Why I Could Never Be a Vegetarian

The weekend before Colin and I left for Hawaii we joined his parents, brother and his brother's fiance for dinner. The decision was made to have dinner at The Naam, a vegetarian restaurant in Kitsilano.

I wasn't sure about eating vegetarian cuisine, but I am not adverse to trying new things, especially food (heck I've eaten haggis and poi) and I didn't really have a say in where we were dining, so the Naam it was; and Colin assured me that there would be something on the menu I would like.

The Naam is an extremely popular restaurant, especially on a Saturday night, so we had to wait to close to an hour before being seated. Someone made the decision though, that we should sit at separate tables, otherwise we would be waiting a lot longer. I was not happy with this decision because it was supposed to be a family outing, but turned into a date night (Colin and I decided to go sit on our own). Now don't get me wrong, I love spending time with my husband, but we were both looking forward to spending time with his family (yes, I actually like my in-laws) and catching up.

The decision to split up added to my unassuredness of the evening.

The waiter came by to order our drinks - I ordered a diet Pepsi - stupid me. I received an almost lecture-like reasoning on why The Naam didn't serve diet Pepsi or any pop for that matter. A simple "we don't serve pop" would have been suffice. So now I was feeling slightly jilted and embarrassed and I hadn't even looked at the menu yet.

I decided to order wine - I had a feeling with the way the night was heading I would need a glass. It was the must disgusting wine I have ever had. Apparently there is vegetarian wine too - but it was dry and bland!

I looked over the menu and most of the dishes looked appetizing. I considered ordering the Agadeshi tofu, since this is a favourite of mine, but decided to be adventurous and ordered a vegetarian enchilada. It was OK. Wasn't bad, wasn't great. It definitely tasted like something was missing though.

We then decided to order dessert. I choose pumpkin pie. You can't mess up pumpkin pie, right? Wrong. It was the most tasteless pie I have ever had. In fact everyone in the family commented on how bland their dessert was.

So I gave vegetarian a try, but never again. I am not a huge meat eater, but it wasn't the lack of meat available (and there was no fish, which I love), it was the lack of taste, in everything.