a pizza lunch would be provided as a thank you for all extra work that had been piled on recently.

    As I’m diabetic I checked with one of the managers I was friendly with that this was actually lunch for everyone and not just a slice each type of thing (I’d been caught out before and would have brought my own lunch if needed). I was reassured that there would be plenty of food including sides, drinks etc. A decent budget had been provided.

    Meeting rolls around and a few pizzas turned up but not enough for everyone, barely enough for a slice each. The managers look confused and are looking at the receipt. My friend approaches the director and is seen to be having a heated discussion.

    I was filled in later. The managers had put the order together on the website then left the director to fill in his credit card details. He decimated the order, removed all the sides and drinks and half the pizzas.

    Suffice to say word got round and everyone felt even more demotivated from that “thank you”

    1. No one can tell*

      And to Paylocity’s 2019 conference in Chicago, where the only gluten-free option for breakfast was cold boiled eggs.

  84. CTA*

    I attended a coding bootcamp run by a non-profit. For our big demo day (group project presentations), they partnered with a big tech company to host it. IDK who was responsible for food, but it was gross considering the non-profit said we would be fed.

    The food provided as snacks was junk food: soda and chips. After the presentations, there were light bites. IDK if they didn’t order enough for everyone. Me and other students were held back to take group photos, so the guests got to the light bites first and then students could get food after their group took a photo. By the time I got to the food, there was only bell pepper slices and ranch dressing left. I had been at this presentation for 6 hours (from 3pm until 9 pm) because I was required to arrive early for rehearsals.

    I’m sure will say it’s my responsibility to feed myself, but I didn’t like how the non-profit liked to control us with food. They would promise food would be provided for events, but really give you a snack. IT was messed up because the non-profit was serving a low-income community that has to choose between food and paying for public transit.

  85. Texan In Exile*

    Several of us got food poisoning at a multiple-day work event. I reported it to the city health department, but nobody else who got sick would report it, saying they thought they just had a 24 hour flu. Even though our symptoms appeared about six hours after we had all eaten the same thing. And our symptoms were identical.

  86. Nicki Name*

    For a few years in a row, I went to a big industry conference that was held at the local convention center. One year, the lunch each day was themed a street in our city. I’m sure this started with the best of intentions about celebrating the city’s diversity, but…

    One day the street was one named for a well-known Latino and the food was generic Mexican food. The guy in question was a prominent activist for farmworkers’ rights, so maybe they could have celebrated him by assuring us that the food was ethically sourced, but nope, someone had just gotten as far as “Spanish-sounding name goes with tacos!”

    Another day the street name was one that runs through a traditionally Black neighborhood in town. The main entree was… fried chicken. I kid you not.

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      A significant percentage of competent event organising is squelching other people’s terrible ideas. Apparently, this event team either didn’t have a competent squelcher on staff – or someone realised it would be a terrible idea, but didn’t or couldn’t speak up. 0/10 and also WTF?

  87. Siege*

    The food at the convention I planned in May wasn’t bad, exactly, but it was angering. We had a social event at a school with a culinary program and specifically set the menu to include a full vegan option (a staffer is vegan so it’s always top of mind for us, plus academia can be more aware of dietary issues overall). I think we got caught in a leadership change more than anything, given the multiple failures of the venue (too few tables with too many places, the bartender we paid for wasn’t available, a rental tour during a business meeting in the venue, others) where the previous event person had detailed things but the new person didn’t have the record and missed my communication I’d those details.

    But I have no explanation for why the chef decided an explicitly vegan entree should be covered in melted cheese. I don’t think that’s a leadership failure so much as a “do not let this person graduate until they understand this” issue. It was frustrating and there wasn’t anything to do by the time the issue was discovered.

    The fun part is I’m locked into reusing the venue next month for another event and you can bet I’ll be keeping in VERY close communication with their team. I will stand in the kitchen and watch them cook if I have to.

    1. Observer*

      Oh wow!

      But I do think that the food fiasco was partly a leadership issue. Because *someone* made the decision to allow a culinary student make decisions about the menu and specific dishes without any apparent oversight.

      I hope they gave a credit for some of what you paid them. Just sooo many bad decisions here.

      In a way the tour is the strangest piece of this. I certainly would not expect to need to communicate an expectation that they are not going to be parading potential renters through our meeting space while an actual meeting is going on!

  88. Over It*

    I attended a conference in April that was from 8am-6:30pm for four days. They took the coffee and tea carts away by 9:30am each day. No breakfast or snacks were provided. Lunch was a very small sandwich with meat, one bag of chips and one brownie or cookie, and they had people enforcing you didn’t take more than one of each. If you were veg as I am or gluten free, your option was a tiny salad with no protein. I’m a very small adult who probably eats less than most people, and I was STARVING. Oh and did I mention this conference cost over $1,000 to attend?? And since there were 1500 hangry attendees, every cafe within a 0.5 mile radius was absolutely swamped. The food itself tasted decent enough, but there was a serious lack of it. I ate way too much candy from the conference vendors that week.

    1. Over It*

      I’ve also had to attend a few multi-day policy academies hosted by the federal government recently, and they also do not feed us at all or give us any coffee. If you travel more than 50 miles to attend they do provide a hotel room and food per diem. The first academy I attended, I traveled less than 50 miles, but the location was still an hour longer than my normal commute each way. Doable for two days, but I was certainly super salty about waking up extra early, extra commute costs, needing an extra cup of coffee of purchased coffee to make it through the day and buying lunch at a restaurant two days in a row when I usually bring mine, all without any additional compensation. Or even free coffee!

  89. Sally Rhubarb*

    On my last day at a previous job, the office manager was kind enough to have a catered lunch as a going away party.

    Except…she ordered Chika filet.

    I’m A) vegan & B) openly opposed to companies that are anti-queer. (So much so that I can’t be bothered to google the spelling of the fast food place)

  90. Corrigan*

    I was at an academic conference in a nice, very expensive hotel and they had a mixer for the student members (mostly graduate students) The food there was… just pizza and not even particularly good pizza. There weren’t many events at the conference that provided food, but the others had good food. But for the students? Cardboard pizza.

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      Ahahaha, apparently the caterers who wanted to serve pizza at my conference have been giving people ideas!

  91. Emily H.*

    I was not the only vegetarian at a small midwestern college, but I think I was the only vegetarian who wasn’t resigned to never getting to eat anything at work.

    Mandatory all-day meeting one year: there was supposedly a vegetarian option for the soup, but nothing was labeled, so I got a side salad and a roll.

    Mandatory all-day meeting the next year: in the planning meeting, there was a fight about whether there would be a vegetarian option, and something had to be arranged at the very last minute. I ate the broccoli soup, but I’m still not entirely sure it didn’t have chicken broth in it.

    Christmas party that year: sausages, meat chili, meatballs, artichoke dip, sugar cookies.

    Mandatory all-day meeting the next year: everyone seemed to be so serious and so kind about the fact that food needs to be labeled and vegetarian options needed to be available! We had a taco bar. The taco bar had refried beans, unlabeled. Nobody could tell me whether or not the beans had been cooked in lard. Fortunately, tacos with lettuce and cheese and tomatoes and guac is a reasonable lunch option…

    But also, thank goodness I don’t work there anymore.

    1. Mayor of Llamatown*

      I was on the planning committee for a holiday party at my small Midwestern company one year, and a couple coworkers had quietly asked me if I could see that there was a vegetarian entree on the buffet. No problem, I thought. Seems reasonable. But once I discussed with the planning committee, you would think I’d asked for something deeply offensive! Apparently it’s too much to include a small tray of pasta primavera in addition to the huge slab of prime rib and the crab legs.

  92. Heart&Vine*

    We have a story that floats around our company called “The Sweet Potato Incident”. One of our directors was a really nice lady but had no taste when it came to choosing menus. She decided she was going to choose the menu for our annual Employee Appreciation Dinner instead of our Head of Catering and it was… baffling to say the least. Every course had sweet potatoes in it. The first course was a sweet potato soup or a salad featuring sweet potatoes. The main course was a sweet potato pasta. The dessert was sweet potato pie! Maybe our Head of Catering was miffed at not being consulted and that’s why she allowed this laughable menu to go through, but everyone strongly encouraged the director to defer to ANYONE else for future menu planning.

      1. AngryOctopus*

        I hate sweet potatoes (I find them overwhelmingly sweet). I’m OK with the pie because it’s supposed to be sweet, but putting sweet potatoes in everything else??? That’s a lot.

  93. ICodeForFood*

    I’d completely forgotten about this… In the 1990s, I worked for an insurance company which was being acquired by another insurance company. There was a meeting at a hotel, where I was the only person from my company, and there were about 20 folks from the acquiring company. Lunch was served, and it was one of those huge hoagies (submarine sandwiches) that’s like 10 feet long. I’m sure there were cans of soda, and perhaps chips too. But the only option for attendees was a section of this sandwich with salami, bologna, cheese, whatever.

    1. ICodeForFood*

      Hit enter too soon…
      I keep kosher to an extent, so it wasn’t an option for me. The meeting was already a hostile situation, where I’d been given the wrong meeting room, so I’d arrived late in the correct meeting room where all the attendees from the acquiring company were already seated.
      So I walked out on the giant hoagie lunch, bought lunch in one of the hotel’s multiple restaurants, and then expensed it. Best thing was that my boss congratulated me for doing so when I got back.

      1. ChatGPT*

        Was the acquiring company based in the Windy City? Just a weird hunch based on personal experience.

  94. there are chickens in the trees*

    This spring, my coworker K and I went to an all day industry conference sponsored by one of the leading companies in our field, held at a fancy hotel. Attendance was free and we were told breakfast, lunch and snacks would be provided. When we arrived, we found there was no sign in sheet, but there was the usual swag one finds at such events: branded water bottles, tote bags, faux-leather bound notebooks etc. Breakfast indeed was great, cheeses, pastries, salads, fruit plates, coffee, laid out in a number of rooms adjacent to the main conference room. When lunchtime came, we all dutifully trooped to the appointed dining room on the ground floor next to the pool, which held a number of tables, each with 8-10 place settings, and a large buffet at the far end of the room. Unfortunately, there was a shortage of the tables (they needed at least another 10) and the buffet quickly ran out of the mains (just lots of empty chafing dishes). We mentioned to the hotel employees standing around about the need for more tables and they just shrugged. Even though we’d had to register for the conference in advance, they clearly had no idea how many people were actually attending. K and I managed to fill up our plates with assorted sides, and snag forks and knives from a small hutch in a corner of the room. There was nowhere to sit, so we went outside to the pool area and perched on the edges of the lounge chairs with our plates, surrounded by dripping swimmers who eyed us askance.

  95. KB*

    Regional professional conference famous for its good receptions at interesting venues with regional specialties. It was the conference’s 50th anniversary so me, my colleagues, and the other 300+ attendees were excited to see the goodies in store. We enter the hotel ballroom and find a room full of deserts and drinks. Ok, we think, surely we collect our drinks in here, be seated for dinner, and then help ourselves to the dessert buffet. We walk into the dining area to find… half a dozen tables set for 8 and four or five high tops with no chairs. Again, a reception for 300+ people. Servers walked around with savory finger foods that included devisive ingredients like shellfish and pork. I don’t remember there being a vegetarian option or any side dishes. At one point the servers just disappeared. So after having two glasses of wine, three bacon-wrapped asparagus spears, and two pieces of cake, my colleagues and I trooped off to a nearby restaurant for second dinner.

  96. PoohSmile*

    This isn’t quite about work event food, but is about food bought for my team. After a very busy and stressful work period, as a surprise management decided to treat us for lunch as appreciation for our work. Pizza was delivered for our small team, it smelled wonderful, and I was excited to join in. Management knows I need to eat gluten free, and even though many places offer gluten free pizza, there was no GF option for me. Worse yet, me not being able to eat with everyone was ignored. I would have happily bought my own pizza if they were considerate enough to let me know ahead of time.

  97. Bookworm*

    Not *quite* in the event/conference/meeting-specific but an old job used to order one of those subscription snack boxes. Sometimes they were really fun ways to be introduced to new things and ranged from stuff like dried fruit with some sort of seasoning to bad protein bars to veggie chips, etc. It was always hilarious to see that one snack that occasionally were not hits and we’d have like 10 leftover.

    One box gave us two sets of bad healthy-type bars (same flavor) and our then-admin assistant resorted to leaving them out in the shared kitchen-space of the co-working space we were using. It worked as they were snatched up, so YMMV.

  98. HearTwoFour*

    I am extremely allergic to Swiss cheeese (EpiPen allergic). Fortunately, this is a food item that is easy to avoid, so it’s one that rarely comes up. I teach at a local college and attended a day of safety training. The lunch provided was boxed sandwiches, all divided up by the types of meat (and n0 meat). Every type of sandwich had Swiss cheese! Turkey and Swiss; Roast Beef and Swiss; Chicken and Swiss; Veggie and Swiss.
    I had to explain my Swiss cheese allergy more in that one day than in my 50 years put together, as I was the only one not eating a sandwich.
    Three hundred people attended that event. Never mind a rare allergy, who would think all 300 people wouldn’t want at least one other cheese option, or no cheese??

    1. datamuse*

      I’m not allergic but I *hate* Swiss cheese. At least I’d have been able to just take the cheese off since in my case it’s not an allergy, I just don’t like it.

      Maybe they got a bulk discount.

    2. Emmy Noether*

      Wait, is “swiss cheese” a specific type of cheese in American parlance? Emmental perhaps?

  99. ThursdaysGeek*

    The food itself wasn’t bad, but what my company provided was. I went to a conference in Banff, at a hotel out of town (so there were no other food options). This was decades ago, and I was provided $5 for breakfast (included in hotel, so can’t have that after all), $7 for lunch, and $15 for dinner. I could leave the hotel for dinner, but the only thing on the lunch menu under $7 was a cup of soup. The company didn’t allow me to move money around, spend more for lunch and less for dinner.

    Management were allowed a larger dollar amount for each meal, which helped me understand the original meaning of the phrase ‘high muckety-muck’ (hayo muckamuck): ‘plenty to eat’.

      1. ThursdaysGeek*

        It was early 90s, so no. It was $5/7/15 US vs Canadian, but, even with a good exchange rate, it was too little. The hotel/conference breakfast provided was sweet rolls and coffee, but since it was provided, I wasn’t allowed to use the breakfast $5 at all.

    2. ICodeForFood*

      This was in the late 1980s… Professional training class in NYC, and the lunch amount that my company allowed was something like $8 or $10… which, even then, was lower than the cheapest lunch available.
      I put in an expense report for whatever lunch had actually cost me, and got a phonecall from accounting berating me for wasting company money…

      1. ThursdaysGeek*

        Mine was for a city government, and I was warned ahead of time of what I could spend. Although, it never entered my mind to buy something with my own money, so I wouldn’t be hungry.

  100. I Wish My Job Was Tables*

    My first job out of college was with a small company that wouldn’t spend money on food at parties, but would spend hundreds on booze for events. Program launched? Conference table covered in beer and wine, but no food provided. Office birthday? Pull out tons of bottles of sparkling wine but not provide a cake. Holiday party? The owners rented out a bar that didn’t serve food and didn’t hire catering. There was even one really bizarre day where the owners took the department I was in out to get lunch at a fancy sit down restaurant. When we got there, the owners informed people that they would have to pay for their own food, but the company had an open tab and would cover all drinks. I had some of the best cocktails of my life there but I’m still baffled that I had to pay for my meal.

    The higher ups didn’t object to people bringing their own food or going out to get food, they just wouldn’t pay for it. You were allowed to take booze home with you from events though. I once had a house party where all the drinks came from company party leftovers. It was really great quality stuff too.

    1. Warrior Princess Xena*

      This is so weird that I can only imagine there was some sort of tax/regulatory shenanigan involved somewhere

  101. Cookies For Breakfast*

    An old job had a quarterly off-site all-company meeting that was mandatory to attend and was usually at a venue that took 90% of us at least an hour to reach (it was near the organiser’s home, so it kept getting chosen). There was never any food, and people had to go look for lunch in an area they were not familiar with, paying out of their own pocket.

    One time, probably tired of hearing the same things in every event feedback form, they hired the basement of a central chain restaurant + event space, and said breakfast and lunch would be catered. Sighs of relief ensued.

    Now, I’m not a fan of that chain, but lots of people like it. So, fair enough. I pre-ordered the simplest dish and appreciated the effort (it was so undercooked it’s a miracle it ever saw an oven, and I wasn’t the only one to notice). What the place isn’t known for is serving breakfast, and readers, I don’t let anyone mess with my breakfast. As no one told us what it would be, I took matters in my own hands.

    I planned my commute so I could get a coffee and pastry on the way, and still get there before the event start at 9am. I’m never the last to arrive to anything, but I walked in to find a packed room, and most colleagues already seated. Everyone turned their heads as I carried my spoils to my assigned table, because the plates of my starving, early-bird co-workers had nothing but a bunch of sad, plasticky pieces of fruit. “Turned their heads” is no exaggeration, and I even heard a few cries of “OMG where did you get THAT!”.

    The next quarterly event happened at a co-working space near a major train station, with a buffet sandwich lunch. We even got mini desserts. But by that time, everyone’s trust in the organiser was so broken, a lot of the pre-event chatter was about where people were planning to go out for lunch.

  102. cactus lady*

    I once attended a huge conference that lasted all day. They had one food truck for about 15,000 people (which aa im sure you can imagine, ran out of food within the first hour) and there were no walkable alternative food options.

  103. Kat*

    I’m coeliac. I used to travel a fair bit for work as well as attend big industry conferences. Best cast scenario for all day meetings or conferences is that I’d get edible meals with protein, but nothing to eat during the breaks when everyone else was offered dainty cakes cakes etc. Worst case…
    – fruit salad for starter at big fancy dinner. Main meal was ok…then I was served an identical fruit salad for dessert. Meanwhile everyone else had a lovingly prepared selection of mini desserts appropriate to the country we were in
    – same conference, different year: everyone was given lunch bags containing sandwiches, and drink, fruit, a chocolate bar. I was given a very onion heavy salad with no protein or dressings. Scavenged some fruit from colleagues, turns out the chocolate bar contained gluten so I couldn’t have that. Asked about it and apparently they only had gluten containing chocolate
    – work all day meeting venue: caterers had got the memo about including a source of protein in ALL meals. Unfortunately they took this to mean chickpeas (garbanzo beans in the US). So many chickpeas. A chickpea salad which honestly had an entire can of them and not much else. A dinner that was 70% chickpea. Served up on repeat, day after day, trip after trip. I’ve not been able to eat them since I stopped working there.
    – pandemic, work sent out treats to everyone ahead of the zoom holiday party. Asked for dietary preferences. Apparently the supplier couldn’t do coeliac safe so they just didn’t give me anything
    – 5* hotel I got back to at midnight on a day which had involved getting up at 4.30am, red eye flight, entire day of meetings (with the chickpeas), mandatory socialising. Exhausted and hungry, I phoned room service. Normally hotels are perfectly happy to cobble together various coeliac safe options from different meals to give me one meal. This one apparently had never heard of such a thing and after a lot of negotiating about what they could actually provide that was gluten free charged me £22 for a single burger patty with one slice of tomato on top. Absolutely nothing else.

    Needless to say, for work travel my suitcase was always 50% food. At one point I got so fed up that this was always an issue I became a thorn in the side of conference organisers by asking why there was no food for me every time it wasn’t provided (to be fair, most were lovely and horrified when they saw what I’d been given and made an effort to sort it out. Only for the same thing to happen the next year when the conference moved to a new venue). I no longer travel for work. I don’t miss it.

  104. Katefish*

    At a conference in TX, the caterer threw some surprise pistachios in macaroni and cheese (usually a nut free dish!) without any allergy labels. I’d wanted some downtime that evening, but not throwing up. Label common allergens, catering folks!

    1. Artemesia*

      Lucky they didn’t kill you; I have a friend with a lethal allergy to pistachios and who asks if the mac and cheese contains pistachios.

    3. Annie*

      Heck, make a full ingredient list available for each dish like they do at the grocery store! Practically everything is an allergen or otherwise a dietary no-no for some number of people.

      1. I Have RBF*

        This.

        I do this when I make potluck dishes, and include the spices, because I’m allergic to a really common but never mentioned spice: celery seed. It’s not immediate, but if I eat celery seed at 7 pm, I will wake up at 3 am coughing like a three pack a day smoker.

  105. A Duck on my Face*

    Vegetarian here – at a recent conference, the meat option for lunch was sandwiches with a bag of chips, and the vegetarian option was… a bag of chips.

    That same conference said “breakfast provided”. When we arrived on the first day, we learned “breakfast” was actually one fruit tray intended to feed 50-60 people.

    My stomach was audibly growling by the afternoon and I wasn’t even embarrassed about it.

  106. Warrant Officer Georgiana Breakspear-Goldfinch*

    I’m still bitter about the week-long academic conference I went to, during the summer so most of the campus food options were closed (and the campus was big enough that going off-campus to get food would take up most of your breaks, even if you were one of the few people to have a car), that didn’t even provide tea and coffee. Look, we are in academia, we know we could be making a lot more money in private industry, we have accepted that everything runs on a shoestring budget. But please let us have coffee.

  107. Nea*

    I could go on at length about the many, many inadequacies of the worst run convention I’ve ever been sorry I attended, but since we’re keeping it to food…

    The entry price was ridiculously high, but the concom insisted that it included breakfast, so you’d get your money’s worth.

    Day 1 breakfast: eggs, toast, coffee.

    Day 2 breakfast: pork sausage and coffee. That was it. The one thing that vegetarians, Jewish people, anyone on a medical low-salt diet cannot touch. And the concom didn’t understand why I went and yelled at them! Pork and eggs are both protein, right? So what’s the problem?

  108. NotRealAnonForThis*

    At OldJob, it was understood that if there was a deadline at 1 p.m., it was a working lunch with food provided. This is not at all odd in my industry, for the record, either the 1 p.m. deadlines or the working lunches with food provided on deadline days.

    Typically, an administrative assistant we loved handled this. She was able to accommodate basically….anything. Dietary issues? Allergies? Religious preferences? Flat out can’t stand garlic? She had it covered. She’d do a fast head count, note people who she knew had food restrictions, put out a call for last minute food restrictions early and add to the list as needed. Everyone was always satisfied.

    And then one day NewManagerialType decided HE was going to handle it, didn’t announce that it was going to be a mandatory working lunch (note: no deadline, not announced ahead of time, spur of the moment thing. This is important), and didn’t both to get enough food OR handle any dietary restrictions. He then had the full priced audacity to speak with several managers about their reports leaving the “mandatory working lunch” because there was nothing to eat for them. My manager gave him the cocked eyebrow “so…why was it a working lunch? When did you announce this? Why didn’t you let Esmerelda handle the food situation? Of course they left, you can’t starve people! I am NOT addressing your failures with my report here…but I might suggest that they take your coming to me to HR as potential retaliation over documented medical issues…”

    Basically my manager had zero effs to give over NewManager’s butthurt. It was fun to overhear!

  109. Luna123*

    The food was pretty normal … but every single meal came with packets of mustard. Normal for a burger, very weird when the next meal was tacos. There was even a side of mustard at breakfast!

    1. irianamistifi*

      I have a terrible habit of hoarding mustard packets. This would have delighted me and and done my spouse in. He’ll often unpack my bags or clothes and find mustard packets in all the pockets.

      I don’t even eat that much mustard! But I can’t help myself. I see a mustard packet and I must keep it for later. Just in case.

  110. Raisin Walking to the Moon*

    To celebrate the opening of a new branch of our ESL school we had a giant evening party in the school space. We invited existing staff and (adult) students- easily 400 people were in attendance. Since it was springtime, catering came up with 4 spring-themed cocktails and made enough for everyone to have at least one of each. We all danced, got nicely soused, looked around for food, and found… nothing. No catered food, no snacks, nothing edible had been ordered. A few people had the sense to order delivery, but it was too late. By the time it arrived, people were hammered. Asleep on couches, watching inappropriate movies in the classrooms, and generally being rowdy. Then 2 days later we all had to put on professional attire and talk about business English with people we had only just seen twerking in the same physical space.

  111. fish*

    Not about the food, but hope that’s okay.

    I went to a conference where all the “diversity” breakouts were lunches scheduled at the exact same time. So that Women of Color lunch was at the same time as the LGBTQ lunch, etc.

    Apparently the organizers didn’t realize that you can be both!

    1. kendall^2*

      I had to go to an all-day diversity workshop where breakfast and lunch were provided…. but not for kosher me. Way to go, DEI folks! /s

  112. Librarian Jessie*

    A colleague attended a conference with me and had specified in her registration that she is vegetarian and allergic to bell peppers. Sure enough, her vegetarian option arrived and it was a stuffed bell pepper. She mentioned this to the server, who then brought her a gluten-free stuffed bell pepper. Still a no-go. Eventually she wound up with some pasta, but all this was going on WHILE the keynote speaker was talking. Yikes.

  113. Kate*

    I used to be part of a “young members” cohort of a national org that conferenced yearly in the Midwest. One year the planning committee decided that our pizza meet-n-greet at the conference would be vegetarian only, since many members were vegetarian and pretty much all were concerned with the environment. We announced this proudly during our welcome speeches. Cue the conference center staff rolling out delicious-smelling . . . sausage pizza. Oh, the Midwest about 15 years ago. I think there were maybe two cheese-only pizzas. Also, the members of this group were so sweet and trusting more than one of them commented on the surprisingly delicious “vegetarian sausage.”

  114. Well...*

    My favorite version of this was a veg option that was just a pile of hummus and bread crumbs. Like they took time to crumble up the bread, when normal bread would have been easier (but still nothing that constitutes dinner lol).

    Us meat eaters were sharing our sides with the vegetarians as much as possible, mostly giving them our bread.

  115. DrSalty*

    Once we got a cake for an all staff meeting that was Halloween themed. Whatever dye they used to make the icing orange and black turned everyone’s pee fluorescent yellow lol

    1. irianamistifi*

      Please. I need to know who broke the seal on that revelation. Like, who was the first to be like, “hey, um. My urine was a weird color today. Anyone else?”

  116. La Triviata*

    At a previous job, the annual convention was held at a city convention center. The food was so bad – and the organization did not schedule meal breaks for staff – that people would sneak off for a meal if they could. When they couldn’t, people were relying on an exhibitor’s moon pies to not starve during the day and get a late dinner wherever they could.

  117. Syzygy*

    My brother’s mother-in-law was a vegetarian in a rural community who once accompanied her husband to his company’s annual dinner. The dinner organizers were very proud of themselves for coming up with something they assured her was much better than the plates of plain vegetables she’d been served in the past. Her husband got steak. She got a slice of watermelon cut into the shape of a steak.

  118. Nofoodatthisconference*

    I once worked for a Niche Professional Organization (it was also a non-profit). We held a conference every year. Tons of students, professors and professionals attended. But we never fed them once. Crappy tea and coffee was provided once for an hour. People really complained, but there wasn’t much we could do since our budget was so low.

  119. Marketing Ninja Unicorn*

    At a previous job, I was in charge of food for an all-staff event. We had a director who was the pet of the CEO and she was on a vegan/kosher/Keto diet (her words, not mine). I went through a bazillion catering options, ran everything by her, got my boss (the CFO) to sign off on it, because her meal was easily 5X the expense of everyone else’s.

    Day-of, she decides she’s going to have a ‘cheat day’ and (try to) eat the food I’d ordered for everyone else (chicken wings, buffalo chicken dip, grilled veggies, pizza, etc. It was quite a spread.)

    I legit thought the CFO was going to lose her damn mind. CFO marched over to the director, who was standing in line for the ‘regular’ food said, ‘Oh no! Your SPECIAL food that you SPECIFICALLY requested and approved, that we ordered JUST FOR YOU is over HERE’ and physically drags the woman out of line, to the side table with her food, and stands over her as she dutifully picks up the vegan/kosher/Keto food and goes to her seat.

    CFO watched her like a hawk and wouldn’t let her get any ‘regular’ food until she had eaten all of her ‘special’ food. CFO also refused to ever again approve a ‘special’ meal for that director, knowing that it was all fad-based (not religious or cultural or dietary or actual lifestyle) and when the director cried to the CEO, the CFO and the entire finance and marketing departments (both answered to her) threatened to resign if he didn’t stop coddling her.

    That was the most interesting professional development day I’ve ever been to in my life.

