stupid but quick question

[kaigou]

vegetarian = no eggs = no bread ... correct?

is this generally a hard-and-fast rule, enough to consider it a pretty safe assumption?


ETA: apparently the unclear part above is my expectation that bread contains eggs. Yes, as a matter of fact, bread can contain eggs -- pretty much my entire repertoire of bread-recipes all contain at least one egg. (Some of them contain two eggs, even, and some even have milk.) This is not to say I've never made bread without eggs -- I have -- but I don't much care for the texture or the reluctant timbre of the bread when working with it. With eggs, the bread is considerably silkier/smoother, and just more pleasant and easy to work with; thus it's not a headache to let it rise six times and really become amazingly-melty. Or shorter version: bread can contain eggs.

ETA the 2nd: I suppose it might've been less confusing if I'd asked about, say, angel food cake... for which my grandmother's recipe uses the whites of like a dozen eggs. I rarely make it, though, because I hate wasting a dozen egg yolks, but I'm never quite sure what to do with them...

Comments

[owlectomy]

Most western vegetarians do eat eggs, unless they're vegan, in which case they eat no eggs or dairy.
Hindu vegetarians generally don't eat eggs, though.

[serene]

Nope, bad assumption. Most vegetarians eat eggs and bread in my country (the US). Of course, in Japan, they say vegetarianism includes fish, so assumptions probably won't really work anywhere, but in general, in the US, vegans (those who won't eat eggs) are very rare, and there's LOTS of bread that is vegetarian or vegan, so I've never actually met a vegetarian who wasn't on some kind of low-carb thing as well who didn't eat bread.

[casey_valhalla]

Vegetarian = no eggs is definitely not a hard and fast rule. It varies greatly.

However, vegan always = no eggs.

Also, having been vegan for many years, I can tell you honestly that the average loaf of bread doesn't have eggs in it. Usually the problem area was whey, but even that wasn't hard to avoid.

[treesahquiche]

I've never used eggs to make bread, so I'd say bread is still on the table. :)

[autopope]

What on earth makes you think bread has eggs in it?

(Some specialist breads may have eggs, dairy, or other weird rubbish in them, but bread should basically be flour, water, a small amount of fat or oil, and yeast.)

[raletha]

I would think most vegetarians are ovo-lacto (at least I am) and eat both eggs and dairy unless they call themselves strict vegetarians or vegans. Some vegetarians I've met eat fish (and there was one who I saw eating pork sausage on occasion, but I think she was an anomaly with vocabulary issues).

[quillori]

Are you thinking of vegans? I wouldn't assume a vegetarian didn't eat eggs merely on the grounds they were vegetarian, though I suppose I might suspect it on other grounds (eg, as owlectomy says, Hinduism). Also, do you mean no eggs and no bread? I read it first as no eggs thus no bread, which was a puzzlement: I mean, I guess there's things like challah and brioche, which are bread rather than cake in much the same way tomato is a vegetable rather than a fruit, but otherwise bread = no eggs. Might an extremely strict vegetarian object to yeast? But there's still unleavened bread, or even bread leavened with, say, baking powder.

[mongrelheart]

*nodnod* to what other folks said. All the vegetarians I know, eat eggs.

[acari]

Nope, not where I'm from. I'm the ovo-lacto kind of vegetarian so I eat both eggs and dairy products.

[leorising]

While I lived in the ashram, we were Hindu-style vegetarians. We ate milk products, but no eggs and no yeast or mushrooms (fungus are considered "semi-living", borderline sentient, IIRC.) You'll notice Indian breads like naan and chapati are not raised breads. And of course, we never ate fish or other meat.

I heard one lacto-vegetarian put it this way: nothing with a face (or potential for a face.) That was how she ate -- it's a pretty individual thing, if it's not culturally or religiously prescribed.

Here's a way around the whole controversy: if you're wanting to make bread for someone who doesn't eat eggs (for whatever reason,) and your bread recipes include egg, why not use an egg substitute/replacer? They're easily found in pretty much any store's health food section, a box lasts forever, and it works pretty well. You can't use it to make scrambled eggs or something, but it works well in recipes.

[hokuton_punch]

Well, I suppose you've got plenty of responses to go on with, but personally I still eat eggs, so eggs in bread would be fine with me. I also still eat fish, though - not very often at the moment because I don't really care for fish & chips that much and don't know a lot of good fish recipes so don't bother buying it, but next time I visit home I am going to eat ALL THE SUSHI. I'd like to phase out seafood entirely at some point, but I still don't like enough vegetables to live without it (yes, I am actually very bad at being vegetarian).

