Nobody wants to get their ass kicked out of a restaurant. It’s important for vegans to know how to act if they want to get something to eat, even in California. And it’s quite possible they’ll have something without a mother or a face. Walk into practically any restaurant in the Golden State you will see veggie burgers on the menu alongside the quesadillas and the pulled pork sandwiches.
Your waiter is cool. So you politely, but loudly, say you’d like the VEGGIE BURGER. You give him the additional information that you’re a VEGAN and tell him about the HORRIBLE experience you had at a steak house in Texas. You fail to notice the blank expression on his face when you say the word “vegan.”
After a while, he comes back with your beautiful veggie burger and your side salad with balsamic vinaigrette dressing. You take a bite, mmmm, this IS good. You take another bite. This time you notice a whitish string of something going from the burger to your mouth. “IS THIS CHEESE?” you say, again turning up the volume.
You notice your dinner companions are now staring at you with wide eyes. One of them has put her hand gently on top of yours which doesn’t keep you from starting to yell, “Waiter! Waiter! WAITER! Is there cheese on this veggie burger? I TOLD you I was a VEGAN. Are you deaf?”
“No sir, no sir, not deaf,” mumbles the waiter.
“Well, could you make mine WITHOUT the cheese?” you say.
As the waiter scurries off, it gives you time to explain to your companions why you never eat cheese and how cheese is just as bad as meat, maybe worse. You go into the horrors of the veal industry and the distraught baby calves torn from their wailing mothers. You don’t forget to talk about the pus from the painfully diseased udders of dairy cows and how they disguise the bloodiest milk to make chocolate milk. You fail to notice one of your companions was eating the pasta alfredo, but now you see she’s set her fork down.
The waiter comes back with the information that the veggie burgers are made with cheese. “They come frozen that way,” he says.
“FROZEN?!” you yell at the now totally shaken serving person. You notice that the manager has suddenly appeared. In a soft voice he says, “How can we help you?”
You’re starting to understand that you might get your ass kicked out of this restaurant you once thought was mellow, well, mellow enough to put a veggie burger on the menu. You decide to try and play on the manager’s sympathy. “Dear sir, I’m really hungry and I came into your establishment hoping for some cruelty-free nourishment. You see, the smell of cooking animal flesh is so repellant to me, it makes me want to vomit. Cheese and milk make my skin crawl. Call me overly sensitive, but even the idea of eggs also causes the gag reflex for me. I think of all those crowded chickens, 12 chickens stuffed into a wire cage, the size of a file drawer. It’s so small they never even get to even spread their wings or take a step. It’s a nightmare!”At this point the tears are rolling down your face. Then the sobs come. You’ve lost it.
The manager suggests to your dinner mates that perhaps you need a doctor and whispers it’s probably for the best that you all leave, don’t worry about the check.
Damn! Kicked out of another place, in California no less! You never see your dinner mates again.
— A Vicious Vegan blog post —