  120. AnonAcademicLibrarian*

    I was in a conference planning meeting and the theme of the conference was climate change related. So, one person tried to advocate that we should have an all vegan menu for the entire conference. Every reception, the big awards dinner, etc. They went on at great length about how much more environmentally sound vegan eating was and spoke at great length about all the things you can do with nuts and soy. Spent a lot of time emphasizing both nuts and soy, though vegan food is more diverse then that. Thank goodness one of the older committee members with some real political clout shut that down with, “We need to accommodate those who might be unable to eat soy or nuts. Those are major allergens.” There was dead silence after that and at the break, multiple people approached her and thanked her. We went with an organic catering company and there was a very good vegan option. As someone with a pretty bad reaction to most beans and nuts, I am super happy we did not go fully vegan, because I don’t know what would have been safe for me to eat for four days.

  121. Editor Emeritus*

    My company had conferences every year for top clients, one on each coast. There was a buffet with a lot of variety, but all anyone talked about at the West Coast conference that year were the hot dogs.

    At an awards dinner for another company, the caterer provided the same meal for vegetarian and gluten-free: roasted peppers with melted cheese on top. I ate a lot of bread that night, and I hope the people eating gf managed to score some chicken or something.

  122. Thirty Helens Agree*

    There’s a higher ed design conference I dearly love to attend, and did in-person for several years, but their caterers would “theme” the conferences to the point that, like, every meal involved the same themed sauces on everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. I am allergic to mayonnaise, and have terrible IBS on top of gastroparesis, yet there were years that every single food item except for, like, plain bunches of grapes, were slathered in things like Hot Buffalo Mayo sauce. I have missed countless in-person breakout sessions over the years because I was camped out in the conference hotel bathrooms while hot lava kept escaping my body for hours on end.

    Worse yet, we’d travel up there as a group in one person’s car, so I learned after the very first year to offer to be the driver (luckily my vehicle was large because I had kids in sports, etc.), in case I needed to sneak out of our across-town, cheaper hotel at night to purchase things that have included Immodium, diaper rash cream (for myself), and extra underpants.

    While I miss a lot of the in-person networking, one silver lining of COVID-19 is that they finally created an online version of the conference that is so much cheaper my state university will never again entertain the idea of actually sending us all in-person to this conference despite the added benefits. So at least now I don’t have to figure out how to carry around shelf-stable protein sources for myself all day between sessions nor deal with the exquisite pain and embarrassment of being the lava-pooper hiding in the big stall between every activity.

    1. Nea*

      I have eaten So. Many. peanut butter and banana sandwiches in situations where I have to have shelf-stable grow-your-own meals.

  123. Maleficent2026*

    Am I the only one who despises having to eat food served at these types of events? I have unusual food intolerances, so I find it much easier to bring my own food. Plus, I’ve seen way too many people who have apparently forgotten basic hygiene manners after the pandemic.

  124. IAAL*

    My office is generally pretty okay about providing vegetarian options on days when there are lunches, but once even the salad had meat in it. (As did the mac and cheese.) And then there are the sandwich platters where you can’t easily tell if the sandwich you’re picking up has meat in it, or is chicken salad vs tuna (for folks who eat fish but not meat).

  125. Casey*

    So I’m not sure if this falls into the category of ‘terrible food’, but here goes:
    I once worked for a company that would routinely order in lunch, and everyone would go eat in the conference room. The only issue? I keep kosher and the food was never kosher. So…they just wouldn’t invite me. I would be sitting and working and suddenly I’d notice everyone getting up and going to the conference room (which I could see from my desk!) and they’d sit there eating while I worked. It was a small company and I was very young, and I didn’t realize at the time just how bizarre it was.

    2. AnotherLibrarian*

      I don’t keep kosher and I am deeply offended on your behalf. Sure, I’ve occasionally had to eat matzo while everyone else was eating pizza (because a pizza party happened over Passover), but to not even be invited is just really unkind.

      1. Casey*

        In retrospect, I agree. I would have been happy to eat my bagged lunch from home at the conference table and at least been there for the social aspect.
        At the time I was young and new to the workforce and I just assumed it was a normal consequence of keeping kosher in the working world.

  126. anonyjew*

    I went to a conference years ago with a bunch of coworkers. A manager I didn’t know well was in charge of registering everyone and happened to know I was Jewish, so she requested me a kosher meal without running that by me. Problem is I have never kept kosher and happen to be a vegetarian, and it was a meat meal. Someone swapped with me so I was able to eat, but I was also the ONLY person out of 200+ attendees that got a kosher meal. Some poor organizer probably spent a lot of time and money procuring a special meal I couldn’t even eat, and I felt so awkward about it. Lesson learned, let people enter their own food preferences!

  127. yet another librarian AAM fan*

    From the other side: I worked in catering during college, and every spring there was a large orientation event for one of the scholarship groups. It was held on a Friday (every year), but people signed up for sometime earlier in the year. Long before all the Catholics realized that it would be a Friday in Lent. It was a plated meal, and we always had people requesting vegetarian/non meat meals at the last minute. It was always a big mess. For some reason, neither the organizers or the kitchen staff would ask for/make extra vegetarian meals even though it happened every year. They just recycled the food to the cafeteria so it never made much sense to me.

  128. OyHiOh*

    Just once have I had a meal at an event that made the meat eaters jealous – a glorious baked acorn squash with a rice and veggie stuffing. I was the only vegetarian at my table and everyone else was oggling my food.

    Otherwise, it’s been a steady stream of making do on bread and salad.

    The fancy gala I was at last spring particularly comes to mind. The main entree was some ridiculous concoction of chicken, shrimp, and lobster. The vegetarian plate was stewed plantains and what was supposed to be rice and beans but looked more like cat vomit. I have nothing against plantains! One of my aunt’s is Cuban American and makes fabulous dishes with them. This was not a plate constructed by someone who knew how to cook Cuban food, however. The person I attended with bought me a real meal after we left.

  129. Jijimora*

    This was ~15 years ago, so I think/hope things are at least slightly better now, but I was attending a conference where they had tacos for lunch one day. The vegetarian option was just cold, unpressed, unseasoned tofu. I skipped lunch that day and went out to find something more palatable.

  130. Foila*

    This is why I hate ordering food for events. One wrong move and you’re one of these stories. (I’m not an event planner, that’s my nightmare, but I have a few jobs that include picking food for a group and I dread all of them).

      1. Observer*

        That’s deeply unfair. The issue is not that someone made a little mistake.

        If you look at these stories, it’s not just that someone made a mis-step. What’s more, mostly the “terrible” tagging comes not from the mistake, but the refusal to recognize the problem.

    2. Another academic librarian*

      on the other hand, I have organized food at conference events as well as workshops. as part of registration, name the meals, give choice- vegan, vegetarian, gluten free, I’ll eat anything. Kosher by request. Make sure there is a balance of protein and veg for everyone. Have mix and match choices for sides. Skip the cilantro or anything with nuts.

  131. AnotherLibrarian*

    Mine is pretty tame: I went to an evening reception once and I guess they massively underestimated the attendance, because there was like one plate of sliced veggies and hummus and nothing else. For a group of like 500 people. It was in Vegas and not at the conference hotel, so we all had to wait until it was over and then go look for food. Thank goodness you can get dinner in Vegas at 11pm without it being an issue. We were so hungry. I still don’t know if the pasta I had was that good or if it was just that I was that hungry after a two hour reception with no food.

  132. pally*

    A co-worker’s experience attending a lunch meeting with a speaker and buffet lunch:

    The buffet turned out to be a make-it-yourself-burrito bar tucked away in a dark corner of the room. The table was laid with all kinds of fixings to create a nice burrito- plus lots more items. The layout of the table was a bit odd, however. Intermixed with the burrito fixings were a variety of sliced fruits, prepared salads and an array of desserts including a peach cobbler, cake slices, cookies, and a bread pudding. Shouldn’t all the burrito fixings be together? Well, not to worry; folks would be well-fed for this event.

    There wasn’t much time before the event started, so my friend grabs a couple of plates intending to load up before the event begins.

    First plate goes the tortilla, a big dollop of refried beans, rice, cheese, sour cream and lots of salsa. Second plate goes the many desserts. He grabs a drink and finds a seat.

    As he’s settling in, the meeting begins.

    He takes a big bite from the burrito. Only it wasn’t refried beans he’d spread on the tortilla. It was chocolate mousse. A lot of chocolate mousse. Apparently, it’s hard to tell the difference in poor light. No way to get up and make another while the speaker talked; so, he stuck with his dessert plate.

  133. kiki*

    Not a conference, but a big work meeting. Think 20-30 people. The lunch was Lunchables. Not an adult re-imagination of a Lunchable or something, but an actual Lunchable. And it was singular– they only had enough for each person to have one. They’re meant for kids! It wasn’t enough food.

    But the people with dietary restrictions actually ate comparatively well, which seems rare for work food stories. Our company kept a list of folks with dietary restrictions and then kept their preferred order on file from a couple restaurants in the area that handled dietary restrictions and allergies really well. So anyone with a dietary restriction got a real, full meal from an actual restaurant. The rest of us got a single Lunchable (and not the bigger ones that come with Capri Sun and a candy bar).

    1. Dragon_Dreamer*

      I always ate a couple of those, every time I was given one. And that was in the 90’s when they were new, and had more food! Chronically *underweight* as a kid, before anyone assumes otherwise.

  134. Cyborg Llama Horde*

    Last year my wife’s work summer party was held at a new place. Historically the party has had AMAZING food — think fancy cheese plates with prosciutto and three kinds of dry sausage and multiple types of perfectly-ripe fruit, oysters, fancy hors d’oeuvres the staff carry around on plates… and that isn’t even getting to the steak and lamb and chicken and delicious vegetables and two kinds of pasta for the main meal, or the ten kinds of cakes/pastries/etc. for desert.

    So that’s the standard I’m accustomed to for this party. (The food is the main reason I go, let’s be honest. The chitchat with her coworkers is nice and all, but it’s about the food.)

    We get there, and the appetizers are… a veggie tray and hot pretzels like you can buy at a gas station. The pretzels contained milk, which I can’t eat. The veggie tray wasn’t awful (good selection, multiple colors of carrots) but had clearly been made hours in advance and been left to dry out ever since. All the drinks were bottled, and not even good bottled drinks, at least, the non-alcoholic ones were things like the sort of lemonade that tastes like it’s been reconstituted from powder.

    And then comes actual dinner. There was a steak-in-brown-sauce option (contained cream), a salmon option (contained cream), some sort of pasta (contained dairy), “grilled” veggies that were 90% summer squash and did not look like they had encountered any sort of grill I’ve ever met (for one, they were sliced fairly small and would’ve fallen through the cracks… I would’ve described them as “sauted” but that suggests a passing acquaintance with sophistication that I don’t think is warranted), chicken breast, which appeared to have been boiled or steamed in water and nothing else. There might’ve been one of those sad lettuce-cruton-parmesan salads. There was some kind of cake.

    I had edible cooked zucchini and boring chicken for supper. I later realized that there was also a separate kids buffet line with mixed melon (mediocre). It wasn’t the worst food I’d ever had, and there was enough of it, but coming on the tail of parties that contended for “best food I’ve had all year,” is was a serious letdown.

    1. Cyborg Llama Horde*

      And this was a party for which we’d RSVPed in advance, including dietary restrictions.

  135. Owlbuddy*

    We had a meeting at my office, for maybe 8 to 10 people. My colleague (who I used to intern for, and who can be a bit scatterbrained) ordered just one large pizza. For some reason, he had it delivered about an hour before the actual meeting started, so only he and I were around to eat it while it slowly got cold.

    Also, it was a “Wild Mushroom” pizza… which is fine, but I *hated* mushrooms at the time. I was starving so I just picked them off and ate a mangled slice. And — this is just one extra bit of weirdness — he paid the delivery guy with a roll of dollar coins.

    (Another officemate kindly and subtly ordered another pizza from the same place to arrive during the actual meeting, and was delivered by the same guy. He seemed only mildly confused.)

  136. Selina Luna*

    I can’t eat bell peppers. If someone is cooking bell peppers and I’m in the same room, I get violent nausea, and eating them also makes me vomit. I went to a conference where every single meal ordered had bell peppers. One lunch had sandwiches, which you would think would be safe-I could at least pick the peppers off, right? Nope, there was a bell pepper tapenade that permeated everything on that sandwich.

    1. Artemesia*

      That is weird. ON the other hand this happens for us onion challenged all. the time. I have been at catered events where EVERY sandwich includes copious dollops for chopped raw red onion. Can’t pick em off and can’t eat em.

    2. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

      I once attended a work conference where they served lunch in the same room the afternoon presentations were going to be in. I’m so allergic to bell peppers that my lungs were on fire and my eyes were hurting once they brought in the lunch so I had to leave the conference at that point and miss both the lunch and the entire afternoon. It was particularly frustrating because I’d been a presenter at a breakout session in the morning and wanted to reconnect at lunch with some of the people who attended it and had more in-depth questions than we had time for.

      Bleh. I’m honestly not sure how much I should expect to be accommodated when I’m so allergic that raw bell peppers being crunched and aerosolized by others is enough to make me react, but it has been pretty limiting professionally since this has happened several times now, although if I’m lucky the afternoon is more breakout sessions so I can attend one in a room that wasn’t used for lunch.

    3. Daisy Avalin*

      I doubt I have an allergy to bell peppers, but I cannot *stand* the flavour of them, they taste like spicy dirt to me… and I haven’t eaten a supermarket pasta or couscous salad for about 10 years, because I haven’t been able to dins one without bell pepper in it… and, the flavour permeates so much I cannot ‘just pick them out’!

      1. I Have RBF*

        My spouse is intolerant/allergic to bell peppers, and I don’t particularly like them. But at a lot of hotels with buffets have them in nearly everything. Scrambled eggs, with bell peppers. Potato chunks, with bell peppers. Any other grilled item is swathed in bell peppers. Soup? Bell peppers in it. Salad? Yep, bell peppers. Entrees? Bell peppers in it, of course. They apparently are a cheap filler with lots of “color”.

        My spouse and I have enough allergies and food intolerances that eating out is difficult now. (Soy, soy oil, banana, cilantro, celery seed, black pepper, bell pepper, are all no go. Milk products require Lactaid.)

  137. Duckles*

    Opposite experience but at a conference all meals were vegetarian and many were gluten free and vegan, and were REALLY good. It wasn’t even a sustainability or health conference. It was wonderful.

  138. MuseumChick*

    I remember one large conference I was attended a couple of years ago where I witnessed the following conversation between another attendee at my table and one of the waitstaff (and yes, we had submitted dietary restrictions)

    Attendee: “I need the dairy free meal.”
    Waiter: “The what?”
    Attendee: “Dairy-free meal.”
    Waiter: (long pause) “What’s that?”
    Attendee: “Um, like no milk, cheese…”
    Waiter: (appearing frustrated) “Let me go get someone.” (walks away)
    (everyone at our table looks at each other in confusion)

    The waiter brough someone else over, I’m assuming their supervisor/manager and the other attendee got her dairy free meal.

    1. AngryOctopus*

      That feels like the waiters were hired but not trained by the event organizer. Which is not the waiter’s fault, but also very very bad on the part of the organizer!!

      1. The Prettiest Curse*

        That depends on how the catering was arranged. If the organisers are contracting with the hotel, it is the hotel’s responsibility to brief and train their staff. (Same thing if you are hiring a caterer – caterers are responsible for training and briefing their serving staff.) If it’s a good quality hotel, you generally have a pre-event meeting with the hotel staff (including the banquet captain and chef) to make sure they are aware of the dietary requirements and who needs what, then they brief their kitchen staff and servers before the event.
        So it could be the organisers or the venue or the caterers (or various combinations of the three categories) that messed up. Unfortunately, there’s a fair bit of potential for things to go wrong!
        The only case in which event organisers would be responsible for training service staff is if the organisers owned the venue and directly hired the serving staff. Otherwise, you make sure that you have strong and clearly worded provisions in your contract for meeting dietary requirements, you communicate those requirements as clearly as possible to whoever is providing food and you make sure that any issues get addressed ASAP.

  139. Name (Required)*

    I attended a large workshop at a university with dozens of other guests. There were exactly 0 options for someone who is vegetarian, not to mention vegan, or lactose or gluten free. One meal I remember was a sad ham and cheese sandwich and potato chips.

  140. well, well done*

    When my spouse was in the Air Force, there was a big event – sit-down dinner, a General coming in from somewhere to speak. The General’s plane was late. So someone (protocol?) decided the nice steak dinners should be held – for what turned out to be two hours – awaiting his arrival. Everyone was starving (dinner was supposed to be served at 7), and the steaks were…awful. The General made a gentle jibe about the quality of the food and I think he genuinely felt bad that people had to wait so long to eat.

  141. Savoury Creampuff*

    Earlier this year my U.S.-based organization hosted a three-day international conference. The caterers were clearly trying to showcase “American” cuisine for our international guests. Day 1 was barbeque – it was great. But Day 2 was Tex-Mex, which amounted to “Make Your Own Burrito.” A tricky feat under the best of circumstances when you’re in a suit, much less if you’ve never eaten a burrito before! I opted to make a taco salad instead to protect my shirt and my dignity. Then the third day was…deli. Just sad cold cuts and sandwich fixings. Bit of a let down.

    Separately, one of the attendees turned to me during one of the coffee breaks, and a bit abashedly, but still insistently, asked me to explain why American coffee was so watery and did we actually like it this way. The conference coffee was…just that. Conference coffee. But Southern Europeans have higher standards. It was pretty funny, and I directed him to a hipster place two blocks away. Not sure if that stuff passed muster.

    1. datamuse*

      Most of the places I’ve been in Europe, drip coffee isn’t really a thing. Espresso and/or espresso drinks are the norm.

      I’m told this is the origin of Starbucks’ Americano–espresso with extra water added.

      1. Admin of Sys*

        Americanos were invented to water down espresso for Americans who were used to drip coffee, but it massively predates Starbucks. It became popular with American GI’s in Italy during WWII.
        (Starbucks rarely invents drinks, it just often makes up new names for them)

        1. Artemesia*

          And in Italy we have been given Americanos which we find undrinkable more than once when ordering coffee — they sometimes assume Americans like their coffee like that.

    2. Armchair Analyst*

      a Taco salad would protect neither my shirt nor my dignity, but good for you!

      agreed that make-your-own-meal buffets in another country can be daunting. when we traveled to India, some of my husband’s co-workers gave us a dessert. we thought it was like cotton candy with an odd texture. turned out we may have been supposed to stir it into a drink, still not sure.

  142. BugSwallowersAnonymous*

    This dovetails with mortification week for me, because I was in charge of ordering food for conferences at my first job in my early 20s, and I was so bizarrely horrible at it that I cringe to think about it now! I think I just did not have any experience with events, and resented my job and my boss, so I put no effort into making a nice meal for everyone. Cue lots of (justified!) complaints about the food for gluten free folks.

    1. Bridget*

      That’s not entirely your fault. If you were working with a convention services manager worth their salt, they would have been able to make suggestions for good meals, remind you to check for dietary restrictions, etc. I’ve worked with a lot of inexperienced people and the whole reason I’m there is to make you look good!

  143. Rage Post*

    This happened a decade ago and I still feel ways. I worked a horrible underpaid corporate job just out of graduate school. I was 100% on my own, no family, no partner, no friends, in a new city. We had a Halloween party and were all told we had to, no excuses, bring a dish. I was living paycheck to paycheck and had very little in terms of food budget. So I sucked it up and made a huge tray of lasagna, thinking the leftovers would last me at least until the next payday. At the time I was only eating one to two meals a day, even ramen was a luxury, that’s how bad it was. I saw only a small piece of lasagna was gone at lunch so I was happy I’d be able to take the tray home. I had a horrible day with awful clients yelling at me. I went just after the party ended to put the lid back on the lasagna and take only to see Bertha, the mean as a snake receptionist, look at me and ask “is this yours?” and then dump the entire still-full tray in the trash while smiling at me. Embarrassingly, I burst into tears. One of the nicer managers asked what was going on and I explained through tears that I couldn’t afford to eat for the rest of the week and that Bertha had just dumped my literal grocery budget in the trash. It was humiliating. Bertha’s weird smirky response was that the dish “it didn’t have a lid”. It had a lid, nested on the bottom of the tray. Her next argument is that it was rude of me to want to take my uneaten food home (when that’s literally what everyone else was doing). I just went back to my desk and kept working. By the end of the day I ironically I won some kind of Halloween raffle that I hadn’t entered for a bunch of gift cards, all of them mostly for fast food places and one for a grocery store. The manager rigged it for me. We’re still really good friends to this day. I am not friends with Bertha.

    2. Raisin Walking to the Moon*

      God bless the kind raffle riggers of the world. <3 I had that happen to me once, too, with a $500 grocery gift card right when I was about to drown.

    3. Rage Post*

      Also quick follow up- that manager also put a stop to the “no excuses” demand that people participate in the potluck because, duh, people might not be able to afford to participate.

      1. Fran*

        Great manager!

        I had a raffle where I won I think the movie tickets but really wanted the $50 groccery store card- because that was much more helpful for the poor intern.

  144. AngryOctopus*

    Attended a 2 day conference. First day, breakfast was fine (standard pastry/bagel setup), lunch was quite a good buffet. They made a point of announcing that if you needed the vegan option, please ask any staff member and you’d get a vegan meal. Second day, breakfast seemed to be the leftovers from the day before. Lunch was also a good buffet. My vegan coworker attended the second day, and I told her what they had said the day before about the vegan meal. She asked at least 3 different staff members, all of whom had No Idea what she was talking about. Now I don’t know if anyone got a vegan meal the day before, but the whole day 2 (barring the non vegan lunch buffet) seemed to be a total afterthought from the conference planners, and this was the worst example. It was at the airport hotel, so she left the conference early and went to get something to eat at one of the terminals. It was insane to me.

  145. Logan*

    This wasn’t an issue with food quality but I went to a 2 day conference once where on the 2nd day the side dishes were self serve. It was a free for all- people took mountains of mashed potatoes and other sides so by the time half the people were making their plates there was almost nothing left.

  146. Forty Years In the Hole*

    Formal military Mess Dinner…full dress uniform, very rigid protocol. And you’re hungry after standing about/at the bar for an hour (no bar nibbles).
    First course: cream of oyster soup. Think dark, shiny grey eyeballs staring back at you from a thick, greige soup base. 150 full bowls came out of the kitchen; 150 full bowls went back… :=P

  147. ASneakierMailman*

    Not a work conference, but my mother-in-law bought me tickets for a two-day women’s event that was held at a number of large event centers nationwide every year. I was about 7 months pregnant. Bear in mind that this was a WOMEN’S event, so a higher number of pregnant people would be there than in the general population.

    Lunch was provided, which sounds nice. Except it was cold cut sandwiches. If you don’t know, pregnant women aren’t supposed to eat cold luncheon meats unless they’ve been heated safely first. No microwaves were available. So any pregnant woman following medical advice had to leave the conference at lunch and figure things out on their own in an unfamiliar city. In my case, I found a Subway and purchased the exact same thing I should have been provided with, but they microwaved it for me. And because so many other pregnant women were stuck doing the same thing, the lines were insane and I was late to the next session.

    Really, just a little forethought to the audience could have made every pregnant/nursing mother at that event so much more comfortable.

    1. WellRed*

      Microwaved lunch meat? Are pregnant women actually eating that?? I feel a little green at the thought.

      2. Carolyn*

        It’s common advice to pregnant women to only eat lunch meat that’s been heated to avoid listeriosis which is bad for adults and really dangerous for a fetus — I would get a sub toasted from Subway when I was pregnant. My OB said not to overly worry about it though — the odds of eating cold cuts with listeriosis while pregnant are pretty astronomically tiny (so he recommended cutting back (I think mostly due to sodium?) but not needing to 100% avoid).

      3. Dancing Otter*

        Uggh! Sounds like just not eating lunch meat would be preferable.
        Unless peanut butter, yogurt, and soup are also off limits.
        Pregnancy was hard enough when all I had to give up was alcohol and tobacco.

      4. WantonSeedStitch*

        I used to microwave it a bit to get it warm, then I would put it on toasted bread with mustard and mayo, put cheese on top, and stick it in the toaster oven until the meat was good and hot and the cheese was melty. Much more pleasant, because it was on a sandwich designed to be eaten hot. If I didn’t microwave the meat a bit first, the cheese would be way TOO melty before the meat was hot enough for safety.

  148. Zoe Karvonopsina*

    My housemate’s work conference last year decided to go all vegan, because vegan food is delicious!

    Correction. Vegan food can be delicious. It is not delicious when the catering team apparently decided that vegans don’t eat…carbs.

    2. Seven hobbits are highly effective, people*

      I’m having trouble even picturing low-carb vegan food, except for the awful protein shakes my vegan bodybuilder friends used to drink.

  149. Savoury Creampuff*

    At my last job, I got sent to a conference in Charleston, South Carolina over Passover. Not the best time to visit a place famous for its biscuits, but I made do.

    When I went down to breakfast each day, there was a separate table labeled “kosher” – full of muffins and pastries and other things that couldn’t be eaten on Passover. (In case it isn’t clear, the universe of Jews who would care about kosher certification and would eat a muffin on Passover is probably zero.) I love that they were trying so hard and so utterly failed.

    2. nora*

      The one grocery store in my area that has a good selection of Passover food also, every year, without fail, puts out a huge basket of challah with the display. Sigh.

  150. A Noni Mouse*

    Not the worst, but still confusing and unpleasant. Just recently there was an event that my team had to work at where there were a couple of food stations to choose from. The first day I ate at it I picked the “Southwest Power Bowl” from one of them, thinking the picture looked pretty good. It consisted of a bowl of corn and black beans on which they threw a generous handful of what can only be described as tree branches. They mixed that with several scoops of caesar salad dressing and topped it with a few large pieces of deli roast beef. And then gave you only a single plastic fork to try to tear through the meat and disassemble the branches of greens. The flavor combinations could generously be described as eclectic and because I was hungry, I did my best to eat as much as possible while using my fork and fingers. Talking with the team afterwards, that appeared to be the best option. I gave them permission after that first day to please feel free to send one of them out on a food run to local restaurants so that no one had to suffer through that for multiple meals a day, multiple days in a row.

  151. Meg*

    I once went to this dinky little conference in our field. It was my first time, but another student in my lab had gone before and said the food was always *amazing*! So, even though it was out in the middle of nowhere Indiana, I was excited for the food. It was three days, and every night for dinner was fried chicken. I didn’t trust the student after that.

    1. I Wish My Job Was Tables*

      Oh no, I did this to someone once! I attended an event where they served tacos and burritos the entire time, I loved the food, and gushed about it to someone who didn’t like tacos or burritos and gave them the wrong impression. Whoops!

  152. Jen*

    I was running the conference — which involves very long days — and started my morning in a conference hall from an urn of coffee that had just been brought out. I took one sip to find that either my cup or the urn had what was possibly Ajax/Comet/some other kind of scouring powder on the bottom. On one hand, I was happy I got that cup and not one of our attendees, on the other hand, I had scouring powder burbs for several hours after.

    Days later I was attending a conference in another city but at a sister property to where the above occurred. Lunch was a entree salad — and I dug in only to discover a paper towel, presumably left over by someone who was drying the greens — was still in my salad.

  153. Victoria, Please*

    As someone who arranges a LOT of events, tries extremely hard to meet everyone’s needs, and is also at the mercy of crappy campus catering and lots of rules surrounding this issue, I am going to need several beers at hand before reading this post and its comments.

  154. Lynn Whitehat*

    Serious question to people in the hospitality and catering industry: why is it so common to screw this up so badly? Especially in the realm of the commoner dietary restrictions like vegetarian and kosher/halal. It seems like basic competency in the field to be able to produce a reasonable vegetarian meal. Like what is going on here? Is it deliberate hostility or what?

    1. OyHiOh*

      I offer constructive feedback to the staff event planner every time this happens to me, and I’ve gleaned some common threads

      The event planner has been given a budget that allows for, say, 1 entree option, no extras for dietary needs

      The event planner planned appropriately for multiple needs, but there’s a mix up at the catering kitchen, and not everything arrives where it’s supposed to

      The staff event planner is butting heads with a board of directors planning committee and the planning committee (when this happens, it’s always half a dozen old white wealthy ladies) is determined to have the party *they* want, those who don’t conform are an afterthought, at best.

      in short, it is rarely the fault of the actual event planner, who probably put a lot of professional expertise into the best possible event.

    2. Kitry*

      As with most things in life, it usually comes down to money. You can get a catered meal for a hundred people with no dietary restrictions for a fairly reasonable price. For every restriction that you add, the price usually jumps by about fifty percent. If you’re on a tight budget, your options are generally to either sacrifice quality and/or quantity for everyone, or to ignore the restrictions you’ve been given. Option one angers everyone. Option two only angers a handful of people. Pick your poison.

