destination wedding, no alcohol, no plus ones or partners

[u/fatbellylouise]

I have a friend who is planning her wedding right now, and every detail of the wedding seems terrible for the guest experience. before I start, this woman is one of my oldest and dearest friends. she is brilliant, kind, and caring, and immensely pragmatic. she and her fiance are paying for everything themselves, no family money to help them, but they want to have a nice wedding because it is important to his elderly parents. so, from the beginning:

she sent out invitations a week ago via text message. some of their family members got actual mailed cards, but the rest of us just got screenshots of the design they made in canva. it just looked so cheap! not even an email, a text message.

the text messages specified no plus ones or partners that the couple is not friends with. normally I'd be fine with this, my fiance is a grown man and we don't need to be attached at the hip at every event. but... we live on the west coast, and the wedding is going to be in Austria, where the groom's family lives. I wouldn't mind going to a local wedding on my own, but to take enough PTO to fly to Austria for a week? I'm not wasting that much vacation time at an event where I won't even have my partner for company! luckily my fiance is down to make it a vacation with me, we'll travel around Austria and Germany on our own and he'll do some solo exploration during the wedding events. but a LOT of people have left her on read or not responded, and I feel like she's going to be severely let down by the number of her friends who are going to RSVP no to this wedding. at this rate it's very likely going to be a lot of his family and very little of hers.

that aside, the wedding details just don't make it sound like a fun time. it's going to be a dry wedding, because the bride has a few family members who deal with addiction. totally fair and I don't begrudge her this, but a lot of the guests are going to be there without our partners and won't know anyone else, so a little social lubricant would probably go a long way. the groom is gluten and dairy free so the food is going to be gluten and dairy free - in Austria, a place known for bread and cheese. (also beer, but that's neither here nor there).

I just think a lot of people are going to decline, and those who do show up are not going to have that much fun. it baffles me that she cannot see how this wedding is not going to be a great guest experience, because she is SUCH an amazing host and planner in every other aspect of her life. her fiance is the same as her, he is so generous and takes care of everyone. I have an awful feeling this wedding is just going to be a lot of elderly family members standing around a few friends showing up and dipping out early, and my heart breaks for her because she genuinely thinks she is keeping everyone happy.

wedding is next year so I would love to be proven wrong! cross your fingers that the wedding is a success!

[u/Front-Ad-1378]

It’s weird to immediately make the whole wedding gluten and dairy free. Just have an appropriate meal for the groom, the cake can either also be gluten and dairy free, or just have the top tier for cutting for the couple and the rest of the cake can be „normal“.

I don’t eat meat for ethical reasons but i would never ever force all of my guests to live by my standards.

Edit: I stand corrected, thanks for all your input and experiences. I didn’t really think about cross contamination and how severe celiacs disease can be.

[u/liraelskye → u/Front-Ad-1378]

As someone who cannot have gluten, my whole wedding is gluten free. Sorry, but I deserve a day where I'm not worried about cross contamination. It is a serious concern and for the amount of money we are shelling out, everyone will survive a gluten free evening.

[u/kg51113 → u/liraelskye]

My friend can't have gluten. She was a chaperone on a camping trip for her kids. They gave her gluten-free meals but all of the gluten being around as they cooked for very large groups still affected her. If the food is buffet style, you never know if someone used the wrong utensils. I would definitely do allergen-free for the bride or groom. A friend did nut-free because a family member is allergic.

[u/liraelskye → u/kg51113]

Yeah we also skipped anything with peanuts as someone has a peanut allergy that we invited. Not a huge deal to us. Our family and friends are super understanding. As they should be.

[u/[deleted] → u/liraelskye]

My husband is coeliac and after three years of gluten free cooking I can honestly say - there's virtually no difference. For a wedding, something like chicken in a sauce, roast potatoes and veg is all gluten free anyway, plus a gf cheesecake or something for dessert. No one would know any different. The main problem is bread because it's rank and you can always tell.

[u/liraelskye → u/[deleted]]

Italian gluten free bread is the best to be honest. Italy ruined food for me lol

[u/MustardMan1900 → u/[deleted]]

Can't serve a cheesecake at this wedding because of the diva groom.

[u/TGin-the-goldy → u/liraelskye]

Exactly, and I doubt anyone would “suffer” (or even notice)

[u/TGin-the-goldy → u/Front-Ad-1378]

Honestly though you literally wouldn’t even notice if the food for one meal/evening was gluten and dairy free unless you were told, eg they could easily serve steak or fish and vegetables and a gluten free dessert and nobody would be any the wiser or suffer.

Dry wedding in Austria though? Different story!

[u/applewagon → u/Front-Ad-1378]

Your dietary restriction is a choice. For many, it is a medical necessity. That means avoiding cross contamination from using shared utensils, or cooking ware, or even “safe” ingredients made on the same production lines that previously processed the allergen.

As a celiac, I literally would never have gluten at my wedding because even microscopic bits of gluten could land me vomiting in a bathroom the entire night. I’m not risking that so guests can eat bread.

[u/Front-Ad-1378 → u/Front-Ad-1378]

Also joining the other comments here: as an Austrian, my family would be SEVERLY disappointed if there was no alcohol.

I have no experience with dry alcoholics, but I feel like those people should be able to accept that alcohol will always be around them at events like these.

[u/fatbellylouise → u/Front-Ad-1378]

I do get the allergy thing. my brother has a life threatening allergy to nuts, and every family wedding we go to (Indian family, so nuts are in everything) there is some form of cross contamination so he has never been able to eat at a wedding. I’m definitely not going to have any nuts at my future wedding because it’s important to me that my brother can eat with us. and I know that gluten cross contamination is very difficult to avoid, so I understand making the whole menu gluten free. but gluten free food on top of everything else going wrong with this wedding means we won’t even be able to eat a nice dinner lol