Eating out.

Eating out for a lot of people is a fun escape from the kitchen. If we are lucky, what we end up eating out is better than what we can produce in our own kitchen. Eating out as a vegan at non-vegan or even non-vegetarian restaurants can be tricky, but with the right strategy, it can be made to be a fun experience.

• Choose a restaurant that has a wide range of dishes--and a variety of vegetables contributing to each dish. You can look at menus on-line these days.

• Pick restaurants with a vegetarian menu: if that is the case, it's pretty easy to make something vegan, by just asking the server to omit cheese or dairy from a dish.
  

• Learn to scan the menu: if there appears to be nothing on the menu that is vegan, see what makes up other dishes. I was at a restaurant to celebrate friend's birthday. There was nothing vegan on the menu. But, they had a few dishes that looked promising--some sort of meat dish with orecchiette pasta, an appetizer with broccoli rabe (of which I a raving fan), and some other dish with sauteed mushrooms. I asked the server if I could have the orecchiette with the broccoli rabe and mushrooms with some OO and garlic. It was soooooo good. And, the server was very gracious about helping me figure something out.
  

• Call ahead if you can: if at all possible, call ahead at least a day before you are going to attend the restaurant. That way the chef will have a chance to plan something. For the most part, a good chef is going to be delighted to cook something vegan, if given enough time. They consider it to be a culinary challenge. If a restaurant can't accommodate a vegan, they are probably a pretty crappy restaurant (or a steak house).

• Vegan, or vegetarian allergic to eggs and dairy? So this is less a problem than it used to be way back when I became a vegan. But, what used to happen to me is when I said I didn't want cheese on something, cheese would end up on my dish. When I said I didn't want cheese on something because I'm vegan, still cheese would end up on the dish. When I said I was allergic to dairy, no cheese on anything. Basically, I'll do this when it's clear no one on staff has any idea of what a vegan is, and it's faster and more efficient to say I'm allergic to something to ensure it doesn't end up on my plate. For more progressive places, if you say vegan, they'll know what to do. That's just about everywhere in San Francisco, for example.
  

Happy eating!

Real honest to goodness fabulous vegan candy bars.

Ok, so this isn't the best thing for those looking to cut down on sugar. But, for an occasional treat, I have discovered the BEST vegan candy bars EVER. They are made by a company called Go Max Go Foods. They have a bar that is has peanuts, nougat and caramely goodness, called Jokerz. There's another one with coconut and almonds, the Mahalo. Soooo good. I have been a bit overzealous today, and ate one of each.

Another fabulous thing is that it looks like they are pretty easy to find. Go here to find out where to get them (they have them in Australia too!).

A thing to remember about eating vegan.

The biggest thing I have learned about eating vegan is that you shouldn't strive to replicate your meat/egg/dairy dishes and have the result be a perfect replica. It isn't going to happen. In fact, if you make something, and then eat it, expecting it taste exactly like Dad's meatloaf or your Mom's morning omelet, you are going to be disappointed. Not because what you make is going to be gross, but because you have created some cognitive dissonance. Kind of like when you reach for a coke but get water instead. Alone, each of these beverages is pretty yummy, but when you drink water expecting coke, or coke expecting water, the cognitive dissonance just makes you scowl in disappointment and confusion.

Instead, I suggest using your favorite non-vegan dishes as inspiration, or jump off points. For example, using the same spices that you've used before may help along a tofu dish. Use the transition to a vegan diet as an opportunity to explore all the other food ingredients out there that you haven't even thought of, because you've been concentrating on the same 6 things (meat, dairy, eggs, bread, and sugar) most of your life.

Here are some places where you can get some structured guidance on transitioning to the vegan diet:

PCRM's Vegetarian Starter Kit
PCRM's 21 Day Vegan Kickstart Program
Oprah's Vegan Starter Kit
PETA's Vegetarian Starter Kit

Happy eating!

Making the switch to vegan.

I'm back!

The next several posts will be dedicated to my good friends down in Australia, who are making the switch to vegan (or almost vegan) diet. I'm going to go over the basics that I have discovered make a painless switch from meaty to veggie.

Expect posts on:

Best cookbooks
Milks
Substitutions
Snacks
Favorite recipes
Low-sugar desserts
How to order in a restaurant
What to look for on food labels

Here's to you Nathan and Rachelle!

I will be posting something soon! I promise.

Raw... 2 days out of the 30 day challenge.