    3. Observer*

      Honestly, I suspect that more often than not it’s not the caterer that’s at fault. Others have pointed out some issues. But if you look at many of the letters in the archives here, you get to see how the attitudes of some of the decision makers plays into this, as well.

      Like “let’s put the on the plate of the intern because how hard can it be” – we see versions of that all the time.

      Or people who simply can’t be bothered – the the justifications for that are legion. I remember one letter where the planner asked if the are really expected to accommodate “everyone” besides maybe the vegetarians, and how are they supposed to remember people’s needs when they are doing an event with 200 people. There were a lot of good stories in the comments but a bunch of people who also insisted that it was unreasonable to expect to have pretty much *any* accommodations. One commenter explained that they do the ordering and they don’t have time to allot because they need to be billing for their services rather than being tied up with ad min work. And anyway the point of ordering food is not to give people a good time, but to keep them working through lunch. And totally failed to explain how people who don’t get lunch because they can’t eat what was ordered are supposed to work through lunch.

      And then there are the folks who simply don’t believe that these issues are “real”. Or if they are “real”, it’s “your fault” and you need to “just deal with it.”

      1. Anna*

        Ya, I definitely see a lot of the “but why should we accommodate people, that takes effort” variety. Or of like, people ordering the food acting like those with allergies or other restrictions are just trying to inconvenience them somehow.

        That attitude would bother me less if it was paired with a genuine interest in making sure attendees could reasonably get outside food if the caterers couldn’t make something they could eat. But no, it usually has a vibe of “stop being upset you have nothing to eat.”

    4. Half April Ludgate, Half Leslie Knope*

      As an event planner, I think a lot of this falls on *not* hiring a professional, experienced event planner. People think “I planned my wedding, I can do this too” or “I like parties, I can handle it” and don’t understand that there are a lot of logistics that a personal event might not have. For example, I planned a recent event for some colleagues, and as usual, I included an option to provide dietary restrictions on the invite. The person who requested the event was fascinated – she didn’t have any restrictions so she’d never thought to see if anyone else did.

      It’s also a matter of finding a good caterer, not a cheap caterer – I ask vendors what their options are for various diets. If they don’t have good options, I don’t book them, but if you don’t think to ask, you might be left with some of the experiences above.

  155. PlateGate*

    I attended a small conference recently as a vendor, maybe about 100 people total including vendors, and about 75 attendees. The hotel sold lunch by the plate, which is normal, except they counted out the exact number of plates paid for… and that was all the plates available. One catered lunch was only for a subset of attendees to they had paid for 50 plates, so there were 50 plates.Want seconds? Use the same plate. A plate looks like something was missed in the dishwasher? Staff will exchange for a new plate, but you have to wait since they only brought up 50 plates. Under no circumstances would more than the exact number of plates be placed out on buffet. The poor conference organizer spent half of his time chasing down people over plates, making sure they reused their same plate (which also… GROSS) or shooing away people who weren’t one of the 50 they paid for from the buffet or coffee line.

    2. BettyF*

      I was so happy when my state passed a law that you had to use a new plate for any kind of buffet service at a restaurant. If I want salad and then dessert, I want a new plate.

  156. Watry*

    Aside from employee potlucks, I’ve never seen a work-provided meal that wasn’t pizza.

    I can’t eat pizza. I’m always just expected to bring my own food as I usually do.

    1. I'm Just Here For The Cats!!*

      A coworker who couldnt have subs had their manager specially order sushi for him. that manager was awesome but the company was toxic and fired him.

  158. I Wish My Job Was Tables*

    Oh, one more: back when I worked as an office assistant, i worked in an office where it normal to order different meals for folks with different dietary needs. Usually those were set aside and labeled for the people they were reserved for.

    A new hire (Apple) had a ton of dietary restrictions and food allergies, so the company found the one restaurant that would accommodate all of them and ordered her a special meal of her choosing. Day of event, she saw her meal, decided she didn’t want it, and took the Kosher meal set aside for another attendant (Berry) and ate it before he arrived. She tried to offer Berry her original meal, but it wasn’t Kosher so he couldn’t eat it. To make matters worse, she repeatedly complimented him on choosing something tasty and talked about how much she enjoyed his food.

    On the plus side, I ordered a second Kosher meal so Berry didn’t go hungry, but he had the awkwardness of eating during the meeting itself. It also led to a policy of having someone stand guard over the labeled meals, at least until Apple left the company.

  159. Cats Cats Cats*

    After launching a nearly $1B fundraising campaign and working all our butts off, our boss surprised us at the Monday morning meeting with one box of baked goods for 14 people. So like seven or eight items. She told us each to take a half.

  160. wtaf machine*

    I went to a conference once (4 days). It was said that breakfast would be provided. It was cakes. All manners of cake and not even coffee cakes. Bundt cakes, chocolate cakes, yellow cakes. I love cake as much as the next person but a banana or some toast in there would have been nice too. after day 2 of eating German Chocolate Cake at 7:40am I went to a bodega and got some bananas and microwaveable oatmeal for my hotel room.

  161. Hornswoggler*

    This is the opposite problem to what most people are saying. I went to a three-day conference in Haute Savoie in France, at an off-season ski resort. The food was STUPENDOUS.

    Local cheeses, cold cuts, top quality local meats and vegetables, gâteaux, fruit platters, three types of wine with both lunch and dinner, champagne as an apéritif before dinner, endless coffee and chocolates afterwards. It took FOREVER.

    Every single session – even the morning ones, following an extravagant breakfast including cheese platters and charcuterie – failed to start on time. I was presenting after lunch on day 2 and it started 90 minutes late.

    The guy running it clearly felt that the networking and socialising were FAR more important than anything one might say in session – in fact a colleague of his confirmed this to me.

    It wasn’t the best conference I’ve ever been to but it’s one of the most memorable, including a fabulous live band on the final night. Just as well since we had so many calories to shed, and I like to kid myself that the dancing helped.

  162. Alf*

    A state agency hosts a practitioner conference at a venue with extremely meat-centric in-house catering. One year, shortly after the new generation of fake meats (Impossible, etc.) had come out, I asked for the veggie option at lunch (burgers and brats), and was told that the brats were vegetarian. At first I thought that the new meat substitutes must have gotten REALLY convincing. but eventually I realized that there was no frigging way, and I had definitely just eaten a pork brat.

    I told the event organizer what the caterer had done, and I probably should have told other people, but I sort of just froze up, because I was so worried about how upset people might be if they found out they had just eaten pork when they had more serious reasons for avoiding it, and whether there might be a dash for the bathrooms. I don’t observe any religious prohibitions, and I’m not that strict of a vegetarian, so for me there were no consequences other than being angry.

    The next year when I asked for a veggie option (because even the side salads had unnecessary bacon bits), the catering staffer had to go back down the hall and bring out a special plate. Given the location of this venue and known political currents in that town, it’s possible that the management is just clueless, but also plausible that they make it purposely inconvenient to avoid pork or just meat in general. The previous year’s hot-bar staffer probably either thought that feeding brats to vegetarians was funny, or couldn’t be bothered to walk to the kitchen.

  163. It was just chips*

    Ahead of our biannual all hands meeting, we heard rumor of a fantastic nacho bar. I got in line, loaded up my plate with chips, meat, and salsa only to discover there was no cheese. No cheese at a nacho bar. Nachos without cheese are just chips. Completely unacceptable in a city known for its Tex Amex.

  164. Jessica*

    Work conference, remote hotel, no car, Indiana. (My company’s contingent was all from the Seattle area and mostly vegetarian or like me, prefer-vegetarian-but-will-eat-fish-or-poultry-in-a-pinch.)

    The menu for dinner options arrives and it’s all meat-heavy, steak-and-potatoes-ish options. The fish options are all shellfish, which I can’t eat. The true vegetarians are like, “we’ll just take the garden salad and some bread, we guess?”

    I opt for the only entree salad option, the Oriental Chicken Salad.

    It arrives. It has chicken and wonton strips and mandarin orange slices. It is also covered with some sort of heavy white sauce drizzle.

    I ask the server what the white sauce is.

    She tells me cheerily that it’s cheese sauce.

    On a “Chinese” chicken salad.

    I don’t know if it counts as “bad” food–maybe the steak dishes were really good!–but it certainly, for me, counted as *baffling* food.

  165. EtTuBananas*

    I once worked in an office where the business owner was a gluten-free vegan, so all of our work potlucks were gluten-free and vegan. We also were not allowed to purchase meat on the company dime or eat meat at work. I have no general objection to eating this way, but I am a “full carnivore” as my meat-eating colleagues and I joked. It was an events based company, and the company would provide catered meals to employees while events were in session from the hotel/conference room kitchen that were – you guessed it – gluten-free and vegan, and that’s where the problems started.

    I have very severe GERD and cannot eat onions, tomatoes, garlic, lemon, or any variety of peppers, including bell peppers. In very small amounts, some onion powder, a couple cloves of garlic, or a squeeze of lemon juice, are all fine in the course of cooking. I’ve been known to break down and eat a pizza or curry or taco with pico de gallo and just deal with the consequences later. But a stir fry comprised entirely of peppers, onions and tomatoes? Nope. Do you want to guess what most of our catered meals were?

    I ate a lot of plain rice and spent my own money on food I could actually eat.

    1. I'm Just Here For The Cats!!*

      I’m sorry you couldn’t bring in meat to work? Even if you made it or bought it yourself? WOW that is way over controlling, especially given your dietary needs. It sounds like you’re out of that place now. I hope you can eat what you want.

    2. Clisby*

      My son was in preschool with a kid who was allergic to rice – the first person I’ve ever met with that allergy. I was like, man, I’m glad neither of mine had that. (I’m from SC, where if there’s no rice on the table you assume they haven’t brought out all of the food. OK, that’s an exaggeration, but not by too much.)

  166. I'm Just Here For The Cats!!*

    I have so many stories of my time at a call center. Worked the late shift (first 3:30pm to 1am then later moved to 1-11pm) and we often had to work holidays. One year they were very generous and we had a catered Thanksgiving dinner. We were promised all of the trimmings. The earlier shift got theirs around noon, and they were still serving at 2 when I came in to work. I saw them leave but management promised that they were coming back at 6 for the later crowd. They did comeback, to serve us cold food that had been sitting there. There was hardly anything left and what was left was so unappetising. Think burnt corners of casseroles, greasy turkey and gravy that had gelatinized. The catering people had ran out of food because the earlier cowed kept coming through. Most got 3 or more servings!

    The same place would often hype up that they would bring donuts or whatever treats. We would get to work and there would be a stack of empty donut boxes 5 feet high. And these were the giant bakery boxes that hold 3 dozen donuts. The same thing would happen on pizza days. We would be lucky if we got handed a cold slice as we walked in the door.

    Once we had a grill out where the operations manager cooked up a bunch of chicken and hot dogs. He kept hyping it up and made comments about what a grill master he was. For several days before the grill out we could not put our lunches in the fridges because they were both full of meat for the grill out. Day of the grill out everything smells wonderful. BBQ smell permenates throughout the break room. I get a piece of chicken and take one bite of it an its raw in the middle. Not even just a little pink, but like so undercooked it was dangerous. I spit it out, threw it in the trash and went back to my desk. I don’t remember eating anything else that day. Ironically after the place closed he started a food truck. I noted not to ever buy anything from him.

  167. does anyone read this far?*

    Not a catered event but one year at my last job, they decided for the holiday party to take us all out for a cooking class. Cool! So we show up and it’s a class on how to make beef stroganoff. Not something I can eat but ok no worries, I’ll participate and take my portion over to my dad since he loves it.

    But oh no. The cooking class people wouldn’t allow anyone to take any leftovers home and we made a LOT. I was so pissed at the amount of food wastage I almost walked out.

    1. I'm Just Here For The Cats!!*

      What! I hope whoever paid for that complained because with a cooking class, (which can be expensive) the whole idea is that you pay for the ingredients. You should be allowed to take whatever you made home.

      Makes me wonder if the cooking class people wanted it for themselves or if they planned to serve it somewhere?

  168. Mayor of Llamatown*

    Went to a multi-day, international conference/expo for THE professional organization for my industry. In a big city, huge conference center, not swanky but definitely pulled together.

    The lunch was box lunches, set out on a long table. The labels indicated what kind of sandwich – turkey, ham, roast beef, vegetarian, etc. Decent, I thought. Until I opened them. All of the sandwiches were on gluten free bread. And not a good gluten-free bread (which exists, I’ve had it), it was basically like cake. And every single sandwich was slathered with mayo, no option to not have mayo, and it was like someone had just slapped a huge dollop of mayo on it. I hate mayo. I was trying to have a professional networking lunch while eating a sloppy turkey sandwich that was crumbling to pieces in my mayo-slick hands. Not a good look. I was also two months pregnant at the time, so I had to eat something, and this was it. No other food option on site.

    The next day: THE SAME SANDWICHES. We walked to a sandwich shop instead.

    1. mrs whosit*

      Compared with so many of the incidents here, my irritation when every sandwich option includes mayo (or tomatoes) is pretty minor. But it does irritate me! You can always put those on, but you can’t really take them off.

      1. Mayor of Llamatown*

        It definitely fell in the “First World Problem” category, but it was so easily avoided. This is why individual mayo and mustard packets were created!

  169. Single Parent Barbie*

    Not a business conference but I worked for a company that owned several franchise restaurants as well as offered catering. At the time, I was also volunteering as Concessions/Food Mgr for my son’s HS marching band. We were having a Saturday rehearsal day and I was working with our catering manager to order boxed lunches for the kids that day. This was an easy $1500 day which for our smaller store would be a huge bump. My thought was if the kids liked it, we could make it part of the meal rotation for them. I did not ask for any extra discounts beyond normal catering prices, but I did request free delivery . (It was not my money, but it was the band’s money and I wanted to be a good steward) It was less than 7 miles from the nearest store to the High School Catering manager was like no problem .

    Our boss, the operations manager who was also one of the owners, heard her and said “What!” we told him what I was ordering, how much the order was for, etc. He said ” well, we will wave the delivery fee THIS time. But next time, we will have to charge you.”

    I said “well next time, I will just order from someplace else then.”

    For some reason I did not get a good review that year. I guess that $50 fee really hurt

  170. another veggie*

    I used to attend board meetings at a college that had very good food for students – veggie, vegan, gluten-free, halal, kosher, nut-free – you name it, it was covered. The conference center on campus however…one night it was steak, potatoes, mushrooms, and green beans for the regular meal, and a lettuce leaf with a scoop of edamame (so, green) hummus on top. Dessert was chocolate cake for everyone except the vegetarians…we got fruit salad. And we got the same meal the next night, while the regular meal was again a protein + several obviously vegetarian sides + cake. I learned to not divulge I was a vegetarian and just give the protein to someone else.

    This was in 2019 in a very vegetarian-friendly part of the US. Not sure what happened there! Maybe the chef thought vegetarian = on a diet?

    1. NeedRain*

      Yup, that screams “different/new chef with dumb ideas of what vegetarians eat” (which is a very common problem, as evidenced by this whole thread. Why do people literally think they just eat lettuce, OMG.)

  171. FashionablyEvil*

    I went to a (pretty fancy, business attire required) conference and all there was, all day, was coffee. No food, no snacks, just coffee. I resorted to putting extra half and half (which I hate) in my coffee for the calories.

  172. Stephanie*

    I was once at a meeting that went from 9:00 am to 2:00 pm, at a restaurant. And the only food the company provided was a tray of cold danishes and pots of coffee. And we couldn’t even order food from the restaurant because we were in a separate, closed-off room, without any waitstaff serving us.
    This was in retail, in the 90’s, and it was a district-wide managers’ meeting, with the CEO in attendance. We were all a bit dumfounded by the lack of anything resembling a lunch.

  173. Ophelia*

    Big corporate conference. I have a mold allergy, so can’t have blue cheese, and was pregnant at the time, so certain things like deli meats were out. I didn’t think to mention dietary restrictions, because honestly it’s usually pretty easy to avoid like, sliced cantaloupe, deli meat, and blue cheese, but for lunch on the first day literally the only options were fruit salad, cold cut sandwiches, and the vegetarian option was a salad covered in–you guessed it–blue cheese. Learned my lesson to be more of a squeaky wheel (and thankfully the hotel where it was held had a little store with some prepackaged sandwiches and such).

  174. Green tea drinker*

    As a green tea drinker, I’ve learned to bring my own tea bags, but frequently at conferences the hot water for tea is put into a carafe or other container that has previously held coffee and dispenses tea with more than a whiff of coffee scent/taste. Black tea might hide this but green tea definitely doesn’t.

  175. SarahBeth*

    I went to a women’s conference a few years ago and they didn’t feed us really, all day. By the time coffee breaks or breakfast happened, coffee urns were empty and not being refilled. I had to pay for not great coffee, and lunch was a sad salad with some chicken on it. If I’d known, I’d have brought my own snacks.

    Needless to say by the time I left, I was HANGRY and my husband picked me up from the train and took me for pancakes. I knew there was a reason I married him.

  176. Honey Badger*

    It wasn’t a conference or work event but it was a retreat at a lovely retreat center located on an island. The island was gorgeous. The center was delightful. The staff was attentive. The food was….awful. The breakfasts were all high carb, sugary sweet pastries. The dinners bore a strong resemblance to boiled meals in a bag or the fare you’d expect to see at the nearest correctional facility. When it’s in lockdown. And everyone is on rations. But the lunches are what drove me to head into town for lunch rather than staying on site. The lunches were all a baked pasta dish (in the middle of summer!) containing elbow macaroni, weirdly processed cheese type ‘food’ product, and overcooked broccoli that was the size of tree trunks and were woody. I’m not sure how overcooked broccoli can be simultaneously woody and limp, but they were able to accomplish both.

    1. That's 'Senior Engineer Mate' to you.*

      It might not help you to know this, but… if you harvest broccoli too late or cut it too low it has quite strong fibres in the stalks. They’re made of lignin just like real trees have. So yep, perfectly possible to have rope holding your soggy broccoli together.

      Mind you, I’ve been to a few events where I duck out to a supermarket and buy a cabbage or cauliflower or something and eat that instead of whatever the venue provides in leiu of food.

  177. Bibliothecarial*

    Went to a conference recently in a large city outside my home state. The food was a food court where you pay for what you eat. My credit card doesn’t work outside my state unless I specifically call to request that, but I thought, nbd, I’ll bring cash. Get to the lunch break and the food court is card only. So I ate my sad snacks I brought from home. I couldn’t find anywhere on the conference site that you couldn’t pay with cash.

    1. Angry socialist*

      Don’t know what city you were in, but a lot of places around here don’t take cash.

  178. LK*

    At my organization’s conferences, we have staff who are working the conference and staff who are just there as participants along with our members. We provide meals to the folks working the conference, who might not have time to go out and get food, and everyone else is supposed to use their generous per diem to buy meals nearby. Usually, this isn’t a problem, because the staff meal room is adjacent to the conference office, but this time it was in a separate room. We ordered enough food for those working. Except, because we were busy working, by the time we went to eat, the staff who weren’t working found the staff meal room, assumed it was for them, and ate all the food, leaving barely anything when we showed up for our meals. Some of them brought guests. Luckily, I had the authority to order more as soon as I found out, but that still meant waiting for it to be prepared and having only a couple minutes to eat before we had to rush back to work.

  179. Eeyore is my spirit animal.*

    Conference of a few thousand folks that offered coffee and tea at the breaks. Since I don’t drink either, I went looking for a water fountain. 20 minutes later, I finally found the one water fountain in the conference center.

  180. H.Regalis*

    My worst was at a work party we paid for (government job). It was in the banquet room of a good Italian restaurant, so we were excited because we thought the food was going to be awesome! Instead we got the most cardboard, always-on-sale, crappy grocery store pizza, which they ran out of well before everyone got a slice anyway.

  181. AccountOutLoud*

    So not a conference but we used to have a kick-off lunch before our busy season. Some years our supervisor paid for it since we are government employees but this year we all pitched in. We decided on pizza but it had to be ‘good’ pizza so we ordered from a brick oven place – at 11am.
    When it was first decided, one guy insisted on liver and anchovy pizza. All week he insisted that is what he wanted. We all split the cost of all the pizzas.
    Day of, he asked to add on a salad that he paid for separately. Fine.
    Pizzas delivered around 11:30. They weren’t that good because brick oven pizzas need time to really get going.
    And he didn’t touch the liver and anchovy pizza at all. He just ate his salad. It was a joke. We should have known.
    Our oldest coworker managed to down a slice because he hated to waste food but all the freeloaders in other departments didn’t take any.
    I personally asked the jokester to take it home but he did not want it.

  182. Anne Shirley*

    I was on the staff of a very well-funded and highly regarded private elementary school. They were burying a time capsule as part of their centennial event and invited staff for a toast. With Diet Coke in paper cups. It didn’t have to be champagne, but sparkling apple cider or sparkling water would have been way better. (and perfectly appropriate at an elementary school during the day) All their other events had been top notch and continued to be.

  183. Ukdancer*

    The worst I had was the tartare day. I was in Warsaw and had a lunch scheduled with a counterpart in a partner company. His company organised it which was fine but they also pre-ordered the food without asking. And it was his favourite which was steak tartare. I’m not a vegetarian but I need meat to be cooked. That was awkward.

    That evening I was at a formal dinner for my company and again they served steak tartare. It was like a bad dream.

    I’m afraid I didn’t eat mine and wondered why I was unable to avoid the tartare. Fortunately I asked the waiter for an alternative and he brought a very nice soup.

  184. Guest*

    I’m pescatarian, used to be vegetarian, and back in the day, I attended a work conference at which the vegetarian “meals” were all overcooked steamed vegetables with a couple of tablespoons of rice on the side. The conference was held at a pretty upscale hotel and when a couple of us voice our concerns to the restaurant manager, he sneered “we only get about 800 of YOU PEOPLE every year, so it isn’t worth it to make good meals for you.”

    What hotel can afford to lose 800 potential repeat customers every year?

    2. Artemesia*

      The thing is hotels can literally buy packaged frozen vegetarian entrees to whip out when needed that are at least mediocre and not terrible. I ran a conference and we had organized for vegetarians and other special meals. One guest got her vegetarian meal and it was bean based and she didn’t want that — the hotel was able to dig out and microwave a pasta that was fine within about 15 minutes. I don’t hear people upset that the foot is not michelin star but that it is inedible or not a complete meal.

  185. HannahS*

    The vegetarian meal at a fancy fundraising event that I got free tickets to as a student was: five gnocchi (yes, five individual un-sauced gnocchi) on a small artistic blob of sweet potato puree.

    The others had roast chicken or beef, mashed potatoes, broccoli…I was starving. My peers donated their dinner rolls, so my dinner was five bites of potato, a fork-swoop of potato, and three rolls. The centerpieces at this event were over $100 each; I have no idea why they didn’t give me, I don’t know, fifteen gnocchi and some sauce.

  186. Sally*

    I attended an all day training event for work where we had to specify any dietary preferences when we booked. I wrote that I was gluten free and on the day enjoyed a single Naked fruit bar at break (while everyone else enjoyed pastries) and for lunch a clingfilmed plate of shredded lettuce topped with a square of processed cheese and a square of processed ham and covered with shredded red onion (which i do not like). Everyone else has a choice of 3 different flavour sandwiches and two different types of cake. Although that’s still an improvement on the international conference where they informed us on Day 1 that there were NO gluten free options for anyone who’d requested it (quite a large group of us altogether). We spent the week running out every lunchtime to try and quickly find food and by the big Conference Buffet on Day 5 I was so hungry I ate about 10 roast potatoes in one go just to finally feel full.

  187. Madison*

    I once attended an post-conference (but still very much work-related and hosted by the company) social event that was at a different location than the main conference. They had to ferry people there in school busses, but with hundreds of people attending, limited busses and a fair distance between the two locations, about two hours passed between when the first people and last people arrived. I assume the appetizers they served were pretty good, because by the time I got there they were literally all gone, and I was around the middle of the pack. The company had to order like 75 pizzas last-minute.

  188. nora*

    Pre-pandemic I went to a one-day summit on a weekend, held at a sprawling suburban community college with a stupidly tiny parking lot and no public transit. It was packed and the only lunch option was a single food truck that arrived late and would in no way be able to serve everyone, let alone in 45 minutes. I could have left to get fast food but I likely would not have been able to find parking (see: stupidly tiny parking lot and no public transit). I ended up begging my husband to bring me Burger King, which I had to eat during the afternoon session, much to the speaker’s annoyance.

    I did not get reimbursed for my whopper because I “declined the available prepaid option.” I already had one and a half feet out the door and decided not to fight it.

    Last fall my employer held a conference at a local events center. The lunch menu promised us seasonal cobblers for dessert. We got a variety of coconut cream pies that looked terrible and apparently tasted like sunscreen. I do not eat coconut so I skipped out and found an exhibitor giving away full-sized candy bars instead (pro tip for exhibitors, put this in your budget! everyone will love you).

  189. Cheese curds or just*

    Went to a professional conference where it was all seated meals in a hotel ballroom. For one meal, they served salmon for lunch. And then came around with drinks: glasses of milk and water. The ONLY choices for drinks were whole milk and water. For a room full of adults. Eating fish. I mean, I was fine with water but….. what?! No one else even batted an eye, and a bunch of people took the milk. I felt like I was taking crazy pills for finding it odd (not that an adult would drink milk, to each their own! But that it was the only/default option?!) To be fair, the conference was in a small-ish city in Wisconsin and while I’d spent a lot of time there it was my first professional event since moving there full time…. I decided I was just getting the full Midwestern experience.

    1. NotRealAnonForThis*

      A lone business trip to a not large city in Wisconsin involved copious amounts of dairy in all forms – cheese, butter, and (whole) milk products.

  190. I hate forced potlucks*

    I used to work as manager for one of those kiosks in the mall, that sold skin care products (they went out of business many years ago). Every quarter the regions managers gathered at a hotel for staff meetings. I didn’t realize that most of the time the regional manager just rented a hotel room and then commandeered the breakfast area at the hotel for meetings. She also made us do a potluck instead of just ordering food for us. At the time I was really young and didn’t care. Looking back I think its so cheap. Just BUY LUNCH. There were only 10 of us.

  191. Kristi*

    There’s an annual conference in my field I regularly attend. A reception from several years ago is still infamous because the hosts decided on an open (if not terribly well stocked) bar but only provided us a few canapes to eat which were gone before many people had a chance to have any. They’d bused us to a off-site data archive with a big atrium, so leaving early wasn’t an option, and once the speeches were over and everyone had done a tour of the security measures and climate control machinery, there was very little to do but drink cheap wine. Lots of hangovers at the plenary next morning…

  192. Sparkle Llama*

    I went to a conference at a resort in northern MN and I specified vegan on the registration but figured it was unlikely they would have much and packed food accordingly. I get there and the name tags are a different color if you species dietary requirements, which seemed like an odd choice but whatever.

    The first meal comes around and I am in line at the buffet with my coworkers and a kitchen worker calls out to me asking what my needs are and making a scene. She tells me I should get lettuce from the buffet and she will bring me salad dressing – still not telling me what is actually on the buffet. I choose raspberry vinaigrette and figure I will run back to my room for a snack after what sounds like a pretty unsatisfying dinner.

    I then get to the buffet and see it is a taco bar and there are plenty of options for me to make a decent enough dinner. I get black beans, some veggies, salsa, some shredded lettuce and tortilla chips. As I leave the buffet the worker comes running at me with a literal soup bowl full of raspberry vinaigrette. I had to hide my bag tag at the rest of the meals and avert my eyes to make sure I didn’t have her intercept me pre buffet again.

      1. Sparkle Llama*

        No idea! When I sat down my coworkers all asked where the soup was since they missed it in the buffet.

    2. Lady_Lessa*

      If they were going to color code food issues, then the way my board of elections handles it. Clip on name tags, but the color of the connector between the clip and pocket indicates what party you are. (We are very strict about having folks from both parties working next to each other)

  193. Katherine*

    Midway through a grueling 10 hour disaster response shift, I went to get my lunch only to find that the vegetarian option was … lettuce. I complained to the supervisor in charge who said “well, it’s vegetarian, isn’t it?” And I said “this is some protein deficient bullshit is what it is.” My coworker had brought granola bars and shared them with me but I’m still pissed.

  194. RH1812*

    The all-shellfish example is truly awful. In addition to people who have severe shellfish allergies, many people (myself included) just don’t like shellfish. It’s a divisive type of food, some people love and and some hate it.

    1. Wendy Darling*

      Seriously, I feel like shellfish is one of the most common things people don’t eat! Between the people with allergies, the people with religious restrictions, the vegetarians/vegans, and the people who just straight up don’t like it, it seems like the worst option for big events unless it’s, like, the Shellfish Appreciation Club Annual Banquet.

