Non Vegetarian Foods in Vegetarian Meals

Are you a vegetarian? Do you know that you may be eating non-vegetarian foods unknowingly. Note that there may be some non-vegetarian food ingredients in vegetarian foods or vegetarian meals that you may like to avoid.

Vegetarian Health Benefits | Vegetarian Nutrition | Vegetarian Types | Food Serving Size | Food Substitute | Vegetarian Food Pyramid | Non-vegetarian foods in Vegetarian Meals | Vegetarian Diet

Some of the vegetarian foods and vegetarian meals that contain non-vegetarian foods are listed below:

Biscuits/Cookies
May contain animal fats. Look for vegetable fat
Bread
Look for vegetable based emulsifiers (E471, E472). Some bakers grease the tins with animal fat.
Breakfast Cereals
May fortified with vitamin D3.
Broth/Stock
May contain animal fat.
Cheese
Most cheeses are produced using animal rennet. Look for non-animal based vegetarian cheese.
Chewing Gum
May contain glycerine that may have been produced from animal fats.
Chocolate
May contain whey and emulsifiers.
Emulsifiers
Look for vegetarian emulsifiers.
French Fries
May be fried in animal fat.
Gelatin
Mostly derived from animals (beef). Vegetarian gelatin include Agar Agar, Carrageen and sea-weeds.
Glycerine/Glycerol
May be produced from animal fats.
Ice Cream
May contain eggs and gelatin that may have been produced from animal fats..
Jello/Jelly
Most contain gelatin that may have been produced from animal fats..
Margarine
May contain animal fats, vitamin D3, whey, gelatin, etc.
Pasta
May contain eggs.
Pastry
May contain animal fat and/or egg.
Pill Capsules
Mostly made from gelatin.
Potato Chips
May contain whey for flavoring.
Soups
Vegetable soups may be processed on the same equipment that process meats. Whey
Whey is a byproduct of the cheese which is made by animal rennet.
Worcester Sauce
Usually contains anchovies.
Yogurt, Frozen yogurt
May contain gelatin.

Note
When you order a vegetarian pizza or a vegetarian sub at Subway, be prepared to accept a few pieces of non-vegetarian foods. The authors of this web site have noted several times at Subway that most of the times they don't change the gloves for making a vegetarian Sub (unless you ask them). Once it so happened that on a vegetarian Sub, they put a ham and when we told them that it was a vegetarian Sub, they simply removed the ham and offered us that Sub!!

Similarly, when you order a vegetarian pizza, we are more than certain that they don't change the gloves all the times; and the meat topping trays are placed side by side to the vegetarian topping trays, so some of the meat pieces may pass on to your vegetarian pizza or because the same gloves that handled the meat toppings are used for vegetable toppings, your pizza cannot be 100% vegetarian. And off course, the cheese used in pizza is produced using animal rennet. The authors of this web site discovered a meat piece (about 1.5 cm size) in their vegetarian pizza from Pizza Hut.

You are sure to get pure vegetarian foods and vegetarian meals if you go to a vegetarian restaurant.