Ok, well the first two days of the thirty day challenge have been a piece of cake because all of the food was made for me by Alissa Cohen and her fabulous assistants! The past two and half days I've been at the raw food (or, rather, living food) boot camp.

I'm going to follow up with a much more detailed post when I am done with this session (one more day to go). Until then, here's a quick summary of my past few days.

Friday: Who knew walnuts and a red pepper would make the most unbelievable combination? Alissa's "Mock Salmon" was hands down one of my favorites of the weekend. Some other incredibly easy dishes she showed us: Collard Rolls (I have a new found love for Nama Shoyu), zucchini pasta with marinara sauce, portabello mushroom caps with a yummy avacado filling. All of these dishes took max 5 minutes to put together. Pretty cool.

Saturday: More food! Chili using sprouted barley, a KICK ASS onion dip, pizza!, an enchilada!
And, the MOST amazing thing---a date, filled with coconut, and dipped in a combination of agave syrup, pure cacao powder, and coconut oil. Unbelievable.

Sunday: We learned a lot about what it means to "go raw", the health benefits. Throught the past few days I've also learned a lot of detailed information about what raw means, what it involves. I'll save that for my next post.

Tomorrow I'm headed to Grezzo for a whirlwind 12 hour food fest, tour of the restaurant, and a total information dump from the head chef there. Can't wait!!

Raw...

Yes, raw, as in Raw Vegan. I'm embarking on an experiment. I'm committing to going raw for the next 30 days to see what it's all about. To kick start the effort, I'm doing a raw food boot camp of sorts. I'm attending the accelerated raw food teachers certification that Alissa Cohen of Grezzo is holding this weekend. I'll be posting at the end of each class telling you what I've learned.

Toronto, Transformers, and Tasty Treats

Two weekends ago, I went to TFcon Canada. I agreed to go with my boyfriend cause I thought um, maybe a transformers festival of sorts will be fun (?), and, well, it's Toronto, a known vegan hot spot.

Needless to say, the Transformers aspect of the trip was interesting, in full geek glory. I learned a lot more about Transformers than I ever thought I would care to know.

Lucky for me though, there are indeed tons of vegan places in Toronto, and we began our exploration the first night we got there. We drove from Boston, and got in late in the day, and by the evening we were tired, and just wanted food. We were not looking for any ambiance, so we ended up at Sadie's Diner on E. Adelaide St. Simple, simple, simple. No frills. The food was ok, but the notable thing about Sadie's was the Pez collection.

The next day we explored Toronto and for lunch we ended up at Fresh, on Bloor St. There I treated myself to a brilliant Liver Cleanse juice. Um, yeah, I know, Liver Cleanse sounds AWFUL, but it was a beautifully colored juice concoction with beets, and ginger, and some other stuff, and pink peppercorns! They also had this miso dip for french fries that was to die for.

The next day, for lunch, I just had to try this restaurant called the Urban Herbivore, on Oxford St. The plan was to drive into the city from the hotel where TFcon was happening, get sandwiches from the very funky vegan sandwich place, and drive back in an hour. Check on the first half of the plan: we managed to leave TFcon, get to the restaurant, get our sandwiches (a lovely selection of sandwiches, cookies, super relaxed environment, and obviously a popular spot), and get gas for the car. What we hadn't counted on was the jumper who was threatening to jump off an overpass of the Gardiner Expressway, closing off the highway in about 10 miles in either direction, and a major accident on another one of the major highways, and major work being done on another one of the major highways, all funneled traffic onto a few roads. Thus, our entire quick lunch trip took us about two and half hours. The cookie was fabulous, and the sandwhiches weren't bad, *almost* worth the hassle.

Our final veg destination was Fressen, on Queen St. W. I had heard so much about Fressen in the Toronto press; I had big expectations. Overall, it was...a little bit better than ok. They operate on a tapas style model, so we ordered 4 dishes: Mushroom raviolis, some sort of gourmet pizza, a mushroom and vegetable filled purse made from filo dough, and some asparagus. All were very beautifully plated, very delicately flavored, but we should have ordered 5 dishes. Then the kitchen staff apparently didn't realize the order for our dessert had been handed in, and we ended waiting almost an hour for it to come out. They were very gracious about the incident, and didn't charge us for it, and take off the cost of one of the dishes we got.




Back to the Transformers: I discovered during a viewing of an episode of Transformers Animated that Prowl, when turned into a human due to the machinations of SoundWave, he preferred to be a vegetarian, because, "don't you know? Vegetable fuel burns cleaner than animal fuel". Well said Prowl! He's my favorite Transformer these days.