    2. Ukdancer*

      Same, I am not allergic to shellfish but I really don’t like it and some of it disagrees with me. I did go to one formal dinner where I asked for the vegetarian starter because the other option was prawn cocktail which I loathe but I wanted the meat for main. They then tried to serve me the vegetarian main because apparently someone wanting the veg starter and the meat main didn’t compute for the serving staff.

    3. Mischa*

      This is my worst nightmare as a person with a life-threatening shellfish allergy. I cannot be in close proximity to shellfish, let alone eat it! I would’ve had to leave every meal so I wouldn’t, you know, stop breathing.

  195. Ebrofin*

    The owner of our company hosted a work party for senior leaders and their spouses. He had a mansion in a fancy town, and employed a housekeeper and “gentlemen’s gentleman,” so really quite rich. The dinner was outside, under a tent with special lighting, white tablecloths, servers, a bar, etc. The dinner was multiple courses of fancy meats and fish — lobster, prime rib, clams, so really expensive things. As a vegetarian, all I was served was a store brand frozen vegetable medley of carrots, cauliflower, and broccoli that was barely microwaved. It was humiliating, and I’m pretty sure they had forgotten me and just grabbed something from the freezer.

  196. No Tribble At All*

    Ooh, my favorite not-bad-just-weird story. At a fancy thanking the donors dinner gala. The appetizer was an avocado gazpacho served in martini glasses with shrimp. There were three jumbo shrimp arranged in each martini glass. Only they were king prawns, or something, I swear I didn’t know shrimps came that big! These shrimps were bigger than cigars. They wouldn’t have fit on a saucer. They were way too big to eat in one bite, and we didn’t have any plates yet, so we couldn’t cut them up.

    After they served there was an audible pause while everyone looked around out of the corners of their eyes to see how the heck to politely eat these things. Eventually one of the honorees just picked up a shrimp and ate it like a banana. We all followed suit.

  197. Quiet Riot*

    Not a conference but a wedding. Husband and I are vegetarian and we were given the option of chicken, steak, or vegetarian entree (not specified) when rsvp-ing and obviously chose the veg option. We watched the steak and chicken entrees come out accompanied by some really great looking mashed or roasted potatoes (can’t remember which) and roasted vegetables. The veg entree comes out and it is a huge plate of pasta with olive oil and steamed vegetables. Not even the roasted veggies that were the side for the other entrees! It is as if people think vegetarians don’t like food – feed us anything as long as it isn’t meat. Ugh

    1. AngryOctopus*

      Truly I find that if they’re asking you “chicken or fish or veg” or something similar (no details), you’re likely to be getting a terrible meal.

  198. Don’t make me come over there*

    I recently went to a convention where part of the registration process was selecting an option for the Saturday banquet: beef, chicken, or veggie. No other info available on preparation/sides/sauces. Hope you’re not allergic to anything…

  199. Mazey's Mom*

    Several years ago I went to New Orleans for a conference I go to annually. Most of the time the food falls into the edible to actually enjoyable categories. For this conference I knew a few people on the organizing committee and they raved about the menu. Was going to be “very New Orleans” and we would love it, so I was excited, I had never been there before. First day, sit down breakfast and lunch was offered. All I remember was some sort of omelet and chicken. Looked unappetizing and tasted worse. Meant to be hot but not. Even the pastries and rolls were awful and inedible. I decided early on that I would get breakfast at my hotel’s restaurant (fortunately, I couldn’t get a room at the conference hotel so I stayed in a famous boutique hotel about 10 minutes away) then buy lunch elsewhere. Everywhere else in NO the food was fantastic! When it came time to get reimbursed for my meals, they gave me a hard time since many of them were included in the registration cost. Understandable, but I successfully made the case somehow to at least get the per diem for those meals, if not reimbursed for the actual cost. When it came time to provide feedback on the conference, I didn’t hold back. They did another conference in NO at the height of the pandemic, but I didn’t go, so I have no idea if it was an improvement.

    1. datamuse*

      Oh man, you almost have to be *trying* to serve bad food in New Orleans.

      The last time I was there was for an American Library Association conference in 2006. It was nine months after Katrina and the city was still in rough shape, though the business district and the French Quarter has recovered the most. And they did well by us. (I found out later that just about every other professional association that had booked a conference in New Orleans that summer was watching ALA closely to see how things went, which I’m sure was extra incentive, but…everything really did go well.)

  200. Shamwow*

    Not a conference per se, but at an old job if we were catering for staff meetings onsite, we could only use the company caterer (it was higher ed, the caterer had an exclusive contract). This caterer was notoriously unreliable – late, didn’t bring everything he said he would, forgot things like utensils. One day, a coworker had ordered a salad for an event. She saw him pour the dressing onto the salad, and then toss it WITH HIS BARE HANDS.

    Never touched anything he delivered again.

  201. Ultegra*

    At a recent conference, dinner was a build your own pasta plate. That day’s events had involved activities all over the city and many of us had walked or biked 10+ miles (I clocked in at over 13 miles), so we were all starving. The idea was that you would go through the line and fill a little bowl with your preferred pasta mix-ins (veggies, meats, etc.), then bring it to one of two chefs at the end of the line. Near the chefs were large bowls of different types of pre-cooked pastas and sauces. Each chef had one skillet and one cooktop. You would tell them what kind of noodles and sauce you wanted, then they would combine it with your bowl of meats and veggies, heat it up in the skillet for a few minutes, plate it, and hand it back to you. The whole process took maybe 3 minutes or so. But there were over 200 of us. And two chefs. It took over two hours for everybody to get served.

    Meanwhile, it was a madhouse. People were openly ignoring directives to wait until their tables were dismissed to get in line and arguing when conference facilitators asked them to sit back down. Some raided the dessert line and only ate dessert for dinner. Many people left to go get dinner elsewhere even though there were speakers and activities planned. I waited it out and finally, finally ate the most delicious plate of pasta I’ve ever had.

    1. Paris Geller*

      This is the set-up my SIL had at her wedding! And yes, there were about 150 people at the wedding and it took forever for everyone to get food. It was delicious, but a hassle.

  202. The Wizard Rincewind*

    At a weekend event, we pre-ordered dinners for Saturday. I think the options were something like turkey sandwich, ham sandwich, or salad. My friend, who is ALLERGIC TO MEAT, obviously chose salad.

    Come Saturday night, it turns out the salad was a chef’s salad. You know, covered with turkey and ham. Preprepared, so he couldn’t ask for one made without. All of us with sandwiches donated the potato chips that came with them and he ate five bags of Lays for dinner.

  203. No Tribble At All*

    Actual bad story: working night shift at a 24/7 ops center at Thanksgiving. Since it was a holiday, they brought in dinner for us shift workers! They brought in basically Wegmans catered Thanksgiving dinner, which would’ve been great, if we had an oven. We had two (2) microwaves. We could not fit the trays of mashed potatoes in the microwave. The turkey was undercooked and also couldn’t fit in the microwave.

    Good thing I brought my own food.

      1. No Tribble At All*

        The office manager came back and got it all later. We were deeply suspicious that she ordered it for herself/her family and the fact that we couldn’t cook it was deliberate. She was later let go with no notice and rumor was she was stealing catered food leftovers on other occasions. (it was common for them to order extra food for the weekend/night shift folks… but half the time it would go missing!)

  204. MsMaryMary*

    Long ago I participated in a program where once a year the large city I lived in organized service projects across the city on a Saturday, and local employers sent groups of employees to volunteer. Tens of thousands of people participated. We’d all report to the pro football stadium in the morning, and organizers would divide us up for different projects: painting school classrooms, cleaning up a park, etc. We’d get on a school bus to be driven to our project location and the buses would bring us back at the end of the day.

    All participants received a boxed lunch. The first year, I got a pretty standard boxed lunch: sandwich, chips, fruit or cookie. The second year, something happened to flood the area where the box lunches were being stored and ruined over half of them. So if you were not an early arrival, there was no lunch for you. A lot of the areas we volunteered in did not have options for food nearby. Many people hadn’t brought purses or wallets with them. People with unflooded box lunches shared the best they could, but there were a lot of very hungry volunteers.

  205. Dragonfly7*

    Celiac disease here, and both incidences were at the same convention center, although different events:
    1. Ticketed event for which we were asked to provide dietary restrictions but NONE of them were accommodated. I think the chips worked for a couple of vegan / vegetarian people.
    2. Event for which I was again asked to provide dietary restrictions. The only gluten free thing was red salsa.
    I reached out to the event organizer for the latter and suggested speaking to the catering staff at the venue regarding special dietary needs. They instead suggested that someone stole my meal (which does happen). I still don’t know if this has been addressed with the venue.

  206. Lab Boss*

    Summer camp horror stories:

    One year, the cook was terrible and got mad that people complained about his cooking. He’d say things like “You shouldn’t make me mad, I could kill everyone here with bad food!” Then one week, the sandwiches for a staff-only lunch had been made with green turkey. The nurse noticed when she checked her sandwich for onions and yelled at everyone to stop- we still had a minor wave of food poisonings from fast eaters.

    Someone donated a bunch of food. We were happy because free food is free food. They’d donated an entire trailer load of frozen ham and ham products. It was the summer of eternal ham.

    One year’s cook ended up having been unknowingly pregnant all summer, and I’m going to hope pregnancy cravings and taste changes were to blame for her cooking: un-toasted, refrigerated english muffins served with a single slice of room temperature cheese was one highlight. Un-drained taco meat served in a bowl of grease (to make it go further!) was another.

    One year we actually had an amazing, talented cook- even he produced a few legendary clunkers. Pancakes made with so much baking poweder that they were effectively rubber (oops), or when the lid fell off the pepper jar into the Salisbury steak and turned the entire batch of gravy from brown to gray. That one I actually loved, but I was in a vast minority.

  207. Slow Gin Lizz*

    I attended a free one-day conference for a particular software program I use. The event promised free lunch for all attendees. Lunch wasn’t a buffet though; it was trays of food brought out by caterers, quite a bit later than promised, so everyone was famished and absolutely SWARMED the poor caterers. It took about 30 seconds for all the food on the tray to disappear. People were hovering by the doors like lions on the Serengeti waiting for a gazelle they could hunt. It was an insane way to distribute food at a large conference.

    The food, btw, was tiny wrap sandwiches, approximately three bites each. So even if you got one, it was hardly going to make a dent in your hunger. I get that it was a free conference with free food, but if you can’t provide enough lunch for everyone in attendance, maybe skip the free food part of it and just have paid food options at the event or tell them where they can go out and get something themselves. I honestly would have preferred that to expecting to get a full meal and instead getting three bites of food. I have since learned that any free food offerings at events are almost never going to be enough to stave off my hunger, but this was a very extreme case.

    (I have no food allergies or restrictions; I shudder to think, after reading everyone else’s stories on here, what those might have been, if any.)

  208. flatbstanley*

    When our remote team members came to town for a weekend event, our team decided to go to a nice restaurant for Sunday brunch. We called ahead to confirm that vegan options were available for one coworker. They presented her with coffee, a banana, and some orange slices from the bar. They even brought the banana in a bowl—not banana slices, just a whole, unpeeled banana.

  209. Former Retail Lifer*

    Yet another vegan/vegetarian example: I was at a work conference several years ago and lunch was buffet-style for all four days, with a different set of choices every day. There was never a vegetarian option, but I could make do with salad, sides, and lots of bread. One day, there wasn’t a single vegetarian side option (the green beans had bacon bits, etc) except for salad and rolls. However, there was only one salad dressing option and it was Ceasar, which has anchovies. I ate undressed salad and buttered rolls. My co-worker was a vegan, so he ate undressed salad and unbuttered rolls.

  210. Former Retail Lifer*

    Can we count a high school prom? The menu wasn’t made available to us ahead of time, but we were promised a vegetarian option. The “vegetarian” option was fish.

  211. 15 Pieces of Flair*

    A former employer hosted a mandatory multi-day training at a hotel with meals provided during limited windows that negated the potential to get outside food. One day’s lunch featured mayonnaise on everything but the potato chips. Sandwiches? Mayo, all of them. Potato salad? Obviously mayo. Pasta salad? Strangely also contained mayo. I hate mayo and was, thus, very hungry that afternoon.

  212. Lou's Girl*

    Not horrible, but weird: SrVP held weekly meetings with us. She had them catered from her favorite restaurant (yay for free food!). However, it was the same BBQ place and the same exact food EVERTIME. Every week. Without fail. She was not associated with this place in any way, she just ‘liked it.’
    I hate to complain about free food, but I worked there for several years and this went on weekly for several years. And we lived in a major US metropolitan city with TONS of other restaurants and food options. BBQ pork sandwiches, chips and a soda every week for years. Never varied in any way shape of form. Still not a huge BBQ pork sandwich fan to this day and it’s been years.

  213. Professional Button Pusher*

    I’m on the organizing committee of an annual international academic conference with ~400 attendees. We’re always careful to make sure the host institution can accommodate the wide range of different dietary needs, but we don’t typically get involved in the exact menu details. One year, it was large bowls of soup (and only soup) every day for lunch…outside, in the summer, in a tent with no tables. Watching distinguished academics try to network while standing around slurping soup was a hilarious sight, and it will be forever known as the year of the standing soup.

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      Soup and large events without seating just don’t go together, and this is the proof!

  214. SP*

    I worked at a specialty retail store for a niche sport and we occasionally hosted educational events (like having a guest speaker come in on a weekend afternoon to discuss the latest rule update regarding competition attire). Shortly after I was hired, I organized one of these events and asked the store’s manager to pick up some snacks and drinks for attendees. He returned the next day with an enormous jar of cheese balls and 2-liter bottles of caffeine-free Diet Coke, orange Fanta, and Dr. Pepper. All I could think of was people snacking on cheese balls, then touching all the clothing in the store with their cheese dust covered fingers. After that, I learned to give him a list of specific snacks and drinks for these events!

  215. Jane*

    Back when I was a barista at Popular Coffee Chain, our new manager decided that our annual holiday meeting was going to be at this terrible bar/lounge (think the kind of place Tom Haverford and Jean-Ralphio would love) near our location. This was a meeting the entire store staff had to attend, and she proceeded to order: two small baskets of truffle fries. That was it. No one was allowed to order any food on their own, even if they paid out of pocket for it.

    I love fries, but I hate truffle oil, but I was also starving because I’d come straight from my shift, so I had to just sit there and miserably nibble on the four(?) fries I managed to snag before everyone else took some.

  216. Jamie (he/him)*

    Sent from rural Yorkshire in England to Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, for a four-day conference in 1996.

    Upon arrival, the hotel had no vegetarian options. The two vegetarians (me and my boss) in the party asked them to make something on the menu leaving out the meat.

    Not possible, apparently.

    But the wait staff were willing to ask the Important and Named on the Menu Executive Chef if he had any ideas. He did: plain pasta with microwaved tinned mushrooms mixed in. My boss was allergic to mushrooms, so she got plain pasta with a tin of chopped tomatoes on top. Not heated, just dumped on top.

    The two of us went out for lunch and dinner for every single meal after that.

  217. EH*

    My biggest issue at conferences (usually in the South) is that they serve iced tea as the beverage by default, with no option for anything else. I understand not having other soft drinks available, but when I’ve asked for just a glass of plain water (I hate tea!), it’s been a genuine problem to get. Why would water not be the default??

    1. Single Parent Barbie*

      I am a non southerner living in the south for 25 years . I was not raised on sweet tea, iced tea, hot tea, tea. But when you go out in the south your choice is sweet tea. EVEN when I have been in the hospital for surgery, or having babies, it takes an act of God to get something other than “Sweet tea” to drink. One time I was in the hospital and my mom called I was crying. “MOMMY I just want some water…”

      1. Clisby*

        Not in my experience (SC here.) I have never been to a restaurant in the south where you can’t get water. And unsweetened tea is pretty common. (Obviously I don’t know where you live, but it musts be an outlier.)

        1. Dinwar*

          Alabama here, and it’s the same. Unsweetened tea is also (almost) always an option, and while there’s an occasional screwup staff are generally very apologetic. The amount of diabetes in there area probably contributes–it’s generally bad business to kill your customers! Water, coke, and coffee don’t raise any eyebrows either. My wife carries tea bags in her purse, because while unsweet tea is usually available it’s usually pretty low-quality stuff, and she’s usually able to get a cup of hot water as well. This included the maternity ward.

      2. It’s Suzy now*

        That is heartbreaking. You poor thing!

        And I’m so sorry if the other commenters here denying your experience is retraumatising you. I’m flinching in your behalf.

    2. WellRed*

      Ha! My company has a small “high end boutique” conference every year. One year In Minnesota, the conference planner only served water and ice tea for the drink options to save money. Those of us in staff had to smuggle in our own diet cokes and not let attendees see them. Because plenty of people like to have other options. That’s the last time that happened and apologies to the thirsty conference attendees that year.

    3. Lou's Girl*

      OMG, yes! I hate tea, of any kind, and live in the Southern US. Baby showers, weddings, corporate events, sleep overs at friends as a kid- Tea ONLY!

    4. Gumby*

      I have family that live in a town that provides water from a nearby lake. It tastes **awful**. I mean, the city swears it is treated and tested and safe for consumption and whatever. But I do not care because it tastes like dirt. My family members had extra filters added to their homes just so they can get something drinkable from the tap. I’d suggest that the sweet tea was to cover up for undrinkable water but frankly it wouldn’t work. One experience of ordering a soda thinking you’d be safe only to start tasting dirt as the ice melts will make that clear. Long-time residents say you get used to it or some codswallop but ugh. So gross. Also, a smaller town 15 minutes away has totally drinkable water so it really is just their town. When I visit I am totally the prissy person who asks at restaurants “is your water filtered or do you just use [town] water directly? What about your ice machine?”

      1. Dobby is a Free Elf!*

        I have to ask that question any time I travel out of state. It feels rude, but I can’t drink unfiltered water anywhere with weird-to-me minerals. I go through a lot of water bottles and make sure to fill up my gallon-sized emotional support water bottle before I leave home if I’m not traveling by plane, but if I drink the water, intestinal badness follows. I also don’t drink soda unless I have to (empty calories, can’t do artificial sweetener), so…please don’t look at me like I’m nuts, just tell me if this water comes straight out of the tap or goes through a filter first.

      2. Goldfeesh*

        I lived in Lewisville, Texas for a year. Living there got me hooked to the Walmart flavored drink packets to add to your water to cover up the lake taste from Lewisville Lake. It’s like the lake turned over but then never settled. Where I live now in Iowa, the town drinks lakewater, but it doesn’t taste like dirt like in Texas. It’s 15 years later and I still haven’t kicked my flavored water habit. I’m a cheapskate, I’d like to kick it.

      3. carcinization*

        There’s a town like that where I grew up as well. When I was a child I only drank water, unless I was in [town name], I would have to remember that I needed to drink something else there because the water was so disgusting.

    5. Ginger Cat Lady*

      I’ve had this experience TWICE in the south.
      And I’m from Utah, so for the Mormons (who don’t drink coffee or tea) in my work group, this was a big problem, and asking for water got strange looks from the staff.

  218. The Prettiest Curse*

    Alison, thank you for this thread! It’s so useful for me to read about how catering gets messed up (or not) at other people’s events so that I can avoid messing it up at mine. Plus, I just find event stories fascinating in general.

    As an event planner who has food allergies myself, I will ALWAYS go the extra mile to make sure that dietary and allergy requirements are met, but it really pisses me off that so many event organisers, venues and caterers are cavalier about it. Do better, events industry!

    1. lsb*

      Oh my gosh. I am a nonprofit events planner with food allergies as well, and my catering got messed up last week. I handle all of the event registrations, but there is one particular woman who absolutely refuses to give up control of her own registrations. HR has worked with me to basically force her, and I thought I’d finally gotten her on board. But then a month ago, she told me she had started taking registrations for a lecture (scheduled for last Thursday). I asked if she could share it with me. She said “Sure” and then never did. But she did give me a final count, which I passed on to our caterer.
      Well, the literal morning of the lecture, she emailed me to say that she’d collected 40 allergy restrictions. She sent them in a spreadsheet and asked me to send them to our caterer. The literal MORNING of the event. Our caterer requires two weeks notice for food, and while we can usually work with the timeline a bit, THREE HOURS for FORTY food allergies is absurd. Thankfully, there was a huge salad left over from an event the night before, but I hated being the person who serves nothing but salad for allergies! Moral of the story: there’s a reason I insist on handling registrations.

      1. The Prettiest Curse*

        Oh no, this is one of my all-time event nightmare scenarios! Though at least it wasn’t your fault. If I got complaints in a scenario like this one, I would be delighted to forward them all to my difficult colleague.

  219. TechWorker*

    I was travelling for work in India, and had been warned in advance about being careful of food (especially salad that might have been washed in tap water) with my delicate western stomach. Luckily the food at the hotel we were staying at was *amazing* so it was not exactly a hardship to eat there most of the time. I went out to a couple of local restaurants with the team – all fine and great food! Then, on the final day, there was a charity event at the office with a catered lunch. I had eaten multiple chicken skewers before I realised the one I was holding was not even remotely cooked – like it was covered in sauce but basically raw.

    It was an EXTREMELY unpleasant final night and I was genuinely worried I might have to stop the taxi to the airport on the side of the road :O but luckily my stomach seemed to have expelled most of it by then & I made it on the flight.

  220. Maggie*

    Ohhh. One conference we were served a hard boiled egg yolk in a bowl (as an entree). After a week of eating silver fish for breakfast and giant prawn (singular) for dinner this was something I thought “okay I can eat this…” A waiter proceeded to come by with a tea pot of boiling pea soup and without asking poured it over said egg making it (for me) inedible. A tear may have formed in my eye!

  221. Mitford*

    Back in my fund raising days, I worked in the headquarters of a national women’s organization with a large group of very entitled board members who treated the staff little better than galley slaves. One of their rules was that staff could not go through the buffet line until board members had had seconds. Not firsts, seconds. They called it the “family hold back” rule, and Allison’s advice that when someone tells you that they treat their staff just like family you should run is very apt.

    “Family hold back” usually meant that the buffet had been picked clean by the time the staff were allowed to go through, not to mention that, because it was a good 30 minutes before we could go through, we’d have all of five minutes to scarf something down before the next meeting. Because food was allegedly provided for staff at these meetings and conferences, we weren’t allowed to expense any meals. So, if you ordered room service at 9:00 at night because you were ravenous, you had to pay for it yourself, on your non-profit salary, at an expensive hotel. At one conference, a staff member went to a nearby grocery store, bought bread and peanut butter, and lived off that for four days.

    My personal favorite moment was at one event where, during the afternoon sessions, the hotel would put out bowls of popcorn on each table as an afternoon snack. I’ll never forget the board member who sailed over to the staff tables and moved the bowls to tables where board members were sitting, saying, “You can have whatever is left over.” Reader, there was nothing left over.

    1. BettyF*

      Popcorn is one of those things people eat mindlessly (me included) and there is never going to be leftovers. Also, ew to sharing a bowl of popcorn with anyone but my spouse. Please have individual bowls.

  222. Jennifer Strange*

    I’m part of a local group of nonprofit organizations tied together by their use of a specific software system. The group puts together events during the year to allow folks to come together and hear about updates to the software, as well as brainstorm solutions to problems (both in the software and in general).

    Before the pandemic there would be about three events a year, each hosted by one of the organizations in the group. Most of them were low key, but they always had snacks and drinks available to attendees (think store-bought cheese plates, fruit trays, maybe some prepackaged snacks, and soda and water). If it was our end of the year event the hosting organizers would usually up it a bit with fancier appetizers and complimentary wine and beer.

    A few years back we went to one of the organizations for the end of year event. By this point I had been to about 6 or 7 of these, so I had a good idea of what protocol was. The invitation had even specified that there would be an end of the year reception with wine and food. So after the main section of the meeting, someone from the organization said “If you’ll follow me, the reception is right this way!”

    The “reception” was them leaving their concessions stand open late and giving us a discount on wine and snacks (like small bags of chips and candy bars). People were pissed.

  223. Twisted Knickers*

    Here’s a situation I’ll be facing over the next year: I coordinate monthly meetings for a local executive group and we meet at a lovely private club downtown. During the pandemic they really took a hit, so when we returned to in-person meetings/meals last year, their prices had gone up significantly. After a full year of paying ridiculously high per-person charges, we were able to negotiate a much more palatable price for the upcoming year. The catch? For every meal, the entree will be chicken. No beef, fish or pork options as in the past…just chicken. (Vegetarians, vegans and those requesting Gluten Free will be accommodated.) Even though we only meet once a month, and not everyone attends each meeting, I’m still expecting to hear a fair amount of griping. This is after we offered members the option of meeting at a different location that was also lovely (and convenient) and could still offer us reasonable prices and meal choices…nope, they decided to stick with what they knew. We’ll see how they feel after months and months of chicken!!

    1. NeedRain*

      if people are mad about eating chicken once a month…. they have too much time on their hands.

  224. Guest*

    Here’s a funny one: on the first night of a conference, the company that was sponsoring that evening’s presentation set out tons of beer and wine, but no food. Not even chips or bowls of peanuts. Their speakers droned on for nearly two hours and no one had had dinner, so we were all starving. When the speechifyin’ was finally over, we were all sloshed and no one remembered one word the presenters had said.

  225. Baby Sluggo*

    I worked for a state governmental agency, and attended a training session. At lunch we had a buffet of salad and sandwiches cut in half. As we proceeded through the line, each employee took two sandwich halves, to make a complete sandwich. One would think that this was a reasonable thing to do, but soon there were no sandwich halves left, and it was then that we learned that management had allocated only 1 sandwich half to each attendee!

  226. Koala Tea*

    As a vegetarian, I am HERE for these!
    Good grief, I feel like there are a few categories for the veg stories of suffering:
    1. Vegetarian = eats fish
    2. vegetarian/vegan = lettuce and bread for days…
    3. vegetarian/vegan = what do you even eat? Nothing apparently…

    Thank you all for sharing your stories and the humor!

  227. Elle Woods*

    I once attended an off-site all-company work lunch where your entrée choices were either a stuffed pork chop or pasta. There was a miscommunication between the organizers and the hotel staff about what time the meals were to be served. The result was pork chops that had been baked an extra 30 minutes and pasta that had been boiled so long it was basically mush.

  228. NeedRain*

    My current workplace gives us lots of free lunches which are hit and miss for options & quality, some have been tasty w/ good options, some less so. But if it’s meat based the vegetarian option is always quiche. Except some of us can’t eat dairy so can’t eat the quiche either. Every time.

    1. Sloanicota*

      Oh man flashbacks to my HS trip to France – there was something going on with the beef distribution so the meal at every venue, without fail, was quiche lorraine. Only quiche lorraine forever and ever, every night, every meal, for two weeks, amen! I have never ordered it since.

  229. Liane*

    Not the fault of those who provided the food but still a disaster.
    I worked for (In)famous Retail Chain (IR) as Customer Service and also ran their August-Christmas layaway, located in the back. Early fall, the store won some district/regional goal and management ordered from our Bakery 3 full size decorated sheet cakes, one for each shift – Morning, Afternoon/evening, & Overnight. Each was boxed & labeled with the shift. As usual, Overnight was get their late the night before.
    Next morning, just after Overnight left, Alice (onsite Personnel, whose job included carrying out “morale” plans like this) & I arrived and walked into the break room together to put away our lunches.
    We were greeted by a disaster! There were big globs of cakes & icing on every surface – floors, tables, counter, chairs, walls. Maybe icing stuck to the ceiling. From the pitiful remains of the cakes on the tables, it looked like people had dug out chunks with their hands and flung them all over the place.
    Note that I wrote “CAKES,” plural. Yes, these jerks didn’t stop with their cake, they opened the other 2 shifts’ cakes and trashed those as well.
    Alice showed Nero the store manager the mess & asked what to do, since there was no time for the Bakery to make 2 new sheet cakes. Nero told her to store-use whatever premade cakes and sweets she could find in the Bakery as replacements. Both Alice and I expressed our opinion that this called for writeups. Since least was dead, I was able to help Alice clean up and get the new cakes.
    Of course, nothing happened to anyone. Had it been me and not Nero running the store, the whole shift would have skipped a layer of discipline on the grounds of Egregious Misconduct, except for Wanda Maximoff the Overnight Manager. Her I would have given the choice of resigning or being demoted to cashier and permanent assignment to Self Check, for letting them get away with it. (Aside from this, Wanda flew almost every one of Alison’s Sucky Manager red flags. I know because she used to be my Front End Manager.)

