I’ve had this story in an active tab all day now, trying to figure out if this was something worth posting and talking about, and I finally decided that I was curious enough to just post it, ask the questions and see what others think.[
FWIW, I’m a vegetarian, so this personally interesting to me and I find such phrases enormously helpful in buying and ordering food. I can’t see at all that the adjective “vegetarian” (or “vegan”) could somehow confuse or mislead, since it seems designed to inform by modifying/clarifying the noun which follows it. But that’s why I asked about German grammar; I know that other languages do not modify things the way that English does.
Since most of us here are native English speakers, I’m now curious to know if any Doper has ever felt that similar phrases were confusing or misleading. Is the phrase “vegetarian hot dog” or “vegan chicken curry” unclear, confusing or misleading?
I don’t see any case for banning the name ‘sausage’ in the description of something that resembles a sausage.
And if we’re going to ban ‘vegetarian hot dog’ on the grounds that it is misleading, then we also need to ban the term ‘hot dog’ for the non-vegetarian counterpart, unless it is actually made of dogs.
Not the least bit confusing.
And from what I remember from my german lessons 100 years (well, almost) ago, it shouldn’t be any more confusing in that language. Someone correct me if I am wrong.
Not confusing and may have some slight benefit to us omnivores trying to eat a little healthier. If some of the vegan substitutes I’ve had are any guide, without a descriptive I would have had no idea what they were trying to copy. They were fine and I enjoyed them but the meat they hoped to mimic would have been lost.
Agreeing with all the posts so far, including the two about hot dogs and beefsteak tomatoes. It sounds to me like the person is saying ‘vegetarians are jerkfaces and I’m going to make life harder for them for no apparent reason’. Maybe it’s politics and something led up to it. Maybe it’s a food labeling thing and people really are confused…but who? Meat eaters that accidentally eat soy/vegetables are going to survive.
OTOH, I see this in the article “Schmidt has already contacted the European Union’s executive branch to discuss extending rules that govern the use of the terms “milk” and “cheese” to apply to meat as well”
Have they banned terms like soy milk and almond milk?
It’s interesting, because to me, ‘sausage’ is the shape, not so much the content - ‘a sausage’ is a cylindrical presentation of something - usually meat-based, but ‘vegetarian sausage’ is just an obvious description of something sausage-shaped. but not meat-based.
I wonder if the perception is different for those to whom ‘sausage’ means the preparation of ground meat that can be stuffed into casings, but can also be fried as patties.
True, but then in the carnivore world, we’ve got ‘Turducken’ - who wants to eat something that has a name beginning with ‘turd’?
I’d bet you a nickel that this guy is the sort of nitwit who spent his whole life making the lame old “jumbo shrimp is an oxymoron, har har” joke.
It sounds like a solution in search of a problem to me. I’ve never been confused by “vegetarian sausage” or the like. In fact, it’s the perfect description: textured vegetable protein and seasonings formed into a cylinder. “Seasoned Soy Protein Extruded Food Product” might be a more accurate description, but it doesn’t make for snappy packaging the way “Veggie Links” does.
The only time I could see it being a problem is for someone with food allergies, though the people I know with food allergies are already in the habit of reading labels very very carefully and know that meat substitutes are liable to contain soy, nuts, mushrooms etc.
What do vegan sausages use for casing?