Of course beef should be on the menu in meat-free restaurants – and I’m a vegan evangelist

Veganism is not a religion and we aren’t fatally allergic to meat. So what’s the problem when it comes to plants being served up alongside the odd meaty treat, asks Flic Everett

Being a purist is fine when the punters are clamouring for cauliflower steaks (Getty)

Walk down any British high street and there’ll be a raft of shuttered restaurants, tattered menu boards streaked with rain, another business owner’s dreams visibly dashed. In the first quarter of last year alone, 569 UK restaurants closed, with insolvencies up 55 per cent from 2022. No wonder vegan restaurants are struggling.

Full disclosure, I edited the magazine Vegan Living in the glory days of plant-eating, 2016 to 2019, when every day brought news of another chilli-tofu-bite or pea-based-bacon launch, and meat-eating seemed a blood-soaked throwback to the days of brutal Victorian slaughterhouses.

The future was Instagrammable, pastel-pink restaurants, cursive neon signs and a menu of innovative plant foods.