BB Guide for Every Eater

Wow, this is offensive. Being vegetarian or vegan or gluten-free does not equate to picky eating. Saying you hate leafy greens and nuts and red food items makes you picky.

“Picky eaters”? Seriously?! Obviously you have never had any health issues that require you follow a certain diet. The term “picky eaters” implies a spoiled 4-year-old.

Picky Eaters?!?! What kind of title is that for vegetarian or vegan eaters???

Vegans and vegetarians are a group of people who recognize that eating animals is bad for the environment, awful for our health and beyond cruel to the billions of animals that die for non-carnivores, humans. Like smoking, eating animals is the worse thing you can do for your body. It may take 30 years to happen but you will indeed die from disease that was preventable by simply not eating animals.

Humans do not have the claws, jaws, intestines etc. of carnivores/omnivores hence why we get diseased and die from eating animals. Look it up. I don’t know any human that can chase down their prey and eat from the carcass with their own bare hands and teeth.

Siggy’s Good Food, in Brooklyn Heights, on Henry Street, between Orange and Pineapple streets, can make many dishes gluten-free, including pasta.

What else is out there, gluten-free wise?

agreed! labeling vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free folks (et al) as picky eaters is wrong, and offensive. boo!
disappointing… and ya’ll were doing so well…

Our heartfelt apologies to anyone we offended by using the word picky. We actually didn’t want to use the term “restricted diet” and thought picky best described the experience of having to be selective about what you eat. We were not using it in a negative sense.

That said, what’s the best title for this guide? Would like to come up with one that’s agreeable to all.

… “meat-free pancakes”? I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a meat-studded or stuffed pancake; aren’t they usually meat-free, or am I missing something?

This post (and other recent offerings, especially the coffeeshop office post; that was downright terrible) definitely need a stronger editorial hand.

I agree with the previous comments about the offensiveness of “picky eater” as the headline to this post — how about “specialized restaurant options” or something less tacky? Also, there’s so many other great restaurants around that what you’ve mentioned; most places in BK at least offer vegetarian options, and most in trendier nabes have vegan ones too. It’s just not that uncommon anymore.

If you want to be seen as an authority on all things Brooklyn, do your research, expand your horizons, and pony up to pay a really good editor to review your content before it goes online, or your PR visibility push and redesign will be for naught.

how about “BB Guide for Every Eater?”

“Restricted”, “Picky”, “Selective”… i’m sorry BB but by using these terms you are saying that eating meat is the norm and everything else is not the norm.

There’s meat and then there is corn, carrots, onions, kale, broccoli, legumes, cherries, beats, squash, potatoes, nuts, etc etc etc etc. (tons of selections compared to meat)
Seems like eating meat is more selective.

How about BB’s “Guide to Healthy Eating”. Simple and non-offensive.

How about “BB Guide to Better Eating?” BTW, trivia fact: did you know that raising cows for beef creates 50% of the CO2 pollution in the world? Check out “Eating Animals” by Jonathan Safran Foer. 50% of global warming caused by humans is basically because people eat beef. Next time you eat beef, at least buy it in plastic bags and eat it on styrofoam plates, that’s far less harmful for the environment than what you’re eating.

i am gagging at the hypersensitive snobbery on this board. all you people whining about “offensive” use of the word picky need to grow up. fact is: you’re picky if you only eat raw / vegan / gluten free. accept it, your diets are out of the ordinary. it’s not a value judgment, it’s just statistics. get a real cause to champion, and a thicker skin.

@BB: way to roll over, changing the title. c’mon.

@GA: your post about getting disease in 30 years from eating meat is nonsense. one can live a long, healthy life while eating a diet that includes lean animal protein. veg may be the healthiest option, but eating meat is not at all like smoking. ridiculous post.

