The Eternal Vegetarian Dinner Party Question

Mailbag edition returns

This is the fourth installment of Ask Mess Hall. Past installments have covered beans, cast iron care, and not-depressing work lunches. Please send your questions—from the trolling to the esoteric—via this google form, or by replying to this post :)

What are some good vegetarian menus for having people over?

This is a big question, the sort of question that plagues us from birth to death, hand in hand with what’s it all for? and why is it that every once in a while my beans take like three hours to cook?¹ Even if we are comfortable cooking meat-free for ourselves, doing so on a larger scale—and in an environment where we strive to impress—can drive us crazy. I’m guilty of this too, even if the first like four years of my career in food media were mostly vegetarian.