What’s a fuckwitarian, you say? Craig Millar calls out adopters of fad diets

Chef Craig Millar came under fire on social media this week after criticising the adopters of fashionable diets, calling them ‘fuckwitarians.’

The chef owner of 16 West End in Fife tweeted that he had enjoyed a food service with no special dietary requests, joking that he was going to apply to make it a national holiday:

We actually just did a full service with no dietaries it was like the 90’s all over again when the words pescatarian, flexitarian and fuckwitarian didn’t exist and the only allergies were hay fever! I’m now going to petition to have 6th April a national chefs holiday ????????‍????????????????

— Craig Millar (@craigcmillar) April 6, 2019

• The good, the bad and the outright disgusting: which plant-based substitutes should chefs get behind?
• Animal Equality UK: Britons don't want to eat foie gras, so why are chefs still serving it?
• Craig Millar | 16 West End | The Seafood Restaurant

We spoke to Craig to understand his point of view.

Despite the outrage precipitated by his tweet, alleging that he was anti-allergy, anti-vegetarian or anti-vegan, he clarified that his problem is with customers who don’t consider how much work goes into creating tasting menus that account for dietary requirements.

He said:"It was mainly the people turning up and saying 'I'm a vegan' and so we'd do a complete tasting menu for a vegan person, and they'd get here and go 'oh, you've got turbot on the menu, we'll have that.' And we'd go 'hang on a minute we thought you were vegan, we've just done a whole menu for that' - and they'd say 'well, we are sometimes, we're not going to be vegan tonight' - that is what I'd class as a fuckwitarian."

"Genuine allergies I obviously don't have a problem with, but you'd get people who'd claim to be lactose intolerant, so we'd do an entirely dairy-free tasting menu with no butter or cream, and then they'd order a cappuccino." 

 Craig stopped short of calling customers out for being disingenuous, calling it a case of 'too many fad diets.' 

He said: "People saying they're going to be a vegan this week, or that they’re not going to eat potatoes today."

"I don't think they appreciate how hard it is to get your menu and mise en place done up - you do a complete menu and then they decide not to have it after all. It's frustrating."