For some people, having to be selective about the foods eaten is not merely a matter of personal preference, but one of life or death. Before I very unexpectedly experienced an anaphylactic reaction (and nearly died) from something I ate at a restaurant, I had no idea that food could be life-threatening. It was the single most terrifying and horrific experience I have ever had and if there were one thing in my life that I could “un-know,’” it would be that. However, while ignorance may be bliss, I would hope that people who judge others for what they eat, at least can offer compassion and understanding for those, who for health, moral or ethical reasons, choose to be careful about what they consume.

Is it PC to say Indian summer?

Thanks, Brooklyn Based, now that I know which restaurants go out of their way to cater to customers’ dietary limitations, I know which to avoid. I’m sure this article does a service to its intended readership, but its existence is symptomatic of an annoying trend. I’m speaking of the emergence of an obsessive and self-righteous pseudo-gourmandise among the pathologically picky, by which I mean those who view certain foods, rightly or wrongly, as a threat to their bodily integrity. The cause of the trend is that as Americans’ palates have become more cultivated, picky eaters have been left out and left behind. They have become more visible by contrast and more uncool. So they sublimate their food phobias and inclination toward ritual into a facsimile of connoisseurship. But, as with sex and all life’s simple pleasures, you simply cannot appreciate dining if it is a big, scary deal. (And it doesn’t matter whether the threat is real or imagined; the psychology ends up being the same.) To the rest of us, the charade looks embarrassing in the same way that a sex phobic compensating with lots of kinky talk is embarrassing. Everyone can see that you don’t like food. My advice? You don’t have to do everything. Not everyone can dance. Not everyone enjoys movies. And not everyone likes food. Just eat at home and then do something else when you go out. The trend toward neurotic gourmet is obscene.

Does anybody remember the old ’70′s SNL sketch about a husband and wife called the Weiners (“whiners”)? They both had diverticulitis but went to restaurants and made a huge nuisance of themselves. Still so true, only now there seem to be more of these sorts, and they have a greater sense of entitlement. The involuntary nature of a medical dietary restriction is neither here nor there. A restaurant is not a hospital. It is not your mother’s kitchen. It’s a place where people who don’t have diet-limiting conditions go to enjoy food. The push to accommodate those who do represents the same kind of foolishness as the wheelchair ramps that one now sees descending into public pools. People in wheelchairs can’t swim. People with dietary restrictions can’t dine out, not really. These are not injustices regardless of your condition being not-your-fault, whatever that means. No one did it to you.

As a person who has to eat gluten-free and refined sugar free- yes, I’m picky! I have to be and have no apologies for it. Call me self-indulged, psychologically “afraid of food” but what do you care? live and let live, I’m not feeding you, you don’t have to eat what I eat–and vice versa. Besides, there are stories about places to go get your “sugar fix” are you going to cry about the allusion of addiction? I appreciate the fact that it cuts both ways. Besides, I pay for it and if I’m not “picky”, I end up paying with feeling awful, so being called “picky” is/was fine by me! Power to the Picky! (…now, can you come up with a list of places that don’t have soy products?)

Oh you picky eaters. Get off your high, vegan horse and be excited that someone has given you a guide to restaurants where you can have your cake and eat it too. I think this was well-written, and as a non-vegan/gluten-free/etc eater, I want to try a lot of these places!

I’m just happy kosher was included on the list. If it wasn’t for Olga’s or Wild Ginger on Smith, I’d have to go to Crown Heights, Midwood or Manhattan any time I wanted to go out to eat. Try that! Rumor has it that a kosher meat place is opening by Atlantic.

So I am picky if I really wish I could eat pasta, bread and cookie but I can’t because I have disease that makes me very sick if I do? Very interesting. Thanks for your expert opinion, ur2sensitive! I’ll talk to my dr about this, I’m sure he’ll agree it’s just that I’m “picky” and not sick.

Please don’t forget Naidre’s Cafe, 7th Avenue, bet 11th & 12th. A large portion of our menu caters to vegetarian/vegan fare, and most of our sandwiches containing meat, can be substituted with tofu, roasted beets, etc… We offer a great vegan breakfast, vegan chocolate chip cookies, vegan reuben, and a phenomenal vegan carrot cake!