[nagasvoice]

Quick breads like cornbread, banana bread, muffins might perhaps meet the bready need?
My mom makes biscuits all the time using vegetable shortening, and they come out divine to my palate--very light, very flaky, an essence of breadness, but this does not match what everybody else expects. For instance, they do not reek of soda, or of bacon, or of salty stuff (such as would accompany redeye gravy and eggs for breakfast) or anything else that I have heard people expect from their "traditional" versions. They're very good, though. Recipe's on the baking powder can, I think.
When vegans talk about disliking the exploitation of milk cows or chickens, some of them are talking about avoiding factory farming risks and avoiding the whole system which breeds cows who give so much milk that it scours all the calcium out of their bones in spite of supplements. That is cruel and it ends their lives prematurely--totally aside from getting sent to slaughter when their productivity drops too low. And that's part of the argument why eating milk or cheese is just as ethically wrong as eating meat.
In addition, it's a tricky point whether calves "need" the milk as long as the cows are continuing to give it. Breastfeeding is subject to a lot of reasons why it might stop or reduce regardless of what the baby needs. We work very hard to breed and support cows we can milk much longer and in higher volumes than in the old days, while the calves can survive getting weaned younger. Vegans would argue that we artificially wean calves much sooner than is normal to "wild" cows.
I'm not sure we have enough wild cows left with which to get any research on this point, either; I know there's some in places like the scrubby woods in Spain.
Then there's the argument that supporting those cows costs tremendous amounts of ag resources and risky chemicals, to control pests in the fodder that keeps those high-powered animals productive. Plus, the wastes from things like the huge hog farms and chicken ranches are a major problem.
I still like bacon sometimes, darn it. No, I'm not vegetarian or vegan. I'm not terribly tolerant of legumes, or I might live on those more, just because it's cheaper, let alone for environmental reasons. But for practical economic reasons, a lot of us are eating a lot less meat than we used to. This may not be a bad thing, taken all together.

[annotated_em]

Egg yolks = lemon curd! Or other custards, but my mind turns first to lemon curd.

[okaasan59]

This is totally not helpful, but I subscribe to the Southern Louisiana Creed of Food Consumption: Eat everything that doesn't eat you first. And so I've eaten some pretty interesting things. ^_^

[opheliastornoway]

Egg yolk recipes - someone above mentioned lemon curd, and I would add to that any sort of creme brulee/catalan variation: we usually make them in tandem with pavlova, which takes lots of egg whites. Or, for less desserty things, there's a spinach cannelloni (sp?) recipe I do which technically calls just for the yolks, even if I'm usually lazy and use the whole egg ...

[dragonhand]

"What do you mean he don't eat no meat? ...it's alright. I'll make lamb!" /My Big Fat Greek Wedding

Mmmm, egg bread. Mmmm, lemon curd. Uh, what was the question?

Oh, also, I use egg yolks for egg tempura painting. Add a little water and pigment, and those watercolors are as stable and long lasting as oils. And won't crack. But I guess you don't have much use for that. XD

Egg-free breads

[thejeopardymaze]

One of the most famous is the french baguette, or however you spell it. There are also a lot of others made in Europe, but they're not without egg and butter filled yeast raised breads of their own either, my favorite being brioche. I hope to make a decent gluten-free version of that someday, because it's the most heavenly bread there is.

You'll find a lot of good recipes for traditional egg-free breads in pastry and bakery textbooks, or books made by bakers who specialize on the subject. One thing I've learned, the fat-free types of breads are the ones that spoil the most quickly.

[majoline]

I just want to know what bread recipes you have, because they sound FANTASTIC.

Another use for egg yolks

[kathmandu]

I make avgholemono broth with egg yolks. 2 cups chicken bouillon, heat to boiling. In a mixing bowl, put three egg yolks and lightly mix them with a fork. Begin adding the hot bouillon a few drops at a time, stirring constantly, so as not to shock the yolks. The idea is to expose the eggs to near-boiling temperatures without thickening the proteins. Continue gradually add the bouillon, stirring constantly, until it is all incorporated. Add lemon juice to taste, sprinkle with black pepper, and drink.

The classic version has chicken shreds and cooked rice in it too, but I'm not fond of rice and chicken is too much trouble to mess with for the little bit that would go in one serving. This is yummy, tangy, provides protein, and is very simple to make.

I would be interested to hear sometime about your family's vegetable dishes: what all did you make to have twice as many veggie dishes as people at holiday gatherings, and how did you manage the logistics of cooking and prepping them all?