This hasn't been my experience, but I also don't think you're seeing everything I'm trying to say.

For example, how should you handle it if the company tells you there will be vegan options at a lunch meeting and then there aren't any? You plan your lunch around that happening and it doesn't happen.

The first four or five times it happened, I was very congenial, just told one of the assistants what had happened, and suggested some menu items from the common lunch catering place that would work for me. Still nothing. One time after that they even ordered pizza for lunch ... what's a vegan to do?

Finally in my year-end review I brought it up as a really small, totally quick and "no big deal" aside that I'd really appreciate it if they ensured there were vegan choices at any company meal events, like lunches or gatherings.

My boss literally rolled his eyes at me and let out a big sigh and started writing it down on his evaluation form, like it was some big to-do that I wouldn't drop it. And after that they basically started only having low-quality salad options for vegans.

A few months later when there was a company gathering with light dinner and snack items, I actually brought my own food and when I went over to get some of the alcohol that was available and sat down with some people and started opening up the food I brought from home, they started making fun of me over it. One or two comments and I was like, OK, whatever, and shrugged it off, but they kept going and it was really upsetting. But after the big eye roll ordeal at my performance review, I didn't feel comfortable telling anyone that it upset me.

That company was a great company. Good pay, lots of vacation, good tech stack. I left there after a few years thinking I'd made a good switch and then in the first week at my new job the director of marketing wanted to take me out to a pulled pork restaurant for lunch. Here we go again. I explained that I was vegan and he seemed personally offended. Basically he decided, in front of me, that no places he would ever consider eating at would ever serve vegan choices, because vegan choices, to him, were inherently low-quality. Literally, having-meat-in-it was a mark of quality for him. So then he had to figure out where I could eat (this was a city I'd never been to before) and he drove me there to get something, then drove 20 minutes back the other way to go to the pulled pork place he wanted to go to. It was beyond insane. By the time we sat down to eat, we had very little time, and my food had gotten cold. Of course I said nothing but constant thank-yous and apologies for being such an inconvenient vegan.

I think if you're not vegan (or have some similar dietary choice that's difficult to satisfy and rarely shown respect by peers) it's just very hard to relate to how problematic this is, and how often you are put in a situation in which you're made to feel bad about it. It's not the worst kind of discrimination or anything, but it really does make you feel bad and feel like the workplace is hostile and inconsiderate towards you.

On top of all of this, the overall topic I was mentioning earlier was basically something that happens in salary negotiations and you do have to bring it up. If a company tells you to consider the financial value of their catered meal benefits, well, you've got to tell them that that doesn't work for you and give them specifics about why the catered meal service doesn't function as a benefit for you.

Since they have usually already planned how to pitch a salary offer, how to tie in the value of their fringe benefits, etc., they usually are not happy to be met with what they see as a contrarian and annoying difference. They don't want to raise someone's salary just because that person chooses not to eat the company provided food -- but I don't want to work for, say $5000 less per year than what I ought to be paid if I happen to be unable to benefit from the food offering.

There's no way around that discussion. The HR and manager types absolutely do form opinions about you when you bring this up. It absolutely does get talked about. It's not that they are personally so interested in someone's food choice. I'm sure they find the entire topic of food choices thoroughly boring. It's about the way they perceive any kind of non-conformity as a red flag that you won't sublimate away your personal needs to make their lives easier ... that you might actually require them to provide accommodations for your needs, which is a red flag to them.