we asked bursars at every college and hall the following: 

1. Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?

2. If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?

NB: In our letter to Bursars we indicated that their responses would be published online.

Sample menus received can be found on the Sample Menus Page


All Souls College

No response received

Balliol College 

No response received

Blackfriars

  Please note that the Hall does not currently have its own in house catering provision that would allow us to provide regular meals for students, although this is certainly an ambition for the future development of our facilities:

  1. Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?

Yes, we always ensure that vegetarian and vegan options are available at Blackfriars events.  

  1. If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?

n/a (we do not have in house catering provision at present)

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?

n/a (we do not have in house catering provision at present)

Many thanks for your recent message regarding the Vegetarian Norrington Table.  May I invite you (and/or other colleagues from your Society) to join a launch event for a new initiative from the Colleges' Domestic Bursars' Committee on catering inclusively for people who follow diets linked to their ethnic, religious, or belief backgrounds, including vegetarianism and veganism?  The launch event will take place this Thursday, 24th October 2019, from 4 pm at St Anne's College, in the Mary Ogilvie Lecture Theatre.  I have included some brief further details about the event below, and we would encourage anyone who would like to join us to register their interest at the link https://tinyurl.com/y6q9v92z

In August 2018, the Domestic Bursars’ Committee received a generous grant of £12,000 from the University's Diversity Fund to undertake a project to support the Oxford Colleges to cater inclusively for diners from diverse ethnic, religious, and other belief backgrounds, including vegetarianism and veganism.  Throughout the last year, this project has worked directly with BAME caterers from Challenge Consultancy to develop effective new training and resources that will be available for free to all college catering and hospitality staff. We are now excited to tell the wider collegiate and University community about the work we have been doing, the training that will be available, and how they can get involved in a developing network for sharing their practice. Please join us for a series of presentations about our new resources, compered by Femi Otitoju of Challenge Consultancy.

Brasenose College 

We always offer vegetarian and vegan food for all formal and inform dinner I have attached menus, we don’t have a one chef making the vegan or vegetarian food put we all have input and always make sure it’s a balanced meal, we also make our own vegan sweets but no put onto the menu.

Campion Hall

No response received

Christ Church  

No response received

Corpus Christi College

  1. We offer both daily

  2. Not as yet – the kitchen is less than a week old

  3. Yes – more than one.

Exeter College 

No response received

Green Templeton College 

Green Templeton College is proud of its delicious and varied vegetarian and vegan meal options at both lunch and dinner. We warmly invite you to attend a College lunch to sample our dishes.

1. Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?

Green Templeton College offers vegetarian meal options at every College lunch sitting. Vegan food is also available at lunch and catered for alongside other dietary requests. In addition, every Monday lunch sitting at College is Meat-Free Monday, serving a menu that is entirely vegetarian and vegan. This initiative was implemented on a trial basis in June 2018 by our Sustainability Working Group to expand our offering of vegetarian and vegan dishes and allow Green Templeton to continue to do our bit to help the environment. Following positive feedback from members of the College community, the decision was taken to make Meat-Free Mondays a permanent fixture on the weekly College lunch menu. Vegetarian food is available at all College dinners with vegan food also available for those who have requested it. 

2. If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?

Our vegetarian and vegan options change throughout the year to incorporate seasonal produce and provide variety for our diners. Please find recent sample menus for both Meat-Free Monday lunch and College dinner attached.

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?

Our chefs have not had formal vegetarian or vegan food training however they attend shows throughout the year, receive monthly vegetarian and vegan food magazines, and trial many new ideas and recipes, which go through various taste tests before being placed on the menu, where they are always very warmly received.

Harris Manchester College 

No response received

Hertford College

No response received

Jesus College 

No response received

Keble College 

No response received

Kellogg College 

No response received

Lady Margaret Hall 

1.Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?  

Answer - Yes we do

2. If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?   

Answer - Yes we can.  Please send menu 1, next week’s menu is not our usual one as it is Wellness Week

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?  

Answer – yes we do, our Head Chef.

Linacre College 

No response received

Lincoln College 

No response received

Magdalen College 

No response received

Mansfield College 

1.      Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?

There are always vegetarian options at every meal.  For a term time student or high table lunch and dinner we provide two vegetarian options; in vacations one.  (The non-vegetarian options are similarly restricted in vacations.)  Vegan options are provided on request.  For a formal hall there is a set menu – one vegetarian (and/or vegan if requested) and one non-vegetarian.  Since your previous survey we have also instituted ‘Meat Free Monday’ which has been very well received.  On Mondays during term there are four vegetarian options, in vacations there are two.