  230. CatWoman*

    I was honored as an award recipient at a luncheon where there was no choice of dish offered beforehand. I was aghast when the food was presented – each person was delivered a large slice of ham. Apparently, it did not occur to the venue that many people do not eat ham, for various reasons. I must have looked shocked, because I was asked by the server if “everything was okay?” I said I do not eat ham, and was asked if I would like fish instead. I gratefully accepted. When my plate was delivered to the table, every other person stared at me like I thought I was special. Either they really liked ham, or didn’t want to speak up? Anyway, the fish was delicious.

  231. Kyrielle*

    I was pleasantly surprised when I got to my new job and they matter-of-factly accommodated my dietary requirements in meetings. There were a lot of them right then because my GI doctor had me doing an elimination diet to figure out what-all had to be cut out.

    At my previous job, despite *knowing* I had to avoid dairy, and having another coworker allergic to it, the routine food was a pizza party. Once or twice they ordered salads for us, but mostly, it was just pizza. I asked at one point, couldn’t we do pizza sometimes and sandwiches (omitting the dairy) or something else other times? They acted like this was a completely unreasonable ask on my part. Apparently it’s only a real treat if it’s pizza?

    (Worse, I love pizza. So I was smelling it, remembering how good it could taste, and knowing I’d be ill for at least two days if I ate it, but it was right there…. I of course brought my own food, because I needed to eat, but sheesh.)

      1. Kyrielle*

        Not from the pizza place they ordered from, a local that was the “best” in the area per the boss. (I think it probably was. They smelled heavenly and everyone who could eat them, loved them.) This was also most of a decade ago, tho.

  232. Jamie (he/him)*

    Oooh, just remembered 7 July 2005.

    My staff and I had been rudely awakened in our hotel in London’s Tavistock Square by the windows being blown in by a terrorist bomb.

    We reassembled, and with the transport system in London shut down we all walked to Waterloo station to try to get our planned Eurostar train to Belgium. No breakfast.

    Once things opened up, we got a rescheduled train to Brussels. Due to the events that day, there was no on-board catering. No lunch.

    At 11pm we arrived at the chain conference hotel having missed the introductory dinner and were lucky: the kitchens were still open for snacks. Two vegetarians, one vegan, one Jewish person and one Muslim person, plus two people with no dietary requirements. The hotel was willing to do us baguettes.

    They were cheese and ham.

    With much negotiation, honestly, 20 minutes or more, we got two cheese and ham baguettes, two cheese baguettes, and two baguettes. Unsliced, unbuttered, sat on a plate baguettes. Yes, the mathematics don’t work however you look at it.

    But with Belgian beer (and something weird called ‘Frutonic’ for my non-drinking colleague) and British stiff upper lips and the like, we made do.

    And then I went to pick up the tab (the beer wouldn’t be covered by our company). They had charged us for the baguettes that weren’t cheese and ham as that wasn’t included in the room rate. And they had charged a euro extra each for “variations”.

    Oh, but the scene I caused.

    And that annual 50 person international conference..? Not only never held in that hotel again, but not held with that chain ever again either. Because I’m /that/ petty and used all my capital to make sure of it.

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      Good on you for making them permanently relocate the conference. Fortunately, I’ve never had to yell at an event vendor – but this is a situation which 100% warrants yelling, and a lot of it. There’s absolutely no excuse for that kind of shoddy service.

  233. Hosta*

    I was in my early 20s and dealing with some pretty significant medical issues that had me on a VERY restricted elimination diet for the better part of a year. Among the things I cut out were wheat and dairy. My co-workers knew I was on a restricted diet. They also knew that even before I got sick I didn’t like most sweets, but especially cake.

    So for my birthday, the decided that what I really wanted was a cake from the local Chinese bakery. One of the ones with tons of whipped cream, tons of fruit, etc.

    It was super awkward when they sang me happy birthday and I couldn’t actually eat any of it.

  234. Lizcase*

    Not a work conference, but I attended a wedding where the groom had a lot of food allergies and decided Everyone would be able to eat (and had the means to pull this off).
    The caterers said they’d never had so many people with food allergies/restrictions/intolerances. He responded that yes, you have; they just didn’t tell you.

    1. desdemona*

      I went to a wedding at a small resort where the marrying couple rent the whole (again, very small) resort for a weekend.
      It was amazing.
      On the first night, I asked if the vegetarian option had onion powder (having submitted my dietary restrictions in advance as requested). Apparently the kitchen had forgotten/not realized/something else, and I was prepared to just make do (and had brought granola bars just in case). But they INSISTED on making me special, separate food that night, and I had no issues with any meal the rest of the weekend. I felt so awkward but it was also glorious to know I didn’t have to worry about being sick.

  235. Ialwaysforgetmyname*

    Alaska Airlines flight in the early 2000s when airlines still served food: I pre-ordered a vegetarian meal. Everyone else’s meal was a cheeseburger, mine was a cold tofu “burger”, where the tofu had been grilled with no marinade or seasonings, and no condiments were provided. I love tofu but that was disgusting.

    HR conference a few years back: I am not vegetarian but eat vegetarian most of the time so requested vegetarian meals. The first lunch was *almost* a success, it was a cold pita stuffed with lots of good things. The fail? It included mushrooms that had been sauteed and were now sitting in a cold sandwich. The texture was at best slimy.

  236. Catabouda*

    Conference. Breakfast and lunch provided, dinner on your own. 4 nights/5 days and they included lima beans at every lunch. Some had some sort of sauce on them, some were whipped, etc. Everyone was so confused. Why would the organizer pick the same veg 5 days in a row? And a veg that isn’t exactly the most popular choice.

    I do want to weigh in on comments that have been made about meat eaters taking the veg options. I’m one of those people. I’m not vegetarian, but the vast majority of the time the meat options given just aren’t appealing. It’s usually cheap chicken that has a taste and texture like rubber, or fatty roast beef. I wish organizers would plan for 80% or so of the food to be veg and 20% meat. Especially since I find most people are trending more veg.

  237. Beth*

    A minor but persistent grumble from me: every event I’ve attended, when sodas are provided, it’s 90% sugared soda and 10% diet sodas. The diet sodas vanish like snow in hot sun, and when I ask when they’ll be restocked, I’m usually told that that’s all there are or ever will be. Meanwhile, the rows upon rows of non-diet soda remain almost untouched.

    Most of the consumers of diet sodas are women, although it’s also an issue with diabetics. So there’s a clear gender issue with a bit of ableism thrown in. My industry has historically been all men all the time, but the last 20-30 years have seen a sharp increase in women attendees.

    I should mention that I’m one of the diet soda consumers, in case it isn’t obvious.

    1. Beth*

      I should also mention that I’m in a very affluent industry — the budget for most of these conferences ain’t chicken feed.

    2. NeedRain*

      I can’t drink stuff with aspartame (nearly all diet soda) and I don’t want sugar soda… the number of times there’s no water on offer might surprise you.

    3. WellRed*

      Why is there such a dearth of diet soda options?? Drives me crazy and I’m not a fan of water.

      1. Annie*

        At events? Probably a belief that diet soda = weird soda for weirdos and/or diet soda is (generally speaking) just as (un)healthy as regular soda.

    4. BettyF*

      And there are so many other options now, like mineral water. Plus, many people don’t like carbonation.

      1. Artemesia*

        although carbonated, if I were planning refreshments at a conference now I’d make most of it flavored selzer like La Croix.

  238. Lucy P*

    Work holiday dinner…company owner raved about a local Chinese place that had lots of vegetarian options and a separate event room that could accommodate us. Talked to the restaurant to set everything up, picked out the food (to be served buffet style) and discussed letting the vegetarians in the group order a la carte once the event started.

    Food was pretty bad. When asked about ordering the vegetarian dishes, the restaurant staff told us to have them pick the vegetables out of the meat dishes.

    1. WellRed*

      Why couldn’t the buffet include vegetarian options? That’s not usually a big ask for Asian food.

  239. ThirdHandStory*

    My friend not me but too funny not to tell… my company did an all expenses paid trip to Russia (this was over 10 years ago). The final day before flying back included a catered lunch with ‘table vodka’. My friend is vegetarian and was served a single raw apple to have with the copious amounts of vodka on offer. He got so drunk people had to walk him through the airport and he was so embarrassed he tried to resign on the plane. (The company owner basically said ‘don’t be silly’ and he was happily employed for years after).

    1. Artemesia*

      I was at a Russian event where everyone was served horrifying mystery meat and the one vegetarian had the one beautiful edible plate in the place. Sometimes you win.

  240. LanaO*

    Our annual conference has one special outing each year, which you pay an extra $50 to attend. One year, I signed up to go and indicated I needed a vegan meal. When I arrived, the “vegan/vegetarian option” for the event was a steamed, unseasoned portabella mushroom cap and a half of a cob of steamed corn. Nothing else. (The regular meal was some sort of seafood boil or something). I was a grad student at the time and was furious that I had wasted $50 on nothing when I could have just skipped the event and gone out and gotten a great meal for half that much. I vowed to never go again to the extra meal at this conference.

  241. Baby Yoda*

    Attended a writers’ conference where a friend was the main speaker, and she invited me along for the event which included an all you can eat lunch. Turns out, we were escorted into the “main dining room” for the salad bar, which consisted of lettuce, tomato and croutons. Not meant to be a main course lunch, but just a side salad if you ordered off their menu. Which of course wasn’t included for us. Many hungry writers that afternoon.

  242. Dahlia*

    I’ve got kind of one. I used to go to my mom’s holiday parties with her as her plus one because she didn’t have anyone else to take. The first year we went, it was a really nice place. Some kind of fancy lodge thing, with a really nice holiday meal. Turkey, mashed potatoes, all that.

    The second year, it was in a much less nice place and the meal was… pasta. For a Christmas party. There was a pathetic salad (lettuce, a few scraps of carrots), overcooked pasta and two sauces, one meat, one alfredo. No dessert! It was uh. Not great.

    People drove 50 miles each way to eat overcooked, kind of cold pasta that seemed like it had been sitting for A While. Shockingly, this meal did not do much to soak up the copious amounts of alcohol people planned on drinking. That is the drunkest company party I’ve seen. A guy passed out in the bathroom.

  243. Peon*

    3 Day training conference (internal audience) – on one of the days, the vendor gave us “gyros” on a pita that was smaller than the cookie they gave us for dessert. The “side” was coleslaw in one of those tiny clear containers usually used for ketchup or salad dressing. So tiny sandwich with doll sized coleslaw, biggish cookie. That was the entire boxed lunch served to adults.

  244. Tea Kettle*

    I attended a conference where the food was kind of strange combinations, almost like the people planning it just picked things they liked without wondering if it would appeal to a wide audience. Anyway, I had no trouble finding things to eat the first several days but I didn’t like any of the desserts. Then the last day came. It was a piece of lettuce topped with a massive blob of tuna salad. I hate tuna, and I hate mayonnaise. I couldn’t eat that lunch. Someone I sat with saw my reaction and asked a server if I could get something else, only to be told that since I didn’t list any dietary restrictions I couldn’t. I didn’t list dietary restrictions because I don’t have them! I don’t like mayonnaise, mustard, or tuna but any time I’ve seen sandwiches served to a group the condiments are separate so I’ve never seen a reason to put those as restrictions. I can generally eat anything. Lesson learned for next time I guess. (I ended up missing the last afternoon of the conference because I went back to my hotel room and had chips and a brownie. No big loss; it was tangential to my field but a requirement of the training program I was in. The sessions were mostly useless to me.)
    The kicker is a few years later I met a new coworker who’d been with the org at a different location until recently. He was telling me about a conference and I told him about the one with awful food, to which he told me about HIS conference with awful food. I told him about the tuna on lettuce and his conference had had the same! Turns out, he was also at the terrible food conference and we only pieced it together because of our discussion of the food (rather than discussion of the conference topics).

  245. Ialwaysforgetmyname*

    Not a terrible food thing but both food & work related and funny. Business dinner in Buenos Aires, Argentina in mid-2000s. Because of our group size, the coordinator of the event had worked with the restaurant to offer two entree options, beef or chicken. Most of us know that in Argentina, beef and red wine are king, and it is assumed everyone loves both.

    As the server is making the rounds with wine asking “red or white” a woman next to me says “white, I don’t like red wine.” The server looks at her funny but says nothing. When he returns to take our entree orders, she says “Chicken, I don’t eat beef.”

    To which the server immediately responds, “I’m very sorry for you.”

    1. Catabouda*

      This makes me chuckle. We had a work event at a local winery, and I got the most horrible customer service by the folks working at the winery when I asked what types of beer they had available.

  246. VeggieBubba*

    The shift supervisor who convinced everyone, including the higher-ups, that he was some sort of BBQ pit master. Bragged about it non-stop. He finally gets them to fund an at work cook out. The guy brings his own rinky dink charcoal grill, hardly big enough to efficiently cook for 100 people or so, and throws on as many hot dogs and hamburgers that will fit. It’s taking forever, people are getting antsy, so when he decides they’re not cooking fast enough he starts dousing the coals with streams of lighter fluid while stuff is still on the grill. The image of giant flames outside the breakroom window is forever burned into my mind. Not a single burger or hot dog was eaten, so the managers had to order subs for everybody. It was a glorious disaster.

  247. Neo Maxi Zoom Dweebie*

    Not a bad conference food story, exactly, but I was running an all-day meeting for 20 people several years ago. My co-facilitator ordered lunch for the group through a delivery app, something like DoorDash or Uber Eats. The driver made it to the parking lot of our office building, called once to let us know that he was here (my cofacilitator missed the call), and then left after waiting a few minutes. Co-facilitator caught the missed call quickly and contacted the driver, who refused to return with the $200 worth of food. Reordering pushed lunch back by about an hour, and we had some hangry attendees by the time it arrived.

  248. Jewish Vegetarian*

    Conference during Passover- I found the other Jewish vegetarian because all we could eat were plates of lettuce with cheese.

  249. Gina*

    My very first staff in-service day at my current job, I’d been there about three months and been pretty open about being a vegetarian. Even reminded my boss before the in-service. I got there and every single thing had meat in it except the “side salads” (just lettuce), which were so small that they fit in plastic cups like you’d use to give a kid apple juice. I was the only vegetarian, while others were getting second helpings.

    Actually happened again at another event where not only did everyone else get fed, but there was enough food they got to take some home. And I had nothing. Didn’t feel great.

  250. Quinalla*

    We always joke about falling asleep in the afternoon sessions because of the “Carb box” they give you for lunch at a lot of conferences. It’s not all carbs, but mostly. Sandwich with meat & cheese – maybe lettuce too but nothing else except mayo & mustard packets, chips, cookie and maybe a sorry looking apple if you are lucky, but often a fig or apple bar so again even more carbs. I get it, but also geez people. Who know what the poor vegetarians get, probably the same with no sandwich and an extra fig/apple bar :(

    Also been where they had the driest chicken I’ve even experienced in my life, so disgusting and sad and small serving of crappy pasta and a dinner roll. No salad, no fruit, awful! The group I was with ate a little bit and then went and had a real lunch afterwards!

    Another big fail I saw was on a Friday in lent, this place decides to cater pork sandwiches. Yes there was a sad salad (With cheese, sorry vegans), dinner rolls and some sad sides, but pork sandwich was the only entree. So the catholics (there a lot here) and others not eating meat for Lent couldn’t eat, any Muslims who don’t eat pork couldn’t eat and Jews that don’t eat pork, same deal. It was a spectacular failure!

    My company usually does ok, they cater Chipotle or local BBQ with REAL vegan/vegetarian options and they make sure there are non-pork options too as that is something to watch out for.

  251. saskia*

    I used to work in a hospital. My new manager who’d gotten off on the wrong foot with my unit decided to throw me a party because I put in my two-weeks notice shortly after she started. I had actually only transferred to that unit about six months before she started, making me one of the newest people there, so a going-away party for me was an odd choice… but whatever, party! She even asked me what kind of pizza toppings and cake I wanted. On my last day, I arrive at the break room to see Mylar balloons tied to specimen cups (which still makes me laugh to this day, though I’m not sure it was meant to be funny) and pizza… from our hospital cafeteria. The hospital caf was fine generally, but my god, their pizza is bar none the worst I’ve ever had, and yet here were stacks of it, all for me! The party was obviously meant to show the people remaining that they’d be appreciated under the new manager, but it felt bizarre to everyone. People from other units (or even different shifts on my unit) would arrive, ask who was leaving, and when told my name, would go, “Who’s Saskia?”
    Very goofy way to leave a hellish workplace.

  252. Shawna*

    My company brought in sandwiches for lunch during a board meeting today and offered the leftovers to employees. I understand that not everyone can or wants to eat bread, but instead of taking a sandwich, eating the meat and discarding the bread like a normal person, but when I got to the try there were three empty pieces of bread, as if whoever did this thought that someone would want to eat the plain bread that someone else had clearly touched.

  253. pagooey*

    At my first corporate job in the 90s, we took turns bringing in breakfast foods for the weekly team meeting–think a fruit plate, a bag of bagels, or a dozen donuts. When it was the turn of one newly hired DudeBro, he came in at 9 AM with two cold pizzas from the night before…one of which his housemates had already had a couple slices of.

  254. Say It Ain't So*

    As a lowly junior employee, my boss invited me to fill a seat at a luncheon after one of the bigwigs from our company backed out last minute. It wasn’t great food but I was also subsisted mainly on pizza and Kraft mac & cheese at the time. Early the next morning, I woke up feeling a bit off, but headed off to an early morning meeting. Got to the meeting and my boss pulled me aside and said she had been up all night sick and was going to leave as soon as the meeting was over. One of the guys who also attended the luncheon was supposed to be in that meeting; he didn’t show up. By lunchtime, I was feeling queasy enough that I decided to go home too. I ended up falling asleep on the couch and woke up to a commercial for our local news, saying, “Dozens sick from a local conference center – details at 5!” The 5pm news rolls around and sure enough, the conference center I was at was in the background as the news reporter detailed that health officials were investigating what seemed to be norovirus. The next morning, still home sick, I got a call from our employee health person, asking how I was feeling and gathered details from me to report back to the county health department. One of the conference center employees was apparently sick but still at work and handling food. I refused to eat the food at that conference center for a LONG time.

    1. so anony for this one*

      Years ago, I used to attend an annual four-day thousand-person conference where the capstone event was traditionally a giant dessert event where speeches were given by the guests of honor on the final evening. It was a huge draw for attendees, the hotel where the event was held went all-out on the desserts, and it generally was considered the highlight of the entire conference.

      One year, one person arrived the day before the event began with an active case of Norovirus. They were there to staff a sales booth, and of course if they didn’t staff the booth, they wouldn’t make any sales and wouldn’t earn any money, so despite being sicker than a dog, they stayed at their booth selling merch between frantic dashes to the bathroom.

      By the end of the conference, Patient Zero had managed to infect close to a third of the attendees. And because Norovirus is sneaky in how it starts out, the way many of these unfortunate folks discovered that they had caught it was by a completely unexpected and uncontrollable fit of projectile vomiting.

      The dessert event that year featured multiple fountains of vomit being sprayed across tables, chairs, floor, desserts, and other attendees. Nobody lasted long enough to hear the speechifying, even if the guest of honor hadn’t been the source of one of the first vomit-fountains of the evening.

      Technically that didn’t involve terrible food, because the desserts themselves (those that weren’t impacted by the splatter patterns) were really good. But it was a pretty terrible food-related event at a conference, so there you have it.

  255. Ann O'Nemity*

    I have two!

    First was a Young Professionals conference hosted by the local chamber. Lunches were served in labeled boxes. I picked “Chicken Philly,” to my regret. I took the box to a table, opened it up, and found a bun filled *maybe* 1/4 full with a gross gruel of chicken, carrots, and water chestnuts. I think it was some sort of leftover Chinese dish that they tried to pass off as a Philly without even bothering to heat it up. I cannot decide if the measly portion was a pro or a con – like it was obviously too little but then again, did I really want more of the gruel? The only other thing my box contained was a can Diet Pepsi, which I don’t drink.

    Second, I attended a women’s luncheon that Michelle Obama spoke at during her healthy eating initiative when she was the First Lady. We were served a plate of plain lettuce with nuts and no dressing. No dressing! Just lettuce and nuts. Our drink was sparkling water with mushy lumps of frozen strawberry. I saw people trying to scoop out the strawberries and put them on the dry lettuce to make it more palatable. Michelle Obama was a wonderful speaker, but sadly her message was undercut by the underwhelming meal. Like if that’s what it means to eat healthy, count me out. Even though our company paid $1k for our table and lunch, we had to stop for sandwiches afterwards because we were still hungry.

  256. Pocket Mouse*

    Sizeable high school track team in the early 2000s. The head coach was also the football coach, and he was in his first few years of coaching track in addition. He tried quite hard to turn the track team into faaaamily and, as a part of the effort, put on a grill day at one practice. He told the team about grilling up hamburgers and cheeseburgers and generally hyping it up a couple weeks in advance, so my friend and I (both vegetarian) went up to him and asked that there be something we could eat too. He said of course, and we left it at that. The day comes and we don’t see any veggie burgers, portobello caps, veggies to grill, or even side dishes of substance—just meat, buns, and burger toppings. We asked him if there were any veggie burgers (maybe we just didn’t recognize them, or they were in a cooler somewhere and he was waiting for us to get in line before pulling them out to cook?) and his response, verbatim, was: “Oh, yeah, there’s chicken for the vegetarians.”

    I think I’ll be shaking my head at that one for the rest of my life.

    1. cabbagepants*

      The chicken thing I can actually understand. The definition of “vegetarian” varies a lot with group/culture/subculture. Many Hindu vegetarians don’t eat eggs, for instance. In the US in the 60s/70s people for use the word “vegetarian” to describe someone who didn’t eat beef or pork but who did eat other animal meat.

        1. cabbagepants*

          Clearly that’s what it meant to that guy! I also have neighbors who describe themselves as vegetarian who still eat chicken.

          I get that it’s super, super annoying, but I think that linguistic prescriptivism is a losing battle.

          2. Pocket Mouse*

            Are you sure it isn’t highly regional, or some people being snarky/dismissive of those who didn’t eat red meat? I have to think that if that understanding was more widespread, there would be a lot more stories where chicken was offered to vegetarians in this thread.

              1. Pocket Mouse*

                Going ad hominem, eh?

                One, I literally asked if it was regional, which is an acknowledgment there may be different understandings among different groups of people. I don’t think it’s rude to ask if something is common on a local level even if it’s not common on a national level.

                Because two, I think my numbers observation is valid, and I agree with jane’s nemesis that probably there’s a pretty big difference in how the word was widely understood between the 60s/70s and the early 2000s.

                Three, Wikipedia doesn’t back up your argument up the way you think it does. Diets that include fish or poultry (but not red meat) are pretty clearly designated on that page as “semi-vegetarian”.

                But to the point of chicken, I honestly don’t think anyone, including people who think vegetarians eat chicken, would bat an eye at the phrase “get the meat off the bone” in the context of chicken wings or drumsticks. While the understanding that vegetarians eat chicken may have been, or even be, widespread in your individual experience, it’s a pretty unexamined idea, and yes, I would say it’s incorrect.

                1. cabbagepants*

                  You’re right, I should have pointed you and others to the “history of vegetarianism” page. I’ll put a link in a reply.

                  I didn’t meant it as an ad hominem — I meant a general “you” not a “you, Pocket Mouse.” Anyway, I’ll make my point differently. In my life, if I ask “will there be a vegetarian option?” plenty of people will, in good faith, point me to something that contains chicken, because these people are more familiar with the 60s/70s definition. These people are mostly a little older (50 years old +) though anecdotally I’ve also heard this definition is more common in the American South/Midwest. Also I recently made a dish containing mayo for my “vegetarian” friend only to learn that he follows a Sattivic diet and thus also does not eat eggs, even though he just uses the word “vegetarian” to describe his eating habits.

                  tl;dr as I interact with people who are not white Millennial Americans, I find that they use different definitions of the word “vegetarian.” Rather than arguing that they are wrong in their usage I find it preferable to be more specific about food inclusion and exclusion.

                3. Pocket Mouse*

                  @cabbagepants: Well, yes, there are various vegetarian diets, but the common link is that they do not include the flesh of animals. People who offer chicken as a vegetarian option feels like the food equivalent of Hanukkah balls: they’re trying, but it’s not their own experience and they’re not trying very hard, and as a result are just so off-base to the point of wrongness. I would bet good money that no one who offers chicken as a vegetarian option is themselves vegetarian. Like even your neighbors wouldn’t. I’d venture the chicken understanding is more common in the South and Midwest because vegetarianism is less common in those regions—that doesn’t make it valid or correct, it just means more people have an incorrect understanding.

                  As for your neighbors, I can see their approach as potentially reasonable. No one really needs to know the ins and outs of a person’s diet unless they are preparing food for that person, and it may simplify your neighbors’ lives to say that they’re vegetarian in any context where it matters. I do the same for some of my family members, because I guarantee telling them the full list of what I eat will muddy the waters and result in them serving me dishes I cannot eat. I agree that being more specific is helpful when a) it’s different from the standard understanding—yep, I’ll say it :)—of no animal flesh, and b) you’re telling someone who will be preparing food for you.

  257. GreenDoor*

    Not a conference, but a high-school debate meet that I was one of the judges for. The host high school had a culinary arts program and boasted that their students would be catering. Great! I fully support hands-on student learning! The tourny was on Saturday. The food was prepped during school on the Friday before. Everything looked great….until you got on top of it and realized that they just put the food in the fridge – on the serving trays, with nothing covering the food. Deviled eggs were dry. The fresh produce shriveled or went brown. The sauce on the baked chicken got a weird slickness to it. And so on. Everything tasted like the inside of a refrigerator. I felt so bad for the students – it should have been a point of pride for them. But their adult advisors did them (and we judges) dirty.

  258. Keiteag the bookseller*

    My high school reunion offered the choice of three entrees, lasagna, spaghetti with meatballs, and a rice casserole. Side dishes were fried potatoes and mashed potatoes. Rolls and cake. And one tiny bowl of salad. I’m diabetic and I know the reunion chairman is, too. That’s the last time I go to a high school reunion!

  259. Free Meerkats*

    SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) National Herald’s Symposium a few decades ago in a SF Bay Area college city that will remain unnamed. The dinner was roast chicken with period sides. The meal was at least an hour late; sides were great (IIRC pease and grains and posset for dessert), but everyone’s chicken was undercooked, and not just a bit.

    1. Dinwar*

      That one hurts. Literally the first person I met in the SCA was a cooking Laurel. Cooked our wedding feast, in fact (we had a Period wedding). At every event I’ve been to food was second only to the fighting in terms of what people got excited about! (Though I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to chocolate-covered meat…)

      1. Lenora Rose*

        Yes, in general, feasts are amazing – and while they can often run late it’s usually worth it and at least you get fresh.

        But once in a while…

      2. anon scadian*

        OK, I am *dying* of curiosity about the chocolate-covered meat, as I was always told that that chocolate as we know it falls well outside of the standard SCA period.

        1. Chirpy*

          Chocolate *just barely* falls in the SCA period for Europe, and only if you’re doing a 1500s Spanish persona/theme.

          Obviously if you’re doing a North/South America theme, you can have all kinds of drinking chocolate in-period, though.

  260. Minions and Onions*

    Pre-COVID, I attended a design-related conference nearly every year that was great about asking for dietary requirements. As I MUST eat gluten-free for medical reasons, I was always hopeful that there would be something safe for me to consume… and nearly every year, I was sorely disappointed. The hotel in New Orleans conflated gluten-free and vegan – I ended up with chips and an apple that day. Atlanta stacked their breakfast bacon on top of sliced bread to “soak up the grease”. Seattle had breakfast sandwiches and I was told I could just “take the bread off”. I could go on, but you get the idea. It’s demoralizing to be asked in advance, be told that breakfast and lunch is included, and then still have to fend for yourself at every meal. I get that it’s difficult, but why not just say “we can’t accommodate you” so I can plan in advance? Also, if I promise not to eat, can I get a discounted registration fee? Always loved having to tell submit that expense report… “Weren’t meals included? We’ll, yes, technically…”

    I’ve learned to 1) bring A LOT of safe snacks and 2) find a safe restaurant close by and make friends with the staff there. I lucked out in Atlanta and found a great place in walking distance that kept me fed nearly the whole conference.

    1. Fran*

      That is the worst part of it- having to explain when expensing it that yes, there was food but I couldn’t eat any of it!

  261. Chilipepper Attitude*

    I took a group from a Modern Orthodox Jewish HS to a Model UN every year with Yeshiva University. The first time, I asked and was told there would be vegan options. I was also told that only kosher food was allowed for the entire 3 days – they took over the hotel kitchen to kosher it, and all food had to come from that kitchen. I always bring some vegan granola bars when I travel, and I made sure to bring kosher ones.

