Dear Prudence,
My wife and I live in Wisconsin, and our daughter and her family live a couple hours away in a neighboring state. We try to visit them at least once a month and being from Wisconsin, we pick up a package of fresh (squeaky!) cheese curds for them to enjoy, which they do, as the package is gone within an hour.
A couple of years ago, when she was 12, our granddaughter “Caylee” decided to become a vegetarian. We had no issue with that other than our concern that she was getting enough nutrients that meat provided; our daughter reassured us she did the research to make sure she is eating properly for a growing kid.
When we visited several weeks ago, we were told Caylee made a New Year’s resolution and is now vegan. We didn’t think much of it, as she is at the age (14) to make those decisions, and good for her to follow through on what she believes in.
Last weekend we visited again, and as we were leaving, our daughter pulled us aside and told us that Caylee was disappointed that we didn’t bring her a treat. Her brothers (also her mom and dad) got cheese curds, she didn’t get anything. On our way back home, we talked about it and half-jokingly said next time we would bring a bag of carrots for Caylee as her “treat.” But seriously, the cheese curds were for the whole family, not just the kids. And we weren’t trying to be mean, as though we brought candy bars for the boys while Caylee was diabetic. .
If the store we get the cheese curds from had vegan cheese curds, we would bring them for Caylee, but none (are there vegan cheese curds?) were available when we stopped and checked. My wife and I are honestly at a loss as to what to do about this. Should we stop getting the cheese curds to be fair to Caylee but “punish” the rest of the family?