2.      If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?

There is no ‘usual’ – here are some current/recent examples from a student/high table lunch (there being no difference between the two):

Vegetarian

Spanakopita feta and spinach filo parcels, roasted pepper sauce 

Warm salad of roast beets, orange, feta and rocket with pine nuts and red pepper

Coconut and lemongrass curry with sugar snaps, baby corn, peppers and sweet potato

Smokey black beans, tomato, Monterey Jack and chimichurri in a spinach wrap

Grilled soya patties on a bed of tenderstem broccoli, spinach and brown rice with tomato sauce

Chick pea, cauliflower and spinach jalfrezi

Breaded mozzarella and piquillo pepper poppers with tomato sauce

Vegan

Cauliflower, chick pea and tomato madras

Cajun peppers and kidney beans with avocado in a tortilla wrap

Butternut and spinach risotto

Mushroom and sweet potato tacos topped with guacamole

Quesadilla with refried beans, and spinach chilli

Butternut and tofu rendang curry with sugar snaps

And here are some recent formal hall main course menus:

Char grilled polenta topped with goat’s cheese 

Served on Italian vegetables with roasted vine tomato

Roast vegetable and pearl barley potato roulade 

Parsnip mash roast carrots  

Tender stem broccoli beef jus

Roast vegetable and pearl barley potato roulade 

Parsnip mash roast carrots  

Tender stem broccoli beef jus

Roast beetroot fig & goats cheese tartan 

with a warm salad of feta beets new potato, & 

roasted vine tomatoes and balsamic glaze

char grilled vegetable stack 

Served with rosemary garlic potatoes

3.      Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?

The head chef is fully trained in vegetarian cooking having been on several specialist courses.  All other chefs have then been trained to prepare vegetarian meals using the experience of the head chef.

Merton College 

No response received

New College 

No response received

Nuffield College

No response received

Oriel College

1. Yes we offer both in Hall.

2. Attached

3 Chefs Trained internally to cook vegetarian and vegan meals, nobody has done any specialist courses.

Pembroke College 

No response received

Regent's Park College 

No response received

Somerville College 

No response received

St Anne's College 

No response received

St Antony's College 

No response received

St Benet's Hall

1.       Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?

All of our meals are cooked to order for each individual (students and staff have to book in by 8am on the day), so we provide meals aligned with an individual’s dietary requirements.  That would include vegetarian and vegan food, but also dairy free, halal, etc.

2.       If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?

This is the vegetarian menu from Tuesday next week:  

(v) Heritage tomato with buffalo mozzarella and avocado cream

~~~~~~~

(v) Teriyake noodles with  shitake mushroom and pak choi

~~~~~~~

Chocolate tahini blondies with cream

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?

All our chefs are trained to cook vegetarian and vegan food.

St Catherine's College 

1. Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall? YES

2. If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide? AVAILABLE ON OUR WEBSITE https://www.stcatz.ox.ac.uk/catz-students/domestic-information/

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food? All our chefs have experience and training in this area

St Cross College 

No response received

St Edmund Hall College 

No response received

St Hilda's College

1)      All our menus in College have a Vegan Option we also stock a range of vegan snacks and cakes to purchase during the day.

2)      I have attached last week’s Hall Menu which is displayed to all students via our UPAY cashless system.

3)      All our chefs are trained to cook Vegetarian and Vegan.

St Hugh's College 

No response received

St John's College 

No response received

St Peter's College

1.     Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?  

Yes, both on most days, Vegan if only one choice.

2.     If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide? 

Please see attached sample menus from last term and this term.

3.     Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food? 

All chefs at SPC are qualified in catering and I ”Colin Purvis” hold a vegetarian society diploma in vegetarian catering.

We have recently employed a chef who is a vegan, we also plan to send other chefs on a vegetarian course in the near future.

By the way as there is a national vegetarian week next week, we are running a predominately veggie main course menu all week. 

St Stephen's House

1. Do you routinely offer the option of vegetarian and vegan food in your college or hall?  All meals have a vegetarian option

2. If you do, can you supply a sample of the usual menu you provide?  

Vegetarian minestrone soup

Butternut Squash and chilli tart                          

Vegan meringue with marinated raspberries

3. Do you have a chef that is trained in cooking vegetarian and vegan food?  32 years’ experience and many courses

The Queen's College 

No response received

Trinity College

No response received

University College 

No response received

Wadham College 

No response received

Wolfson College

1.       We do always offer vegetarian and vegan option in the hall.

2.       Sample menu attached. 

3.      All of our senior Chefs are trained to cook Vegetarian and Vegan food. Head Chef is also qualified in healthier/nutrition diets.

Worcester College

No response received

Wycliffe Hall

No response received