    When I got there, there was lots of fruit, but the vegan food I got was a plate of iceberg lettuce! Or that was all they could come up with, as there was no vegan option. So fruit for breakfast for 3 days, fine. Iceberg lettuce for lunch and dinner for 3 days, no! I just left the hotel and walked to some local places to eat. But it was not easy because I had a large group of students and did not like leaving the hotel! I think there was something for me for dinner for one of the nights.

  262. formerphotog*

    Not sure if this counts exactly but I was at work technically as a wedding photographer. Some wedding venues were great about giving us the same meals guests were having (access to a buffet, ordering off the menu, etc.), but I once shot a wedding at a really fancy, high end event space and they led us into the back to sit with the videographers, DJ, and band members. They placed a round waiter’s tray full of weird leftover scraps of food (leftover cheese and crackers, pieces of chicken, a bowl of wilted lettuce) in the middle of the table we where we were sitting. They didn’t even give us plates.

    Another place once asked us to sit outside, in December with snow on the ground in the Northeast, with my boss visibly a month away from giving birth. We argued to be allowed to eat inside, but what they offered us was to sit in a hallway across from a coat check and eat dinner on our laps while the attendant stared at us the whole time.

  263. Beans*

    For grad student orientation they asked about dietary restrictions for a catered lunch. I put in for vegetarian. They decided to order from a different restaurant rehab they had selected originally and forgot to order anything I could eat. I wasn’t allowed to leave campus to get my own meal, so lunch was a tiny bag of chips, a pickle, and a cookie. There weren’t even extra sides because they had been provided one per person. 8 hours in a single room in a plastic chair and no food.

  264. BandKid*

    Not work, but college marching band. On game days we had to be there for 12+ hours with no opportunity to leave or order food elsewhere, so we were totally at the mercy of whatever food was ordered. Usually they were great with food restrictions but a few times… Not so much.

    -one time they forgot to order anything vegetarian at all. Those who didnt eat chicken ended up just eating the buns their chicken sandwiches had been on and nothing else.
    -Another time the food was left out in the sun during rehearsal, resulting in a special level of disgusting which ended with 3 people getting transported to the hospital for food poisoning. One of them quit band the next year.
    -Once they got a local company to cater noodles and chicken, a HUGE step up from the typical soggy sub sandwiches we got. Unfortunately, every single piece of chicken was pink. Just, fully pink and raw in the middle.
    -And finally, one year some Band Alumni offered to make Taco salad for the band one game day. By this quarter, a number of band members were down for the count with diaharrea and/or nausea… Taco salad was never served again.

  265. nojellybeans*

    I’m a musician and my band (a jazz big band with nearly 20 members) performed at a local music festival that also features big name musicians from out of town. We were the first act on the main stage, before the headliner later that evening, and our contract said they’d provide dinner.

    Until we showed up and they realized how many of us there were (apparently we read the contract but they didn’t…), then suddenly we weren’t allowed anywhere near the buffet, and it was only for the headliner.

    But we still had a “green room” (a tent that could fit 6 people max) with snacks: mixed nuts that one band member couldn’t eat because of their nut allergy, tea bags but no source of hot water, and something so inexplicable that it’s become a long running joke for our band: a piece of fresh ginger.

  266. Middle Aged Lady*

    A friend calls these meals ‘rubber chicken dinners.’
    At a work Thanksgiving event, the horrid IT guy set himself up in the breakroom in the morning of the meal to carve the turkeys. It took hours with the turkeys sitting out at room temperature because he kept breaking to chat and to eat bits off the turkey with his bare hands, then licking his fingers. It might have still tasted good but I wasn’t going to touch it after that display of bad food handling practices.

  267. Traffic Nerd*

    At a conference in New Orleans, all non-veggie/vegan attendees got salmon for the awards lunch. It’s a seafood town, fine, never mind that plenty of folks don’t really like fish, one of whom was at my table. Mine was raw on the inside, as was the non-fish eater and at least half the plates in the room, it turned out. Not medium-pink salmon, straight-up raw. I was pregnant at the time – I ate around the edges as best as I could to make it through the luncheon and had to go find more substantial food elsewhere. At least the dessert beignets were on point!

    1. Alisaurus*

      NOLA is known for seafood, but you’d think they’d have at least served a fish that’s native to the area! Maybe that’s why they didn’t know how to cook it.

  268. Peanuts*

    Remember the Peanut Corporation of America peanut butter salmonella outbreak in 2008/9 in the USA? The one that killed 9 people and made thousands more sick? The one that was due to terrible food safety violations on the part of the company?

    Well…let’s just say that two people were sentenced to 28 and 20 years (respectively) in federal prison for crimes including the bad food at a conference I attended in late 2008.

    Thankfully no one from our conference became critically ill, but it was a pretty miserable experience.

  269. Little Miss Sunshine*

    undergrad innovation conference at an ivy league school where my company had sponsored the event which began at 7 am. I attended as a rep of our business and the promised breakfast consisted of an orange and bottled water. no coffee or tea. we were dying. lunch was pizza brought in from campus catering. it was awful.

  270. Captain dddd-cccc-ddWdd*

    At a conference which a number of the people from the company had gone as a group – there was a mix up over whether there was a catered lunch (company for whatever reason thought there was, but there turned out not to be) so they hastily arranged to go out for lunch as a group, except one person got left out because “we need you to stay and cover any questions that come up or if anyone needs to call us from the office”, so she ended up getting absolutely nothing. I think “being the only person to get jack all” qualifies as a pretty bad ‘lunch’.

  271. The Ghost of Cable Street*

    I’ve spent 37 years eating conference food and its got worse. Three day events in the late 90s were chicken, salmon, maybe lamb but probably back to chicken. I can’t eat salmon en crute to this day or chicken in a gloopy white sauce.
    Lows have mainly been buffets but (dis)honourable mention to the Kensington Hilton in London, actually in Shepherds Bush, which served chicken breast with a “sauce” of Heinz tomato soup and I wasn’t the only person that said so.

    1. DaisyGJ*

      Oh that ties in with my most memorable ‘work event’ lunch in about 2010. We had a teambuilding day at a different Hilton (Queensway, London) and were told we would get a sandwich lunch.

      Lunch came out late, we had trays of salad (which was just mixed lettuce leaves) and three types of sandwiches: ham and mustard (so much hot mustard people found it hard to eat), lettuce, and pasta (yes, cooked pasta shells in bread, nothing to give some flavouring).

  272. Whistler's Mother*

    I had to attend a fancy reception for work at an art museum. The venue and food presentation were lovely but the food was a disaster. The organizers clearly spent a ton of money – prime beef, seafood, complex salads and soups and hors D’oeuvres, but no way to eat them. There were no low tables or chairs, just a few high top tables (for over 100 people) and no utensils! We all had plates of food but no where to put them and no way to eat them (this was not finger food!). Think long strips of beef and substantial pieces of salmon.

    Someone flagged a server and the (in-house) caterer seemed surprised we couldn’t eat the food. They finally brought out forks but no knives or spoons! Execs were trying to cut steak with forks (didn’t work) and creative staff poured soup into cups – all while standing. It was bizarre! I had to attend the same event the next year and thankfully they provided utensils AND tables to sit and eat.

  273. Managercanuck*

    A medical education conference. One breakfast was so weird. It was bagels, yoghurt, and hardboiled eggs. There might have been fruit as well, I can’t remember. I suspect the organizes didn’t want to buy a lot for a meal that typically isn’t well attended, but I felt sorry for anyone who was allergic to any of those things!

  274. Ann*

    This happened a few months after Hurricane Sandy. My husband’s office building flooded badly enough to close for a few months. The ground-floor shops were closed even longer. So a couple of months after the office reopens, a cafe on the ground floor also reopens and decides to inform the office managers for the many building tenants. The email came with a little freebie – a sandwich and a drink on the house the day of the reopening. I guess it wasn’t written very clearly. Judging by what happened next, the cafe did not expect one of the biggest tenants in the building to circulate the freebie offer to all staff. They decided to stand by the offer, but it wasn’t easy. There was an epic line of hungry municipal workers streaming in one door, and heading upstairs with food out the other door. Some were coming back around to stand in line for seconds. The cafe ran out of food before lunch even started, and had to close for the rest of the day.
    Well, at least now everyone knew that they’re back in business.

    1. Not Tom, Just Petty*

      The cafeteria did that in my office complex. But when they contacted the office managers, they had a plan. They controlled the insanity by having employees register in the morning. You didn’t have to pick your food, but you had to say you were coming and given a voucher.
      They did it once a week for four weeks. All the companies were hybrid so it worked out for whenever you came in.
      They said you were welcome every week. Most people did it twice. It went smoothly.

  275. Another academic librarian*

    Best advice I got when going to my first professional conference. When a meal is served, eat before. Bring a snack.
    The first thing I do after checking in at my hotel is find the nearest grocery store. (always get a room with fridge) I get milk, yogurt, granola, fresh fruit, a knife, paper plates, bowls, a baguette, good cheese, protein bars, water, nuts and dried fruit. I bring my own “pour over” coffee. If there is ready made stuff sometimes egg salad or whitefish salad or smoked salmon.
    The MOST annoying part is if a conference says it “provides meals” they are for the most part bad (sweet rolls and bagels for breakfast) inedible (coldcut buffet for lunch) unappetizing (a slab of chicken and wilted salad for dinner) then if a per-diem is available, my university will not pay it because “Meals were included in the conference fee”

  276. Woah*

    I have celiac and keep kosher. I’m basically never fed anything other than potato chips and whole fruit.

  277. Sciencer*

    A conference I went to earlier this year had a pretty good BBQ spread for the keynote presentation, which was a moderately famous public figure (so EVERYONE went). The caterers put the vegetarian option in front of the meat options in the buffet line. For this audience (college students and faculty), that was a really bad move. Tons of people took the veggie option AND the meat option because it all looked good and they weren’t afraid of jackfruit. Many, many vegetarian/vegan attendees simply didn’t get food. It was bad enough that the speaker joked about it in his presentation (I think he’s veg too).

    It was a great learning experience for us though! My colleague and I both have a solid mental note now to arrange buffets carefully.

  278. CiarraiV*

    Unlabeled food is definitely a vegetarian’s nightmare. Last year I attended a work conference at a very high end hotel. The vegetables and rice looked safe so I took a portion of each.

    Something was not safe. I was up vomiting for hours later that night because after being a vegetarian for over 35 years my system cannot process animal products. And then I had to drive 4 hours home the next morning still nauseous and worried I would have to hurl into a bag halfway home.

    1. NeedRain*

      Rice is a really common carrier of food poisoning, I found out a while back. There’s some kind of bacteria that loves it. I’d be more suspicious of that.

      1. desdemona*

        Vegetarian here – some restaurants LOVE to use chicken or beef stock to cook food items that would normally be vegetarian…like mac and cheese, or their mixed vegetables, etc.

  279. ragazza*

    Does no food count? I remember a job where we had a company-wide last-minute early-morning meeting. Think 7:30 AM or thereabouts. There was coffee and tea, but no food. I’m sorry, but if you’re going to make people make special arrangements to come in that early without a lot of advance notice, you better serve breakfast. Donuts at a minimum.

  280. Cedrus Libani*

    In my student days, I went to an intensive hands-on biology course. It was held over the summer, with attendees living in a dorm at the host university for two weeks. For reasons that are still unclear to me, the program held a reception at a fancy Italian restaurant nearby, but they didn’t have Italian food. Rather, they did the usual for an American outdoor event, with hamburgers and hot dogs. Turns out that Italian chefs aren’t used to making burgers…

    I woke up the next morning to find a trail of vomit running down the hallway. The trail ended at the bathrooms, which were so full that people had to take turns as they worshipped the porcelain gods. The trash cans had been pressed into service to provide additional capacity. They’d all been up since the wee hours.

    Also…it was a biology program, heavily focused on dissections. We would be spending the next few days working through the “big bag of dead animals”. The aroma was a bit challenging under normal conditions! The vegetarians were fine, as were myself and another omnivore who only ate the hot dogs, but everyone else was miserable.

  281. KayDeeAye*

    Our staff Christmas party always consists of a lunch, an activity or two, some holiday-ish remarks, and then everybody gets to go home early. One year we had it at one of those game/entertainment/arcade places with video games and pinball and mini-basketball hoops and so on. The plan was for us to gather in one of their group rooms for lunch and a few holiday-appropriate words, then we’d play a few games, and then we’d go home early.

    But there was some sort of major misunderstanding, because even though it started at noon and we had PAID for a lunch for 50-some people, they apparently thought that all we wanted were appetizers or something. Or maybe they thought we said “5” people rather than “50”? Because for 50-some people, they brought in one medium pizza and a chip and dip plate. Once we’d devoured that, they said, “Oh, you need more? Huh. OK, here.” And out came another medium pizza and maybe some wings and a raw vegetable plate.

    This took a full hour, by which time about half of the staff had managed to get one (very) small piece of pizza and maybe a couple of chips. I myself had “lunched” on one chicken wing and some carrot sticks.

    Anyway, the message eventually got to the kitchen that our group wanted – and had PAID for – lunch, not just a few nibbles, because after about an hour, they finally starting bringing out enough pizza and wings and things to feed us, and our Christmas party got a bit more cheerful. It took so long that we actually didn’t get to go home very early, though.

  282. MargeMay*

    This is at a charity auction I attended for work- does that count? A famous local restaurant known for serving large quantities of farm fresh was advertised as catering so everyone can excited and hungry. There were passed appetizers that looked like two small balls, which turned out to be barely cooked potatoes. Another appetizer was equally unpalatable, so people were pretty hungry when they sat down to dinner. For each table of 8, there were 7 small pieces of chicken and a bowl of salad to share. It was like the hunger games after people realized that was it and there was no additional food coming. At our table the first few people took two pieces not realizing there wasn’t more, so half the table didn’t get chicken at all. Also the bartender had no experience and was pouring the wine a centimeter from the top of the glass. People couldn’t even walk without spilling their wine. By the end of the dinner people were hammered and hungry. I left early but heard it ended in couple’s fighting, women puking, and wine just everywhere.

  283. Chris too*

    I went to an after work event put on to get a bunch of us from different companies together to learn about something – a “dinner and learn” if you will.

    There was a nice buffet but whoever arranged this was going with normal catering standards. They forgot to take into account that we were llama groomers. Llamas are big animals that don’t want to be groomed and we burn through a very large amount of calories during the day trying to make them look nice and pretty. A very large amount of calories indeed!

    You could see panic in the eyes of the hotel staff after the first table went through. There was a lot of discreet slipping back to the kitchen if you were bothering to look. I would have loved to see what was going on back there as they were obviously working harder than usual to try to keep the buffet filled.

    1. Anna*

      Okay wait are you actually llama groomers? Llama groomers is used as the default “don’t want to disclose what my job is” stand-in here it’s hard to tell. It would be awesome to hear from people with genuine experience grooming llamas.

  284. Bosslady*

    A conference I attended had a “Green Lunch” which I thought might refer to things that were environmentally friendly or vegetarian. Literally all the items were green and didn’t even really go together. Grapes, guacamole, some green peppers, and key lime pie. I don’t even remember everything on the buffet but it was bonkers. It must have been the absolute cheapest option for the meeting planners.

  285. Rebecca*

    This is a story of almost-bad conference food:

    My team was helping to plan a customer event and inevitably this meant choosing from the catering options the hotel and conference center provided. So for instance, you could choose from options like “coffee break” and then there were several choices for that – cookies and chips vs a fruit plate and yogurt selection.

    One of my colleagues was very health conscious and kept steering us toward “healthier” options while ensuring everyone’s dietary restrictions were accommodated. All fine and dandy. However, we were choosing the menu for one of the coffee break/snack periods and none of the options were healthy enough in her opinion. Not the fruit plate, not protein bars and bananas, not crudites and hummus…you get the picture. Her suggestion was to offer people a bowl of peeled hard-boiled eggs.

    A bowl. Of peeled. Hard-boiled. Eggs. Sitting on a table in the back of the conference room for hours, just making the whole room smell like farts.

    We chose the crudites, in the end

  286. Erin*

    At BlogHer years ago, they put out bacon with a gluten-free sign on it.

    …..Except the bacon strips were all sitting on slices of toasted bread.

  287. Alisaurus*

    In contrast to all these stories of not enough, this happened to me years ago.

    My first year at a new job, the upcoming staff Christmas party was announced and there was a big deal made about no dinner will be served/we’ll just have hors d’oeuvres/eat before you come/etc. Apparently previous years had featured full meals and they’d had to make some changes due to budget and a growing company. Okay, great, no harm done. A few people were upset there was no sit-down meal, but most of us were fine with it. I ate a full dinner beforehand at home, many coworkers made a date night of it since the venue was downtown and they had fancy dinners out before heading to the party. We all assumed there’d be small plates of appetizers circulating with the drinks…

    Well, whoever planned this had a very different idea of what constituted an hors d’oeuvre than the rest of us. There were multiple stations spread out throughout the venue, each one with a different fare: sushi, chicken and waffles, crepes, etc. I could easily have eaten from just one and had a very substantial, very nice dinner. As it was, almost no one ended up eating because we’d all filled up before as we’d been warned – several times! – by the party planners.

    I don’t know which wires got crossed, but I still regret not being able to eat more of the lovely-looking food.

    1. Scarlet Ribbons in her Hair*

      I’m wondering if the party planners planned it that way, so that they would get to take home the leftovers.

  288. Stacey*

    Another vegetarian story: Holiday party at a steakhouse. I’m not a very strict vegetarian, so when asked to select my meal in advance, I considered whether I should just go with one of the meat options given the likelihood that the veg option at a steakhouse would be bad. But our office manager/party coordinator is pretty good about dietary accommodations, so decided I could trust her judgement that the veg option would be decent. Fast forward to the day of, and the veg option presented to the multiple vegetarians in our group was steamed spinach, steamed asparagus, and steamed broccoli, all presented in their own little cups on a larger plate. Apparently they thought all the vegetarians in our group were babies lacking teeth.

    It wasn’t the office manager’s fault though! The steakhouse told her that the veg option would be a ratatouille vegetable stack.

    Also, the resolution to all this was the restaurant giving compensatory gift cards to all the vegetarians in our group…. because we all really wanted to go another round at the steakhouse. But hey it was a good regift for my inlaws!

    1. Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est*

      I had a work lunch like that. About a year after I’d left the job, one of my peers called and invited me to an informal lunch at a nearby restaurant his team was having. I’d worked with and was close to all of them, and I had the day off, so I made a trip of it.

      The (should have been hot) food came out cold, my order was forgotten entirely, and all of the cards and bills were wrong at the end. The 45 minute lunch was an hour over at that point. The manager came out and apologized profusely, comp’d all the meals, and handed out $50 gift cards to come back (I guess figuring that’s the only way we would come back). I handed mine to the peer I’d worked with the most with a broad smile, who was dumbfounded by the gesture. I told him that he’d steered thousands of hours of (desirable) overtime into my queue; it was the least I could do to repay that kindness (and I had no idea when I’d be back that way again).

      I’m not a vegetarian, but I’d still be bummed about being promised ratatouille and getting what you were served instead.

  289. Lainey L. L-C*

    Went to a 3-day training that was literally out in the middle of nowhere at a “resort.” (It’s put in quotes for a reason.) The resort was booked up for a conference, so we had to stay at a hotel about 30-40 minutes away, in an area that did have food options, so dinner and breakfast were ok. But lunch was a struggle. The training class let out for an hour lunch – at noon – the same time the conference had an hour break for lunch. The resort supposedly had 3 restaurants – 1 was open and all it had was a buffet of bland, overcooked not good food that cost more than our per diem. There were maybe 3 waitresses to bring drinks/checks, an entire resort-booked up conference amount of people, and us for the training. And there was nothing around for miles so you couldn’t get delivery from anywhere. The resort also put the training class in an old building that looked like it had been used for storage way off away from everything else, so by the time you walked to the restaurant, there wasn’t a lot of time to eat the gross over-priced buffet.

    We did get snacks, which was junk food – think chips, cookies, donuts, etc. We survived on that for lunch.

  290. Left Turn at Albuquerque*

    Mine is very petty in the grand scheme of things, but I’ll never forget the time the hotel hosting a conference I was attending served, as a morning snack, stale churros. That’s it; that’s the snack. Stale churros, with no sauce to dip them in and no beverage to wash them down with.

  291. Henry Division*

    Another vegetarian story!

    When I worked in publishing, we went to visit a printer as a way for my boss to show the three new employees (including me) the manufacturing process. The owner, who was showing us around, provided lunch in the break room . . . it was a few large deli platters, a kind of DIY deli sandwich deal. 3 of the 4 of us were vegetarians, including my boss who had arranged this meeting; I have to assume they didn’t even think to ask her about dietary needs. The 4th person had a great time making a sandwich, the other three of us made a single lettuce and shredded cheese sandwich each. It probably looked WILD that we had eaten basically none of what they bought for us.

  292. ProfP*

    Just back from a week-long conference in a country known for a meat-centric cuisine. They promised vegetarian/vegan/gluten-free options and indeed there was a separate counter during the lunches with meals that were vegan most days. But, they only ordered enough for the small-ish number of people who stated they were vegan, which meant that all the vegetarians were expected to eat the “regular” food, so when instead they went for the vegan option, there wasn’t enough of it. Plus none of the meals ever involved a green vegetable or any fruit, either the vegan option or the regular. Just some kind of stew and rice every day.

  293. Please Make It!*

    Spicy food for me. When the organizations asked for dietary restrictions/preferences I assumed they meant things like celiac or vegetarian. I tried to eat some salad, but that had jalapenos in it too. I was starving by the time this lunch was served after a full morning of workshops and presentations and no food/snack breaks. I ended up eating plain bread and desserts and feeling awful the rest of the day.

  294. JustaTech*

    The worst work food I’ve ever been served was at a multi-day training for some specialty equipment at the company headquarters in a light-industrial park (so no option to go out and find other food).
    This lunch, like all the others, was served in a conference room, and consisted of a regular main, a vegetarian main and a salad. I don’t remember what the regular main was (maybe a stuffed pepper), but it was so utterly inedible that everyone chose the vegetarian entre.

    The vegetarian option was plain, uncooked, refrigerator-cold tofu.

    With the prospect of cold tofu, that inedible thing, or nothing before another 4 hour training session everyone doused the tofu in salad dressing and made do.

    (Because this was a training session for specific equipment we were a random assortment of people from a dozen organizations, so had no real structure to try and figure out who, if anyone, should say something about the *terrible* food.)

  295. All of the Porks*

    There is a regular regional conference which circulates around various different northern UK towns and cities – they all blur together after a while.
    Except one, where the buffet food is always entirely pork based. Pork pies, sausage rolls, scotch eggs (wrapped in pork mince), ham sandwiches etc. A few years ago a small token bowl of salad started appearing, to everyone’s amusement.
    Given how standard vegetarian is, then throw into the mix religious reasons for not eating pork, plus vegans, health reasons – the mind boggles, then remembers to pack sandwiches.

  296. t-vex*

    I’ll never forget the outdoor, unshaded networking reception where the only vegetarian option was a hot grits bowl. In South Carolina. In August.

  297. Generic Name*

    Professional society in a major metropolitan area’s annual conference. When you registered, there was no way to indicate any sort of dietary restrictions. I am lactose intolerant, and am apparently pretty sensitive, so I can’t have most cheeses or butter in addition to milk/cream. This is often surprisingly difficult to accommodate for at restaurants, since the vast majority of entrees seem to have cheese or butter or cream in them (except for Asian food). Nevertheless, I was able to cobble together something I could eat for most meals, which were served buffet-style. Except for the capstone banquet. There was a single entree option, and that was chicken in a butter/cream sauce with mashed potatoes (which is usually made with butter and milk/cream, for those who don’t know). And the single option for dressing for the salad was ranch. So I ate a dry salad and tried not to look miserable. When it was clear I could not eat anything on the plate when the main course was served (I can’t even trust steamed veggies, since lots of places use real butter), I just got up and left. I was very surprised at how clueless this organization seemed to be. In our metro area, being vegetarian or vegan or gluten free is pretty commonplace. It’s actually pretty rare to see dairy free called out as an option, but I’m more than happy to have a vegan meal.

  298. Trippedamean*

    The most frustrating one I experienced was a conference I went to while pregnant. They provided lunch but the only food available was sandwiches that all had cold cuts on them and chips. (For those who don’t know, pregnant women are advised not to eat cold cuts due to the risk of contracting listeria.) Considering I had just discovered that the conference topic, while adjacent to my position, wasn’t going to be helpful to me at all, I was pretty frustrated.

  299. t-vex*

    Second story here: I ordered Panera catering to be delivered mid-way through a 3-hour business meeting. It never arrived though they swore up and down they sent it, the food was never found, and we cut the meeting short because everyone as starving. Never again, Panera.

    1. I Wish My Job Was Tables*

      Oh boy, screwed-up deliveries could be its own thread!

      Ages ago, when I was doing office manager work, I placed a special order for an employee with a dietary restriction, got a confirmation through a delivery app, settle in to do other work… and got a call 45 minutes later from the delivery driver saying “the restaurant isn’t here.”

      Turned out, the restaurant (which we regularly ordered from in the past) had shut down at some point, but hadn’t turned off its page on various apps and still had some way to approve orders. Driver arrived to find the door locked, the restaurant gutted, the phone disconnected, and a handwritten sign that said “OUT OF BUSINESS” taped to the glass.

      Order got refunded and we ordered a replacement meal for the person, but I never found out what happened. The restaurant got taken off the app, but it kept returning and being removed for a while.

  300. JustMe*

    When I was in the nonprofit world a local church would host a monthly lunch gathering for all the social service providers and churches in the community to network, share resources, and discuss local trends in poverty, homelessness, etc. Very nice idea but very grassroots. Lunch was always made by some church grandmas with a very meager budget. I think I remember once it was a giant bowl of popcorn with a paper cup for a scoop, homemade peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and paper towels from the church bathroom for plates. It was extremely nice and thoughtful but…I think the pastor saw “Free lunch!” as the draw and it definitely was not.

  301. David Levenson*

    Years ago we had a night technical supervisor who loved to feed “her boys.” She invited me up to join them for a cake she baked. As she lifted out the first piece, hair could be seen dangling from the bottom. Did I mention she kept horses? For years, “hair cake” was legendary.

  302. RIP Doc Potter*

    Many years ago…
    Undergraduate trip in the 1980’s to a geology field camp – traveling from the Northeast to Big Bend, Texas. 3 Days of steady driving in the college van. The professor LOVED McDonald’s, and was of course, driving. 8 out of 9 meals were at McDonald’s. The 9th was in a location where we could walk to another restaurant (he went to Micky-D’s). He always said “If only they served soup, it would be perfect.” I have never seen that many vegetables in the grocery cart of college students as when we were loading up in Texas for our campsite.

  303. Elizabeth West*

    I went to a sci-fi/fantasy convention once in Branson, Missouri, in the winter. If you know anything about Branson, you know it’s a heavily tourist-oriented town in the Ozarks, where the lakes are, and most of the things to do there are lake/summer-oriented. In winter, most of the town dries up and blows away.

    The hotel where the con was held had one restaurant. Choices around it were limited at best and hard to get to without a car (plus, if you left the con, you lost your parking space, which most people were not really willing to do). The food on their highly limited “winter menu” ranged from meh to utterly inedible garbage. The latter was the limp and soggy steam table breakfast buffet the last day — I tried, but it was so bad I opted to just drive the 30 minutes home and eat when I got there.

    Knowing they were going to get all that business from the convention, you’d think they would have tried a little harder, but no.

  304. Fran*

    A tale of two conferences…

    My colleauge got to go to the east coast of Canada at a smaller conference with free alcohol and great seafood with lots of dietary options and clearly labelled food. He had a great time.

    I ended up at a giant conference at a very touristy town in central Canada with no free drinks, no clearly labelled food and while there were lots of snack foods out for tea/coffee breaks, lunch/dinner was not good. The lunch had one seperate buffet for non-meat- for everyone who was hallel/vegan/vegetarian/celiac/gluten. How do you put us all together and don’t label anything? And pretty much only have halel chicken as the protien?!

    I’m used to my university which is usually great at listing all of the ingredients- mentioning who should be aware (i.e. contains wheat/nuts/meat/shellfish).

    Also, as some have mentioned, dealing with expense reports trying to claim a per diem when you had to go buy a lunch or dinner as not all meals were covered/you had to go buy something because you were starving!

