Vegetarian meal at a buffet

An option would be to have the vegetarian option plated and brought out to the vegetarians who ask for it directly to the table...

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I've thought about this, I guess I need to contact my caterer but there's a different charge for plating and there will be at least 20-30 of my 100 guests who will be vegetarian. I don't know if they'd be willing to plate that many.

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Hmmm...I think you're right that if you put it out with everything else at the buffet, the non-vegetarians may want to try some too. I think your caterer will just have to make enough for everyone to have some, vegetarians and non-vegetarians included. That way you don't have to worry about paying extra to have it plated.

I think you need to have enough of each entree for everyone. There may be people there that are vegetarians that you don't know about, or they are avoiding meat for some reason unknown to you. Also, there have been times I've been to weddings and I don't like how the meat is prepared (I'm picky about my meat) so I would prefer to eat the vegetarian option.

ETA: people don't usually pre-select their entree choice when you have a buffet so how would you even know how many people are vegetarian? The caterer should already prepare more than enough food for everyone to have some of everything. That is the advantage of having a buffet - people get choices and can eat different things.

Generally, your caterer's job is to make sure that there's enough food for everyone. I would just confirm this with the caterer in order to ease your mind. My caterer wouldn't even give me the option of getting less of the gluten-free vegan option I had at our wedding because she wouldn't chance it running out for the people who needed it. (and it turned out that the non-vegetarian/vegans loved it, too)

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I've asked people on their RSVP to let me know if they have any dietary restrictions. I did this because I know at least 10 people just off the top of my head with dietary restrictions. I know that the caterer will prepare more than enough on the meat options, but I don't know how that ties in with the vegetarian options. Basically, our buffet includes two entrée options, the addition of a third, vegetarian option is something that I've added on, and for every vegetarian meal we add we have to cut a meat entrée, according to my caterer.

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Thanks, I'll probably just tell my caterer that there needs to be enough. I believe they will increase the cost since they mentioned how vegetarian meals cut into the amount of meat meals offered, but that's fine for my peace of mind.

It seems odd and hard for the caterer to release individuals rather than tables. I would just have the caterer prep their whole plate prior and bring it to them.

View Quoted Comment I think this sounds like a good idea. I would probably do the same and just pay extra to make sure everyone has something they are comfortable eating. I think having a different buffet or calling only vegetarians up might make people that eat meat feel like they can’t have something that they may also like from the buffet.

I’m a vegetarian and including myself, there will be around 5 vegetarians in attendance at our wedding. We’re doing a buffet as well and will have 1 vegetarian entree and 2 meat entrees, plus sides. All of the options will be set up at the same buffet table. I had similar concerns as you but discussed with my caterer and they had a good estimate on the quantity of the vegetarian entree that they will need to bring. Most experienced caterers anticipate that meat eaters will also eat the vegetarian option if all is included at the buffet, so they include this in their calculation of how much food to bring. As other people mentioned, you could also serve a separate plate to the vegetarian guests, but personally, I’m not a fan of this as it draws more attention to myself and then people start asking questions etc. But I would never be offended or upset if my meal was served this way.

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Agreed, your caterer should be able to plan for this.

Hope you’re able to deal with this dilemma well and had a blast at your wedding. In situations like this, the best course of action is to serve dishes that can be enjoyed by everyone. We tried doing this for a company event with the help of this catering Ibiza based provider, where we served salads that can be partnered with chicken. This way, we can accommodate vegans and non-vegans alike. But if you can’t do this, I think an alternative solution for this is to properly arrange the food stations in a way that everyone can easily get their preferred dishes.

The caterer should be able to handle this by having enough food for everyone without special plates.