  305. Anon for this*

    When I was a litigator, and pregnant, I went to several mediations and there was zero food I could eat. Except maybe salad (think, lettuce and tomato). The protein options were all things that needed to be heated to steaming for me to eat, but there was no microwave, and the salads didn’t have proteins, or if they did, they were the ones that were high listeria risk (chicken salad, egg salad.) God forbid if I had been a vegetarian. So I had to leave and get my own lunch because I couldn’t eat the expensive catered food.

    In a mediation. Where you are supposed to stay with your client all day even over lunch and coffee breaks.

  306. Dinwar*

    The worst I’ve had was a mandatory 3-hour environmental compliance training session. Not that I’m complaining about that–I wrote part of it!–but the coffee maker was busted. It was there, it just wouldn’t heat water. And the training started at 5 am. The kids pounding energy drinks were okay, but the rest of us–like 15-20 people–were not exactly thrilled.

  307. Strict Extension*

    I was once a speaker at a yearly function for a collegiate women’s group, the kind where membership is generally sixty and up. It was at a country club, and lunch was provided. They asked me if I wanted turkey or ham. I said I was a vegetarian. They said they could accommodate that.

    I was the only vegetarian, and I’m not sure the club had seen one before. My lunch was…well, you know those grocery store fruit platters you buy for parties with the sweet cream cheese dip in the middle? They took out the dip and turned one onto a plate. Just an absolute mountain of melon, strawberries and pineapple with a scoop of cottage cheese in the middle. Thankfully the fruit was pretty excellent, and I ended up eating the whole thing. So not actually the worst work food, but definitely the weirdest.

  308. Rikki Tikki Tarantula*

    Several incidents of this back at former ToxicJob:

    People from Office A were flown up to Office B, then bused to a weirdly isolated venue. Lunch was intended to be “healthy” and consisted of some lettuce with a 1/4 cup of chicken salad or something similar on top. And that was it. Especially difficult for people who’d gotten up at 4 a.m. to fly up to Office B. I remember that people were bribing one of the few coworkers who had a car to go drive to a convenience store and get something, anything for them to eat.

    People from Office A were flown up to Office B. Even though the Office A people arrived on time, Office B people had already eaten all the food and then they laughed at us when we had nothing to eat.

  309. Mairzy Doats*

    Holiday catering mishaps at my job over the years:
    • The caterer brought a microwave, along with four big, portable warming ovens … and an extension cord. Which they plugged into an outlet in our printing room. The circuit got overloaded and shut off the power on our end of the building. Yay! Great excuse to not get any work done while they were setting up.
    • One caterer provided a taste test, which included burger sliders. Are they sure they can provide sliders for 600+ employees? Sure they can! They arrived the day, of the employee event, unexpectedly, with a residential-sized grill. Our property required a fire permit ahead of time for anything open-flame. We’re lucky the fire marshal’s office was able to accommodate a last-minute request AND the grill passed inspection. However, they couldn’t cook the meat fast enough for the growing, hungry crowd.
    • Then there was the caterer that used a credenza in the hall to cut and plate desserts. But they didn’t clean the wall. Imagine frosting, cake, and pie filling providing a new mural in the office. Cleaning crew got the food off, but the wall had to be repainted due to the stains.
    • So many caterers over the years say they’ll have vegetarian/vegan options. Veggies swimming in butter does not count. Salad? One humongous bowl … and no extra … which ends up being long gone before people halfway in the line get to it.

  310. LabRat4Life*

    We had a work celebration lunch at a government agency, catered by a sandwich chain that sounds like a method of mass transit. We all got food poisoning and the entire office was out for nearly a week.
    Our government agency was the public health lab.

  311. Cheers*

    Not work-related, but really similar to some of the conference disasters.

    I went to a fancy beer tasting event at a brewery out in the country with some friends. Because it was a drinking event, there was a special bus option for people traveling from the nearby city (about 45 minutes away). We chose to pay for an Uber, which was actually cheaper when split between our group.

    Beautiful venue, tents for shade while standing in line for samples, some tables and seating, a view of the neighboring vineyards, and amazing, high proof, rare beers.

    There were 2 food trucks: barbecue and pizza. I can’t tell you if they were any good because both ran out of food halfway through the event. The brewery sold some snacks, like soft pretzels with cheese dip or trail mix. Small and expensive, not meals. Cell service was spotty, too, so getting delivery wasn’t an option, even if you could find a place willing to drive out there.

    I felt bad for the people stuck waiting for a bus. Our Uber driver was happy to stop at a drive-thru on the way home.

  312. fluffy*

    I was tabling at a local comics/anime/gaming convention which was hosted in a dying mall. On the first day of the convention, the organizers suddenly told us that we were getting free food! This was an unexpected perk and we were all surprised.

    To get the food we were shuffled into a tiny room in the back, where they put out a bunch of trays of random assorted things, mostly sides.

    It didn’t take long to realize that the food was full of ants. Apparently they had just gone to some of the still-around food court vendors and asked them for whatever food they were getting rid of.

    I ended up not eating it, and warning everyone else about it.

    1. fluffy*

      Oh, and much longer ago, I was once at a major conference for my industry (one that’s well-known even to random people who aren’t a part of it). One night the theme was “international food.” Which consisted of nachos and Bratwurst. Nothing else.

  313. Dimetrodon*

    Not a conference, but at one point a Very Large Company known for its excellent employee cafeterias invited a few representatives from our office to participate in a focus group. Over lunchtime. For two hours.

    We were provided with three (3) chocolate truffles per person (I don’t remember why) and at one point there was a fifteen-minute break during which we were able to go to the nearest kitchen and scrounge up nuts and granola bars so we wouldn’t faint from hunger during Part 2. I was on a low-carb diet at the time and ate a prepackaged hard-boiled egg.

    At least I got a nice water bottle of out the deal.

  314. Lunch Theft*

    This isn’t a bad food I was presented with at work, but a bad food incident story.

    I was in charge of a group of VIPs at an event-their schedule, ordering their meals, coffee runs, etc…but I was also helping another set of the staff that helped behind the scenes too. With their food pickups, running for copies, etc. I was working from 7am-11pm for three days. The VIP group all ordered off a menu and their lunch was called in and catered. One VIP was really upset their lunch order (some kind of roast beef) was wrong and didn’t mention it until the catering person left. I offered to get a new lunch sent over but the VIP declined saying, “It’s not a big deal really-your lunch looks good enough, we’ll just switch.” And they reached across the table and grabbed my lunch bag and took a bite of my sandwich before I could finish saying, “Well actually I’m a vegetarian…” They ate three bites of my sandwich and then threw it away and proceeded to eat my apple and chips and drink my coke. I had no food the rest of the day bc I was planning on eating half the sandwich for lunch and half for dinner.

    The real kicker was when I went over the VIP menu orders to figure out how the lunch order got messed up to only discover the caterer didn’t mess up any orders. That VIP lunch order was exactly what they circled from the menu-customized as they wanted.

    I’ll never understand why this person felt compelled to steal my homemade veggie sandwich. ‍♀️

  315. No Bees On Typhon*

    I was once at a small annual scientific conference that’s known for its superior catering. The morning session included several talks about Salmonella food poisoning. The chicken option at lunch actually looked really good, but hardly anyone ate it…

    (There was also a very tasty salmon option at lunch, then the afternoon session included talks about salmon farming. Everyone agreed they should have done the morning and afternoon talks in the opposite order).

  316. Hosta*

    It was a day long meeting for geology and environmental students to hear talks from reps for oil/coal/ various kinds of power companies. Many of us were stylish but a significant portion were extremely informal. Birkenstocks were big and so were cargo pants and dreds. We looked exactly like people who would happily spend three days pooping in the woods for a chance to find a cool rock and getting to poop in the woods.

    Beforehand, one of the teachers had given us the tip to dress well and carry a copy of our resume.

    So there we were, awkward in our nicest clothing, suits and blouses. Each of us had a bag of nice folder for our resume. Students from other schools had also recieved some version of the talk because they were equally eager to make a good impression.

    Breakfast was coffee and baked goods.
    Lunch was a cruel trick.

    Pizza and wings. The pizza came in two flavors: pepperoni that had curled up while cooking so that each pepperoni held a little cup of its own oil, and cheese that was also unaccountable greasy. The wings were barbecue or hot wings and were already sauced. Did you want a side? Put those wings alongside your slice of pizza and figure out how to eat while standing and holding a can of pop. The cheese pizza went fast, leaving many of us to degrease our pepperoni by gently tilting it on one side and then dabbing it with a napkin that never had a chance. One guy figured out that he could do a better job by sucking the oil out of each pepperoni first, an image I want to forget, but can’t.

    We were angry and distressed, but the speakers were furious. I’m pretty sure that one of them got grease on his very nice suit.

    Later, I remarked on how many of us were wearing black when it was normally wore dye or earth tones. It turned out we were evenly divided between funeral clothes and what we wore to the last wedding we attended.

    1. Dinwar*

      We have A Look, don’t we?

      I remember once driving to a paleo field trip with the kids. I had a name and phone number for one of the organizers, and a location to meet at. The kids were scared I wouldn’t find them. Took me thirty seconds. You can just tell.

  317. mrs whosit*

    This is so small, but a school I worked at used to order the most delicious food from an Italian place for us to eat the night of parent-teacher conferences. Which meant that in our 10- or 20-minute break that evening, we were all trying to saw off pieces of roasted chicken quarters with plastic knives in a room without enough seats and then dash back for the next conference. Lovely choice, hapless planning.

  318. Ron McDon*

    The first time I attended off-site training (about 26 years ago) I was quite excited – a chance to get out of the office, meet other people in similar roles at other companies, free lunch…

    I put my dietary requirements down as vegetarian on the booking form, and checked in the day before the training to double check they’d booked my vegetarian meal.

    When the lunches were being served, I declined the plate being offered to me, saying ‘I’ve booked a vegetarian meal’. The waitress I said this too looked very surprised, went out of the room, and soon a cluster of wait staff were deep in conversation. Their manager then came over and said ‘we haven’t got you down as needing a vegetarian meal’.

    I explained I’d put it on the booking form, and confirmed it again the day before. The manager looked visibly frustrated and said ‘I’ll see what I can do’.

    So everyone else had a delicious, hot meal (of what, I can no longer remember), whilst I was given 4 Jacob’s cream crackers (the driest crackers on Earth), no butter/margarine to spread on them, and a block of very poor quality catering cheese to slice with a blunt knife and lay on top.

    It was awful!

  319. No Bees On Typhon*

    I was once at a conference in Tokyo where they gave us these incredibly elaborate bento boxes for a working lunch discussion on the first day. The non-vegetarian option included a whole tiny octopus. It was delicious, but highly disruptive to the work that was supposed to be happening… almost everyone was taking photos of the food, and someone at another table was trying to make my friend laugh by waving their octopus in her face and doing Admiral Akbar impressions.

  320. Storm in a teacup*

    I was at a 3-day European scientific meeting in Germany a few years ago and about 25% of the attendees were from the UK.
    Every break time there were lots of self-serve coffee stations and only 1 station for tea. At the tea station there was only Lipton yellow label which isn’t the strongest tea and you couldn’t serve yourself. There was a very proper gentleman who would insist on making your tea by first adding the water (which ran not hot enough), then milk then the teabag. Because it was Lipton, the tea stayed a horrendously week pale cream and didn’t brew properly. It didn’t matter how much we insisted bag first, no milk etc… he blithely ignored us and carried on his own way.

    PSA: DO NOT, I repeat, for the love of all that is holy, DO NOT GET IN BETWEEN A GAGGLE OF BRITS AND A PROPER CUP OF TEA

    The first break: everyone was a bit nonplussed but gently amused and it became a talking point over lunch.
    Break two: there were a few tuts from the more vocal of the group.
    Break three: a few of us snuck out of the last session early to get to the station before the tea-man. We did! It was great! Until he came and gave us all a disappointed glare and we spent the rest of the break a)saying sorry a lot and b) gleeful at our rebellion.
    Break 4: Brits quietly sobbing in corners at the lack of proper tea
    Break 5: thankfully home

    I now always travel with my own teabags

    1. UKDancer*

      My mother and I go to a spa hotel in Austria every year in summer and she always brings her own teabags because the German ones aren’t strong enough for her at breakfast. The staff there all think this is hilarious.

      I am hugely fond of Germany and Austria, had fun living there and love being on holiday there, but they really can’t make a proper cup of tea in my experience.

      1. Storm in a teacup*

        To be fair at least they offer tea.
        US is the worst as most hotel rooms only have coffee machines so one can’t even make tea with bags from home.

  321. GovSysadmin*

    I used to attend an annual IT conference that moved around the country, so the quality of the food varied each year, depending on the venue the conference was held in. Most years, the food was at least pretty decent, but one year set the low bar for conference food: the salad cones.

    This conference always had an exhibitor hall, and they would usually have at least one of the meals served each day in the hall, to force attendees to walk past and hopefully interact with the vendors who ended up covering a lot of the costs of the conference. A lot of hotels would do those meals as small plates / appetizers, so you could walk around and talk to the vendors while you were eating.

    That year, we walked over to where the food was set up to find not serving trays filled with food, but a long plastic bar with lots of holes in it, each of which contained a salad cone. These were paper cones filled with a few leaves of lettuce, maybe a crouton or bit of cheese, and no dressing. No plates were provided for that meal, so I gather they expected us to just grab the cones and walk around, eating them like it was ice cream. There was some dressing you could pour on top, but then you would be walking around with a soggy cone dripping salad dressing.

    We all ended up going somewhere else to eat, which was annoying, because as government employees, we get a per diem each day for food rather than expensing meals. If food was provided by the conference, the per diem would be significantly reduced, so we ended up having to spend our own money for dinner that night.

    The upside of it all was a story that we all still tell at conferences, and the ability to say “well, at least it’s not salad cones” when someone complains about conference food.

  322. Ex-prof*

    I went to a conference way out in the woods once where they made a huge fuss the first night about choose-your-own pasta; you select the ingredients and cooks will then cook it in front of you.

    When I saw the pasta was being fried up in teflon-coated pans with half the teflon scraped off, I fled, drove 20 miles to the nearest town and found the lone restaurant there was a McDonald’s. Since I eschew burgers’n’fries, I had an ice cream.

    That was the last we saw of the cooks. For the rest of the conference, something would appear at every mealtime in Costco packaging. A bag of bagels and a tub of cream cheese at breakfast time. A tray of ham sandwiches at lunch time.

    The last night the organizers organized s’mores, which was the only decent meal we had all week.

  323. DreamingOfWinter*

    Technical product conference that ended up being mostly a three-day sales pitch (but with such good swag). Lunches were dried out pre-wrapped sandwiches consisting of two slices pf bread, one or two slices of meat, and a handful of mustard and mayo packets. Plus the option to grab a small bag of chips at the end of the buffet. I can’t remember dinners, maybe we were on our own for those.

    I’m spoiled, my own company hosts conferences with *amazing* food, true vegan options plus something for just about everyone else and always at least three selections of tiny adorable desserts. I may walk three times as much but I eat enough to make up for it!

  324. Pasghetti*

    Not a conference, but I used to work in film production. On one show, the catering company served spaghetti as the side at lunch every. single. day. It didn’t matter what the entree option was, the spaghetti was themed to match. So we had greek spaghetti, taco spaghetti, etc. Luckily, I was on the crew that was setting up and tearing down sets, so we weren’t at the same location as everyone else, and once we noticed the pattern we made excuses to eat out as often as possible…”Gosh, we’re not gonna make it back to set for lunch today, guess we’ll have to expense some fast food again. What a shame.”

  325. Lorraine*

    Block of tofu for the vegetarians. Not cooked, no sauce or seasoning. Just a 2x4x2 block of tofu on a plate.

    (One of our vegetarian directors immediately speared hers on a fork and wobbled it around at the waiters until they could find us some sides. But I still went hungry that night.)

    Also – last September. Conference made mention of covid-precautions (our workplace had been fairly covid conscious all pandemic.) I checked in specifically with all the conference organizers that all meals would be out of doors. First dinner: in a building, lined with windows, but none open. I opened all the ones by a table in the back near me, rudely jumped to the front of the buffet line and INHALED my plate of food in under 5 minutes in a manner that certainly didn’t do my networking or professional reputation any favors. At least every meal after that was outdoors or had optional outdoor seating.

  326. Michel*

    I once organised a conference for about 40 people from various European countries for a charity I worked for in the UK. We had a fairly decent budget but still it was a charity and anything I didn’t spend on this could go to something else, so when one of our Trustees offered to sponsor the lunch along with the venue (a meeting space in the office of a major corporation), I happily accepted. As the venue was a high profile publicly traded entity, and it was the first time I’d ever organised an event like this, I guess I just assumed it would be a nice lunch and didn’t ask a lot of questions, so imagine my horror when lunch was wheeled in and consisted SOLELY of very soggy egg sandwiches on the cheapest bread imaginable. This was accompanied by cheap boxes of concentrated supermarket orange juice. That was it. There were no other meal options, side dishes, dessert, anything, that was literally it.

    To top off the mortification, this was part of a series of rotating conferences and all of the other host organisations had beautifully presented local cuisine – full buffets of meats, cheeses, veg, seafood, you name it – when it was their turn. Everyone was too polite to never mention it but I wanted to sink into the floor.

  327. RetiredAcademicLibrarian*

    Not a conference, but a “road scholar” bus tour that the midwest university would host for new faculty so they could get familiar with the state. One of the lunches was on a family pig farm, where we toured the barns before lunch. My seat mate on the bus was a new theater professor from the East Coast who was vegetarian. The lunch provided was pulled pork sandwiches, baked beans with bacon, green salad with ham and bacon bits, and watermelon. Watermelon slices are not the most filling meal, and we were on a rural farm, so there was no heading off for a vegetarian lunch elsewhere. Dinner that night at another location was chicken; my seat mate got the sides: rolls, broccoli and baked potato.

    1. Lulu*

      As a fellow vegetarian (and fellow academic librarian…) I have to say that while I expect meals at places like conferences to have a wide range of options that are comparably tasty and filling to the meat option, travel is sometimes a different beast. I’ve eaten okay at North Carolina fish camps, camping in the Rockies, and at Texas Roadhouse. Did I think it was the best food? No. But I got to participate in places and with people that I wouldn’t otherwise, and sometimes the meal isn’t the point. That said, it can be handy to travel with some granola bars for when you’re stuck with a dinner of watermelon.

  328. Jess*

    Pretty small-scale incident, but I’ll always remember it: about a decade or so ago when I was working as an admin, I was responsible for getting in lunch when we hosted training or meetings. Our organisation included a cafe who did catering, so I’d usually order some platters of wraps etc. from them – always good, and they’d deliver it to us.

    One day we were hosting a meeting (I want to say that it wasn’t just training, it was with People We Needed To Keep Happy), and as the morning wore on I wondered were our food was. I called to check on the delivery and…it turns out the guy I always emailed our orders to had been on leave and NO ONE WAS CHECKING HIS EMAILS. Our order had never been organised. I’m sure anyone in a similar position can imagine the way my stomach dropped as I realised what had happened.

    I put in a phone call to a local French bakery, who earned my eternal loyalty. They quickly put together a box of the most amazing filled rolls and sandwiches, along with slices etc. for a sweet treat, and had it ready in the time it took me to leave the office and drive ten minutes down the road to them. Problem solved, and I developed a healthy distrust of any orders I placed that I didn’t get confirmation for…

  329. SB*

    I have a bunch of allergies which I always alert them ahead of time, however I also have blanket permission from my manager to put any meals I need to on my credit card because I have never once been to a conference where I was able to eat every meal they served me. My allergies aren’t complicated or unusual, just plentiful – shellfish & bivalves, latex (which includes fruit & vegetables from plants with white stick sap like avocado, banana, figs, kiwi, strawberries, etc) & mushrooms. Thankfully I am not anaphylactic, I het get an uncomfortable rash & my mouth & tongue become itchy so I don’t die when they invariably mess up.

  330. Envee*

    I served on the board of a local bar association, and I was the only vegetarian. The executive committee always ordered food for meetings and events, and every time there was nothing I could eat. After too long of being hungry at dinner time meetings, I gently asked them if they could accommodate vegetarians. The following meeting, they ordered a bunch of meat … and a salad. Just green salad with a few tomatoes, Italian dressing. They meant well, but :/

  331. Warrior Princess Xena*

    I still can’t decide if this was on us or on the food place. Our office hires new staff and interns on set time tables, and will assign each new hire a ‘buddy’ to be a source of information for them during their first few months. They also give us some expense budget for buddy lunches. Well, a bunch of us decided to order from a local sandwich place. This is where our slipup happens, because it went from 2-3 people saying ‘let’s all order sandwiches!’ to nearly 30 people ordering and we didn’t call the sandwich place ahead of time. OK. We ordered around 9:00 to have delivery around 11:30, which the sandwich place’s website was saying they could do. 11:30 rolls around. 12:00 rolls around. 12:30 rolls around. Finally at nearly 1:30 the sandwiches arrive. People are getting hangry so there’s something like 30 college age people hanging out in the kitchen just waiting for their lunch. We open the boxes, and absolutely nothing is labeled. They didn’t put people’s names or the names of the sandwiches. We had to basically look at the cross sections and hope for the best. It did not go well and that place has gone on the office list of “places to not order from”.

  332. Nope, Not Me*

    Weird pseudo-camping trip in the middle of a state park, but at a resort that hasn’t been updated since it was built in maybe the 50s.

    The CEO-equivalent was a vegetarian and had to eat a plain bun for lunch one day. They ran out of food if you didn’t get it fast enough, because they just plain didn’t serve enough. I’m not sure who minded not getting a serving of gluey pasta, greasy flavorless mystery meat tacos, or scrambled eggs masquerading as flan. They served a coconut dessert with a known allergy, and the gluten free wasn’t. Most of us lived on snacks we’d brought or visited the single, tiny bar with off hours that served food.

    This was 2022.

  333. Where’s the Orchestra?*

    This one was mine:
    Worst conference food I ever had to deal with was the conference that didn’t think about the need to accommodate those that can’t eat seafood. Three day conference, lunch and dinner provided and every single meal was shellfish of some variety. No vegetarian options, no shellfish free options (though with the quantities of shellfish they were prepping I wouldn’t have trusted the kitchen anyways) – just scallops, crab, shrimp, crawfish, lobster as far as the eye could see. I had to leave for every single meal because of a lack of food.

    The saddest part – it was a three day conference on religious, allergy, and disability accommodations in Public Schools, in a completely landlocked state. Major fail. There was about five or six of us eating McDonalds every meal for three days because it was the only option even remotely close for food.

  334. AliceBD*

    Celebratory work outing to mark the new website, where I had done a TON of the work. We parked at work and did some kind of carpool or bus (I forget details) to get to the restaurant, because parking was hard there. I can’t have tomatoes, because they upset my acid reflux and make me nauseous (can lead to vomiting), and I mostly drink water for the same reason. We went to a brewery where the food options were almost all tomato based. Food options had been brought in special for our event so there was no kitchen I could go ask. My boss was in the same boat because the food was also covered in cheese, which she couldn’t eat. So we just sat there in an overloud room while coworkers got drunk and were bored and hungry.

  335. nonprofit llama groomer*

    I went to a conference in a very food-focused city in the South (USA). They didn’t provide meals, which was fantastic for people who wanted to eat all the food in the city. Unfortunately, they only allowed an hour for lunch between sessions. If your session went over or you wanted to stay late and ask questions, you ended up having to eat at the Starbucks in the hotel or something similar or miss out on the next session.

    Definitely not the end of the world, but a bit frustrating.

  336. TeoD*

    My company had a conference in Phoenix and the tap water tasted like … burning? Like not only was it undrinkable from the tap but the ice water served during the conference was the same. And at an event in the desert that was heavy on the alcohol, water was key. It was all the employees could talk about (esp bc we couldn’t expense the bottled water)

    Fortunately, it was all the attendees could talk about, too, and they had the power to get bottled water served at meals, at least.

  337. Subs Please*

    Academic conference- they decided to serve soup for lunch (as the only entree!) when it was 90 degrees outside. It was incredibly unappetizing! They also covered everything in cheese, which was terrific for dairy-free people.

  338. Godbert*

    Employee Appreciation Lunch at a hospital, for all employees (clinical and office/non-clinical staff). The C-suite made a big deal of this, starting a full two weeks in advance. Managers were instructed to remind their employees not to bring lunch on a specific day, because the hospital would be providing lunch that day at noon.

    The day comes, and there’s no indication of where the employee lunch is going to be held. No flyers, no announcement. Well, they’ll probably tell us when it arrives, right?

    Noon rolls around. No announcement. Hungry nurses start calling other floors for information, since they can’t just all walk off at once for lunch, they need to take turns so that the others can stay to take care of the patients.

    At 12:15, the PA system booms with an angry voice yelling: “THE EMPLOYEE LUNCH IS CANCELED. >CLICK< "

    There was never any explanation or apology.

  339. Kez from Oz*

    At an internal work event I gave the caterer concise, clear details about my dietary issues (Low FODMAP, which is complicated, but I’ve gotten good at giving caterers something they can work with). For morning tea I got a box with three kinds of cheese and crackers plus there was a general fruit platter. I was delighted, I love cheese. I became less delighted when lunch was an identical cheese and cracker box and afternoon tea another identical cheese and cracker box. I was probably served around 200g of cheese across the day and not much else.

  340. KT*

    Every single corporate conference I go to with my current company. Every. Single. One. They have the option to provide any allergies (I have a few food and preservative allergies).

    The first time, I provided all my allergies, got to the event, and…. nothing. One of my allergies is dairy products. Every single sandwich on the lunch spread was on brioche bread and had cheese. Every single salad was pre-dressed with a creamy dressing. I asked the event organizer about it and she said they’d accommodated my allergy, and pointed out the soy milk in the coffee line.

    The second time, I provided all my allergies, emailed the organizer and reiterated all the hidden places my allergies could hide, and was assured that it would be fine, they could accommodate my allergies. That time they had allergen cards in front of every food item, detailing which of the “Big Ten” allergens (including dairy) were in the food. Great. Cool. Everything still had dairy in it.

    The third and most recent time, I provided all my allergies, emailed the organizer, her boss, AND the catering lead, reiterated all the places my allergies could hide, and sent screenshots of what to look for on nutritional packaging for some of the preservative allergies. Got there and everything had dairy in it. Again. So I ended up going to my boss and explaining the whole deal and just getting permission to buy my own food for these conferences for the foreseeable future.

  341. Other Alice*

    Once, the org I volunteer for was helping staff a large event. We were working all of Saturday, for free, and in exchange they had promised us lunch. For other similar events we’d had sandwiches, trays of pizza, and my favourite was when an event had given us vouchers for a nearby buffet restaurant and we’d had a proper hot meal. This event, long after lunchtime, sent us a tray of plain focaccia bread. There were more volunteers than slices of focaccia. We did not offer to staff this particular event again.

    I do think the absolute worst are group lunches at my current job. The person in charge of organization is lovely, but chooses locations and menus based on where she would like to eat rather than what works for the group. A few months ago we had a set menu with no vegetarian options and found out at the restaurant that a new hire was vegetarian. No harm done, the kitchen made him some pasta with tomato sauce rather than the meat sauce. But then again this month we had a group lunch and again we had no vegetarian option… and new hire is still here, and still a vegetarian… and we also had an important guest from HQ, who’s also a vegetarian… It keeps happening, and it annoys the restaurants that we send dishes back and ask for modifications that would have been so much easier to sort if the organizer had told them in advance that we have two vegetarians as well as one person who can’t eat dairy and one who can’t eat strawberries. She can’t get it right even though it’s mostly the same 20 people every month, with a guest here and there…

    1. Other Alice*

      My brother disagrees and claims the worst was when he was sent to a remote job site for 2 weeks. He had to live in corporate housing and eat all his meals there, because it was so far from the nearest town. Food was curry, every meal, always the same curry. By the end he was figuratively and literally sick of it. He travels a lot (mostly Asia & Africa) but says this was by far the worst, to the point his company complained to the client and afterwards he got a bonus as compensation for the bad conditions. And this was not a poor country as you might imagine, just one that treats workers very badly.

  342. roisin54*

    I was at a 3-day national conference for my field last year, which 10,000 people attended. The conference center was located in something of a food desert, and the vendors at the venue did not open until halfway through day 2. Despite food trucks being very popular in the city the conference was in, and there being a large plaza at the venue where they could’ve parked, none were arranged to provide food. Our only options were the tiny cafe at the conference hotel and 2 (very small) eating establishments nearby. All three places were completely overwhelmed by hundreds of hungry conference attendees at lunch, and orders were so backed up that many people had to leave without their food in order to get back to the venue for the next session. Somehow I was lucky enough to get my burrito in enough time to eat it while walking back to the venue.
    Then there was the truly disgusting breakfast at a special session that was comprised of various unidentifiable things with weird textures that absolutely no one finished. Snacks were eventually provided in the exhibit hall, but it was mostly hugely caloric baked goods. I was so desperate for something nutritious that I devoured two whole apples the day they put them out.

  343. Chicken Nightmares*

    housing conference in Michigan and for some reason they served SKIN ON, BONE IN barbecue chicken, buffet style, as the main entree. Imagine the poor workers having to clean up and dispose of THOUSANDS of plates of chicken discards.

  344. Ms. Characterized*

    Professional teacher’s conference: “continental breakfasts” that were sponsored by hugely wealthy educational companies (think textbook publishers or tech tool companies) consisting of weensy trays of grocery store mini-muffins and sad, small croissants alongside coffee that ran out within 15 minutes of its arrival. The conference charged roughly $70 per sit-down meal as part of the registration. After the sad, wee carbohydrate and four hours of morning sessions we were starving for a hearty lunch.

    It was…a salad. A small, run-of-the-mill Platonic ideal of a Marie Callendar’s ‘dinner salad’. If you ate meat, *sometimes* an anemic chicken breast the size of a small sponge perched atop your iceberg lettuce and bagged salad carrot shreds. If you didn’t, then just the lettuce for you. Protein was a privilege.

    My colleague and I had been there before, so we knew what to expect. When the people we were sitting with started looking around for further service, we had to regretfully inform them that the salad and small dessert already on the table were it. Their expressions wilted like the lettuce on their plates. SEVENTY DOLLARS.

  345. Blue Horizon*

    When I was a grad student, the department used to put on lunch seminars from visiting professors and the like, and serve pizza (everyone knows the secret to getting grad students to attend is to feed them).

    Only this was Rhode Island, where ‘pizza’ can sometimes mean a kind of thick focaccia-like bread spread with a layer of tomato sauce, cut into strips and served cold. Or all the time, if the admin doing the catering happens to like it (which apparently ours did).

  346. Megan*

    This isn’t the worst compared to other’s stories here, but I went to a training event that had a fancy steak welcome dinner. Everyone received a large chunk of steak that was very thick, but no steak knives. Everyone only had butter knives, so like our whole table was shaking from everyone trying to cut a thick steak with a butter knife with barely any edge to it. On top of that, it was advertised as medium on the menu (you could pick steak, chicken, or vegetarian option, but all but 2 people chose steak), but was served medium-rare.

  347. ?*

    my sister was volunteering for a nonprofit organization and she and another lady were charged with providing food for about 75 of the non profit volunteers… who volunteer a lot of their time for this organization. so the expectation is reasonably nice food… nothing overly fancy. the lady my sister was working with instited she would handle it and had an excellent idea for it that everyone would love.
    it was #10 can chili from Sam’s and Frito chips. and that was all. my sister was so embarrassed serving it to the volunteers.

  348. The Taco Bar of Kings*

    I work for a government agency that doesn’t have an especially lavish budget, so our conferences don’t provide food. Traditionally, the bigger regional offices will each book out a restaurant in the area for a staff dinner on the first night, and we each chip in a certain amount. One year, the place our office picked put out a taco bar in lieu of anything on their regular menu. Fillings on offer included, and were limited to, unseasoned chicken, unseasoned hamburger, a tray of lettuce and tomatoes, a dish of guac, and some grated cheese. There was enough for all the meat-eaters to have one taco before they ran out of meat. The vegeterians were left just spooning lettuce, cheese and guac onto smashed up taco shells (until we ran out of guac too). For this feast of emperors, we paid $60 per person.

  349. GarnishesAndInfusions*

    I’m allergic to raw tomatoes and I once went to a conference where they served all the meals buffet style with about 90% of the dishes topped by a random garnish of diced raw tomatoes. Every meal. Pancakes with diced tomatoes. Grilled chicken with diced tomatoes. Roasted carrots with diced tomatoes. It was awful and they wouldn’t provide alternatives. I existed mainly on buttered rolls and dessert for four days.

    Runner up was the conference where they decided the only water they’d provide either at meals or in conference rooms would be inundated with either fruit or vegetables (think 1 part fruit or veggie to 3 parts water in a big jug that clearly had been allowed to infuse for a day or two). There was one option at each meal and in each conference room (same all day). Blueberry water was the absolute worst, but they were all dreadful. Interestingly, they had no fruit and limited veggies at meals – they used them all for the water!

  350. Chester*

    I still laugh about an all-day conference from about 2012 or 2013. Very low-key, my sector has a wide mix of government, nonprofits, some companies, a lot of freelance and startups. It was held at a local government conference center, obviously pretty budget-conscious. The goal was definitely networking, not a lot of free swag.

    The lunch, to be eaten indoors at the round tables with table cloths, was picnic food – a buffet table as we filed into the dining hall. A sandwich in a box, grab a can of beverage, a fruit, and here’s a lot of individual bags of chips you can choose from.

    The bags of chips had come in those multi packs with many different brands and flavors. Potato chips – ok. Corn chips – ok. Cheetos? Like, the puffy stuff covered in cheese dust? Those are my favorite!

    Thank you to the goddess of wisdom who touched my head and reminded me that having fingers covered in cheese dust during a networking lunch would be an extremely poor choice! At that point I grabbed regular potato chips- still greasy but at least can be managed with my napkin – and sat down at a table. I knew I had my entry to making friends or at least being comfortable being the first one to talk at a table of strangers:

    “did you see the Cheetos?! at a networking lunch?! can you imagine – ” here I mime licking cheese dust off my fingers, then sticking my hand out for a shake – “hahaha don’t worry! I got the chips!”

    It was a great conversation opener.

    1. ThursdaysGeek*

      Which is why you should always take chopsticks with you, as they work great for eating Cheetos.

  351. Bashmelia*

    I attended a conference for childbirth educators several years ago. The conference was interesting and the food was actually presented beautifully, was delicious, and there was enough it! The problem was that two days later I was posting on Facebook about how sick I had been the past couple of days. My co-worker told me that educators who had attended the conference from all over the state were calling in sick and there was no one to substitute their classes. So basically we all got food poisoning from the conference and there were no classes that week.

    1. Shutterdoula*

      I remember that! One was so sick she got an obstruction and had to have surgery. And the venue claimed it came from “the hospital” even though educators came from over a dozen different hospitals, and some didn’t even work in hospitals.
      They never had that conference there again.

  352. Sabrina*

    Being a vegan at a conference in France o knew it would be tricky. I ended up at a fancy dinner with a bowl of pureed cucumber as my dinner …

  353. allathian*

    Reading these, I feel so privileged that I’ve never had to go hungry at any conference I’ve ever attended. Granted, I’m not a particularly picky eater and I wouldn’t describe most conference food I’ve had as a great culinary pleasure, but my food restrictions have always been catered to. I’m lactose intolerant but it’s not the end of the world if I eat something that contains it, even if I prefer not to do so at conferences because farts. I’m somewhat allergic to fresh strawberries, uncooked apples and uncooked carrots, especially during pollen season, but it just means that I have to be careful with the greens I eat, usually not a problem with a buffet lunch. My allergy symptoms are a rash and a runny nose rather than anaphylaxis, but they’re unpleasant enough that I want to avoid eating my allergens at conferences anyway.

  354. Abbie*

    My profession’s national convention is held over Memorial Day weekend. Always. They don’t provide food to attendees. What they *also* don’t do is make any arrangements for the convention center and nearby businesses to ensure that the supply of food available can actually meet the demand. Or even communicate that the demand is coming.

    All those high-priced food places you see in big convention centers? Closed for the holiday. The concessions in the vendor areas that sell burgers and hot dogs? Open for exactly one hour at lunch. The coffee shops? Open for an hour in the morning and an hour at lunch. Want an afternoon snack or a hit of caffeine? If you’re lucky, you might find a vending machine. Restaurants nearby? Completely understaffed with people who are shocked that there’s a convention over a holiday weekend. Hotels where all the attendees are staying? Also massively understaffed and unprepared.

    Every year. For 25+ years.

    1. ICodeForFood*

      Oh my! That’s crazy–you would think that they would have figured it out by now, and that SOMEONE would deal with the situation… What profession , if I may ask?

  355. Sad Sandwiches*

    At my job someone decided for our department to have a “planning day” after not having had one for years due to budget cuts. It was held in the office, but with lunch provided and we were expected to stay in the building and “network” with each other over the lunch break. Well, the budget cuts were still in place and the organisers were given such a pitiful budget that all that was provided was a couple of sad supermarket sandwich platters and some unappealing looking fruit. It was really not good quality and I resented having to give up my lunch break to make small talk with people who also didn’t want to make small talk, for the sake of a couple of sandwich quarters and a couple of grapes.

    1. Baby Yoda*

      That reminds me of a previous job’s Christmas party — being held in their tiny conference room that we all didn’t fit into. Then they slapped some packs of cold cuts and a loaf of white bread on the table as the holiday dinner. Don’t miss that place.

  356. FormerGirlScout*

    Not a work conference, but a special Girl Scout event in the mid ’90s. This was a competitive nationwide event that high school-age Girl Scouts (14 to 18) applied for a spot to attend. Part of the 2.5 week conference was a job shadowing opportunity at a prominent aerospace firm. The job shaddowing day included a highlight special presentation by a company executive during a luncheon held in a big, sunny glass atrium. I sat there, famished after a full morning of lectures and presentations, and watched while my fellow Girl Scouts tucked into what appeared to be hearty, meaty fare. Then came then vegetarian option. It was vegetables on a plate. But not salad, or seasoned vegetables, or anything that went together, no. We’re talking about a single carrot, a half radish, a sprig of asparagus, a near-flavorless wedge of pineapple, and a few other random veggies, all undressed and unseasoned, presented on a small, sandwich-sized plate, where more plate was showing than covered. That plus a very pink, entirely flavorless Kool-aid like beverage was the full extent of the vegetarian option. It’s been almost 30 years and I still remember that lunch for how bad it was.

  357. Ms. Murchison*

    My first professional conference was held in St. Louis. I don’t know what it’s like now, but back then downtown was a total ghost town on the weekend. By Sunday, the convention center stores were bare of food, and there weren’t any restaurants open nearby. We were a bunch of very, VERY hungry librarians.

    1. Ms. Murchison*

      Then there was the work trip to Mississippi that turned out to be a horrible idea because I’m dairy-free and restaurants down there don’t really accommodate that. I’ll never forget the look on the face of the young man behind the counter at the first restaurant when I asked if there was anything made without butter.

      And the coworker running the trip was unwilling to adjust his schedule to allow me time to get alternative food. So at least one night I couldn’t get 8 hours of sleep because I had to run out to Walmart on foot at the last minute to get my own breakfast after the others on the trip told me they’d picked a breakfast restaurant where I wouldn’t be able to eat. Don’t get me started on everything that happened earlier that evening and why I ate dinner an hour and a half after everyone else.

  358. Freya*

    I’m dairy free diabetic on the registration forms (it’s more complicated than that, but that covers the important things, protects me from people who think ‘lactose intolerant’ means ‘willing to risk stinking out the venue’, and is easy to understand) and one conference, the catering decided that meant nightshade free.

    There’s also been infinite conferences and hospitals where for some reason people think butter isn’t dairy. Occasionally, they think cheese isn’t dairy.

    And don’t get me started on the catering where the special meals have obviously never been tried by the catering business providing them… Gluten-free wraps (everyone special got the same meal that year) should not break when you try to bend them to wrap it around the filling!

  359. Anonymous-mouse*

    My coworkers still regularly tell the story of a project meeting in a rural area of not the most enlightened part of Germany. Think strong on BBQ, sausages and the like. When dinner came around, they announced all the great, meaty food. Just imagine the chef saying in the most clueless manne “and for the vegetarians, we have chicken!”

  360. Mat*

    This is not my story but it happened to a friend of mine (genuinely, I have seen the pics). She was/is vegan and her first lunch at a conference was a plain baked potato (It hadn’t even been split, just dumped on the plate) AND a handful of raisins. Just sat there on the plate alongside the potato. I was moderating a vegan message board at the time and this became our gold standard for terrible.

  361. Johan*

    The worst one I’ve ever been was a training sort of thing for my study circle that I needed to do to be allowed to run a study circle. I’m vegan so what I got was a disgusting beetroot burger, some sad kale chips, and I don’t remember if we got anything more (it’s some years ago). What I remember most about it was looking at what the non-vegans got – potatoes & brown gravy with something and I remember thinking “just serve us up those potatoes and the gravy/vegan gravy if it wasn’t w. a regular soy burger/meatballs”, it’s the definition of trying too hard, which vegans unfortunately come up against quite often. They think because we’re vegans we want those kinds of things when in reality, most of us don’t. I was not filled up at all. I would literally have preferred them to tell me they’re not going to provide food for me, because at least then I would have brought my own food and I would not have been hungry for the rest of the day.

  362. Onelia*

    Not a conference, but I belonged to an association that only met quarterly so we ended up having full day meetings. We took turns hosting it, and the worst was when our Promotions person was in charge and booked us into a very small rural venue, expected us to find our own lunch, and then provided NO COFFEE or tea for the entire day. Luckily my mom has a summer home up the road and I got an SOS coffee when I texted her.

    My favourite was when I was a graduate student and they accidentally ordered like 3 times the amount of cheese and wine they needed for a small symposium. We drank all the wine and were taking fancy cheeses home in bags. The organizers said that it was the most wine they ever saw a cohort drink. And I think they blamed it on me cause I’m from an East Coast province with a party reputation.

  363. o_gal*

    Not bad food but a bad manager. We had an all day meeting with our customer, and each of us got to choose which boxed lunch to be brought in. The manager (who was overall a bad manager but the customer loved her) needed someone to drive over, wait a half hour for it to be finished, then drive it back. She found a guy who worked for her but not on the project. She promised him his own boxed lunch as a thank you for taking up his entire lunch hour. In anticipation, he decided not to bring lunch that day. So at 11am he heads out, drives over, waits for the food, heads back – and then there is no lunch for him. She didn’t order it the night before when placing the order. A good manager would give him hers. She kept hers and told him that he’d have to make up the extra time for him to go back out to get his own food that he had not budgeted to buy.

  364. Huzzah!*

    I attended a women’s leadership conference last year and right before a break, I went out and saw the water pitchers out. So I filled up a cup. The staff immediately admonished me and told me it wasn’t “open” until the break. I stood frozen with the full cup of water until they finally said “well it’s too late now-you can drink it!”

  365. ThreeSeagrass*

    This didn’t happen to me, but to a colleague. At my university, all the faculty who achieve tenure get invited to a special appreciation dinner. It’s catered by the hotel on campus, which honestly has a bit of a spotty record – they do really nice hors d’oeuvres, but their plated dinners are suspect. The year my colleague went, quite a few people ended up sick with food poisoning the next day, and the health department got involved. Turns out it was linked to the chicken entree served at the tenure dinner. Not quite the appreciation the university planned… (and also very much like the plot of the movie Airplane – there may have been some jokes to that affect in the aftermath).

  366. CrabbyLibrarian*

    Let me tell you the tale of The Bacon Disaster.

    My public service organization closed operations for the morning so we could all go to the local country club for a Staff Development day (some speakers/socialization, the usual). Breakfast would be served by the country club. It was our first time having an event of this nature, and it was STRONGLY ENCOURAGED that we all attend, even if the event didn’t coincide with your regular shift (we were all part-time). So I think something like 80% of our organization attended (about 250 people).

    The buffet was an okay spread: pastries, fruit, some bagels, eggs. And then there was the bacon. Reader, this is the best bacon I have EVER eaten in my life. It’s been well over a decade and I STILL remember how good this bacon was. It changed the way I cooked bacon. It was all the coworkers at my table talked about. It was so good I ignored the buffet line behind me so I could celebrate in the bliss of this bacon.

    So I was unaware that the bacon ran out. Then the eggs. Then the fruit. Then the bagels. Soon all that was left was pastries, and there were still well over 100 people to feed. This was a portent of things to come.

    The speaker was terrible. Like this man did not understand what it was we did as an organization, and basically just threw shade at us the whole time. Then there was a whole kerfuffle with how we’d get paid for travel from the country club to our work sites (aka we wouldn’t, even though it was on work time). Also there was one entrance to the country club, so there was a massive traffic jam that took up the entire 30 minutes the organization had budgeted for travel AND lunch. Basically the only redeeming thing about the whole morning was the bacon, which apparently only like 10% of attendees ever got to eat.

    We got back to our work site that day and I casually mentioned how good the bacon was. I was not prepared for the 45-minute diatribe I received about the “injustice” of running out of food. By the end of the day, I felt guilty for being one of the Chosen Ones who could eat this bacon. When most of my coworkers made it through the line, all that was left was pastries that had clearly just been pulled out of the freezer and microwaved just so there was something on the buffet. Emails were sent to HR. My manager was on the phone with at least 3 other managers talking about “the food issue.”

    At the time, we were told that the country club “didn’t believe” the headcount we gave them but to be perfectly honest, in the years that I’ve left this organization I strongly suspect admin figured a) not everyone who signed up would show up and gave a low number for food and b) that we all would take bird-sized portions. For the remainder of my time there, I never heard the end of The Bacon Disaster. I can’t prove it, but I’m pretty sure that’s the reason the organization suspended staff development events for the next 3 years.

  367. Mr. Toad*

    I was working a wedding at a very nice venue that provided us with meals. The crew was all in a darkish room and we received our salads, fine. Then the main. Only I and one other person were hungry enough to eat the main, which looked, in the dim light, like salmon with a sauce. It was salmon, but the sauce was some sort of beef gravy. Complete with ground beef bits. It took us until we were about halfway through with eating it to figure out what it was because of the unexpected beef flavor on salmon. To this day whenever we see each other we just point and say “Beef Salmon”.

  368. Occasional vegetarian*

    Disclaimer: I’m not a full-time vegetarian or a vegan, I just don’t eat dairy.

    Last year I went to a conference in Las Vegas and got a copy of the menu ahead of time because, well, I marked that I was dairy-free on the registration. As I was looking over the options, I couldn’t help but feel so sorry for all the vegans and vegetarians that would be attending. Every salad marked as vegan or vegetarian had cheese or meat on it – I guess you were supposed to ignore those ingredients and just not eat them? I mean, goat cheese still comes from an animal and no vegan is going to eat that!

    Going back this year and I’m hoping the food is better for my vegan and vegetarian friends.

  369. Nightmare caterer*

    This was just this week!

    Our (public) organization’s preferred caterer has its menus online. Those menus indicated a handful of vegetarian and vegan options, but we had other dietary restrictions (e.g., dairy free, gluten free, kosher) that weren’t indicated in the menu. I asked the caterer for guidance on choosing items to accommodate these restrictions and the caterer… directed me to the menus. No additional guidance, even with prompting.

    So I took some guesses! Ordered a falafel plate, salads, and a couple other options that looked like good gluten free options. They arrived… and the falafel was served on a pita and the salads were served with bread. And there was not enough food. And what was there tasted terrible.

    The caterer is our only preferred vendor for food. We have to go through tons of red tape to order so much as a sandwich from somewhere else. They have been a huge disappointment for tons of other folks in our organization, up to and including sometimes not even completing orders, so the best guess is that someone is getting kickbacks from this subpar caterer being the org’s only preferred vendor.

  370. Scorpiooo*

    In 2020, my old company decided we would do a virtual Christmas party.

    We had two offices in different cities about 3 hours apart, plus a few employees working remote elsewhere in the province. Of course, after the pandemic was declared, everyone went remote.

    In the Before Times, we would have a casual staff lunch at each office and then a more formal Christmas party at the main office, but that year, the higher ups decided everyone would have their Christmas dinner delivered to their house and we would all hang out in Zoom breakout rooms.

    The deliveries were supposed to be sent out the day of the party, and the organizing committee set up a Google Sheet where we could mark our food as delivered. A few hours went by and I still hadn’t gotten mine, so I checked the Sheet and saw that some people had gotten theirs as early as 8/9 am. Finally it gets there, I want to say around 5 pm, and the delivery guy is a bit curt with me.

    I forget what the actual dish was, but I think it was a shepherd’s pie type deal. What I DO remember is that it arrived lukewarm and needed to be heated up for ages in the toaster oven.

    After I messaged some coworkers in the know, it appears that all the food was prepared by the cooks at the daycare next to our company’s main office 3 hours away from my city (they also provided lunch when people were in the office) and loaded onto a single delivery truck with a single driver who had to make 80+ individual stops between multiple cities starting at the crack of dawn, and was thus very cranky when he got to my apartment. It was a bizarre decision, and I still don’t understand why they couldn’t have just had local restaurants deliver or given us all restaurant gift cards.

    The next year, after a reorg, we skipped the awkward Zoom party and everyone just picked a themed gift box. It went over much better.

  371. LCC*

    I worked as a camp counselor for two summers during college. The cook left and was replaced between the two years I worked there, and the new cook literally did not understand the concept of vegetarianism. As the only vegetarian on staff, my options for the summer bounced back and forth between gluten free vegan and white meat (which I don’t eat). A few highlights…
    -Breakfast was an assortment of delicious looking frittatas, all with lots of veggies but also bacon or sausage in them. Mine was a slab of tofu microwaved with vegan cheese on top and a small sprinkling of dehydrated peppers like you get in instant ramen packets.
    -Grilled cheese day – there was a giant tray full of normal grilled ham and cheese sandwiches, and a small dish of sandwiches made with gluten free bread and dairy-free American cheese. (I grew up going to this summer camp and we had grilled cheese and tomato soup every single week. This is the only time I ever saw that include ham.)
    -The one that fully broke me and the rest of the staff – I don’t even remember what was for dinner, but at the end of the line was a big bowl of room temperature rotisserie chicken pieces labeled “CHICKEN – VEGETARIAN.”

  372. Beige Food*

    I was planning a big for our community dinner for 300ish people. I worked at a food bank that prided itself on being one of the top 3 healthiest food banks in the nation, we distributed over 50% of our food as fresh produce. I spoke with the head of the catering department and explained this needs to be healthy, vegetable forward, super colorful. NO PROBLEM I was assured.

    Night of the event, served on a white plate was chicken breast, white asparagus, and rice pilaf. There was a white sauce on it. Everything was beige. 100% beige food with a beige vegetable.

  373. Justkim*

    I was part of our overall office events committee, but I worked on smaller monthly events, not the big holiday party. One year, the vegetarian option was fettuccine Alfredo, made with real butter, cheese, and cream. The salad was served with boiled egg and bacon bits, and the hot vegetable (Brussel sprouts or green beans) also included bacon. There was nothing for the vegans to eat! I had to explain this oversight to the event committee after the fact, because they didn’t see the problem.

  374. S*

    Not so much bad food as a bad overall experience. I attended a small conference where we were asked in advance about dietary restrictions. I requested a vegetarian option. During dinner, the servers started bringing out plates with the meat entree. When they got to the table next to mine, I overheard one of the other attendees ask if there was a vegetarian option. The server said, “Sure” and gave her a pasta dish. Then the server came to my table. When I asked for the vegetarian option, he got flustered. He told me they’d already served the one vegetarian entree they had to someone else (the woman at the next table) and that I should have requested a vegetarian meal in advance. I said I *had* requested one. The staff checked with the other woman – and it turned out she hadn’t requested a vegetarian meal in advance but didn’t like the meat dish being served. The upshot was that I ended up waiting a long time – watching other people eat – while they sent out for another vegetarian dish. All the while, the conference organizer, who was sitting at my table, was expressing his annoyance to the staff over the situation – which made me feel self-conscious and terrible for the staff. So, I felt incredibly uncomfortable – not to mention hungry! – and wished I could just go back to my room and eat the snacks I had in my suitcase.

  375. jenny_linsky*

    I have celiac disease so I absolutely require gluten-free meals. I always let conference planners know this, and to the extent possible, try to meet and speak with whoever’s providing food at the event so I can be sure they understand how to prepare gluten-free food safely. Often, this means I get a specially prepared meal served directly to me (as opposed to from the buffet, which is usually a festival of cross-contamination). At one very memorable conference, a member of the dining staff brought out a plate and presented me with my… couscous. For those who don’t know, which apparently includes the chef at this conference, couscous is basically pure wheat. I explained that I couldn’t eat this dish and asked whether it would be possible to get something else. After much skepticism (“We’re pretty sure couscous is gluten-free”), they took the plate away, and a while later came back with a dish that heavily featured… bulgur. As in bulgur wheat. Also very much not gluten-free! The chef came out himself to try to explain to me that it wasn’t gluten, it was bulgur. The remainder of the conference, all of my meals were either packaged foods I could be sure were gluten-free (like yogurt), or from offsite restaurants.

    My employer was actually the organizer of the conference.

    1. Anna*

      You’d think at some point someone would at least like, use Google is they weren’t sure what gluten-free looks like? What is up with that chef?!

  376. Not That Kind of Lawyer*

    I have a seafood allergy – both shellfish and fish. If it breathes in water, lives in water, or feasts off water creatures, I cannot eat it. I also live in a city where seafood is one of the main sources of food. I attended a three-day conference and made note of my seafood allergy. Standard continental breakfast, served lunch, and dinner on your own. Day 1 – chicken fried in the same oil as the fish. I broke out in hives and was given a million apologies and promises for better attention to detail. Day 2 – Salad bathed in Caesar dressing. The dressing wasn’t made in-house, and apparently, no one in the kitchen knew Caesar dressing has anchovies. I had not eaten anything, but the salads were already prepared and pre-dressed. I asked for the vegetarian option and learned there were a dozen or so other hungry people who were not eating the salad so they gave us PB&J sandwiches and fruit. Day 3 – Mush. It was a brownish mashed potato-looking mush (it was not mashed potatoes) covered in a “gravy” with tri-color bell peppers. Fortunately, after day one, I went and got a lot of snacks and it was reimbursed b work. I avoid hat conference now.

  377. Damn it feels good to be a government or nonprofit professional*

    Once at a small conference, there was one celiac and one vegan (me). Breakfast was your standard pastries/yogurt/fruit buffet. They put aside two plates of fruit with plastic wrap over them and sticky notes that read “gluten-free” and “vegan”. Lunch was those ubiquitous, godforsaken balsamic portobello/pepper wraps which they served in lettuce instead of carb wraps. So apparently they thought vegans and celiacs can survive off purely fruit and vegetables. My celiac friend and I clinked the protein bars we brought in our bags in a toast to the absurdity.

  378. Chirpy*

    I had a vegan friend in college who got out of living on campus for the required 2 years because the “vegan options for every meal” was…the salad bar. With cold raw tofu as the only protein. She ate cereal moistened with water for breakfast. Sometimes there was an un-buttered vegetable side she could eat, but the only reliable food was that salad bar.

    A second vegan friend got a job in the cafeteria largely so she could get them to cook hot vegan food (and succeeded).

    This was at a university known for its environmental/science programs, with a much higher than average number of vegetarians and vegans….I heard they eventually improved the food but it was ridiculous.

  379. LabSnep*

    In the late 90s someone I am still in touch with and myself worked for a horrible person in a very small company who knew the two of us did not like pre dressed sandwiches. He deliberately ordered Subway for a team lunch and did NOT ask for sauces on the side for ANY OF THEM. And then got upset and called the both of us picky when we were upset. All the other members of our team stood up for us.

    He did this in front of a client.

    We ended up with pizza, I can’t remember if coworker and I ended up paying for it or if the client did, but I know our boss did NOT.

    At another job, I asked if I could take a portion of a salad before the dressing was poured on it (it’s a neurodivergent sensory thing) and the person with the dressing stared at me as she poured it on. They also told me it was rude to ask to alter menu items (like no mayo) and both jobs gave me work catered lunch anxiety that still sticks with me to this day.

    My current workplace is great, but if anyone other than our usual people order food, I inevitably end up with a dressing covered sandwich I can’t eat and I’m horribly embarrassed that I have to deflect questions about why I’m buying lunch on free lunch day (pro tip. Do not ask this to someone who is buying lunch on free lunch day. The odds are we already feel a boat load of shame or anxiety about it)

  380. Loop*

    One time I requested a “wrap with no pork” from a catering place and got served a ham salad wrap. When this was brought to the catering place’s attention, they were confused by the complaint because they “didn’t put pork in the wrap, just ham!” The catering company employees genuinely didn’t know that ham was made from pigs. We were not allowed to order from anywhere else due to a contract so I had to start requesting “wrap with no pork, ham, bacon or pig products” before I was able to get a meal I could eat!

  381. LifebeforeCorona*

    We once stayed at a motel that advertised a free continental breakfast. It was instant coffee and Krispy Kreme donuts. You get what you pay for. Fortunately there was a breakfast buffet just down the road. It was amazing and we ate so much we didn’t have another meal until very late in the day.

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