Posts archived in food
I’ve never been to Rosetta’s Kitchen in Asheville, NC but everyone raves about it and especially the Peanut Butter Baked Tofu. [oh man, sorry folks, that link went bad.] The recipe is crazy simple. My only complaint is that it came out pretty salty, even for me, and I like salt. It’s probably because I used tamari instead of regular soy sauce. Next time I’ll try soy sauce and if it’s still too salty cut the soy sauce with stock for the third try. Bonus, the leftovers made a nummy sammich.
Our flight was at 2pm so most brunch options would be cutting it too close. The Organic Grill‘s brunch started at 10 and was pretty close by so we decided to try that. It’s not a vegan restaurant, but there were plenty of options. I got the tofu rancheros. I was completely happy with this. Right amount of food. Very satisfying.
Okay, so we might have gotten 3 breakfasts between the two of us. *blort* Kevin wanted the blueberry slamcakes. And he was glad we’d ordered an extra thing. The pancakes were pretty small and he didn’t love the scramble. I liked the pancakes but if you’re starving it might not be enough food.
The other thing that intrigued us was their tofu omelette. They really hype it up on the menu. And what could be bad about tofu stuffed with vegan cheese and veggies. We’re pretty sure they’re using Daiya cheese too. It was huge, like almost burrito sized. They seem to shred the tofu and maybe mix it with little batter to make it into an omelette shape. The Daiya really made it though.
After this, we walked around the corner to get falafels from Mamoun’s since Kevin hadn’t had them yet. We ate them later on the plane. Kevin wasn’t impressed. I still think they’re pretty good but not necessarily the best I’ve ever had.
While eating brunch, Matt & Danielle sent out a tweet that they would be at Pala Pizza at 4pm and to come join them. Uh, sure, why not! It was kind of dark in there so photos were pretty sucky. The pizza was good. They used Daiya. We also split some gnocchi. Sadly, it was gummy and undercooked.
So after eating at Pala, we hopped in a cab with Ken & Leigh and headed to Veggie Conquest to eat some more! We were lucky enough to be in NYC during Veggie Conquest and to get tasting tickets through Ken & Leigh. Thanks guys! The secret ingredient for this event was cranberries and the course was dessert. Here’s the list of entries. I think #4 was a no show.
The tastes arrived in small bites. Definitely doable. My favorite was also the judges, #7 the rice crepe with cran-ginger sauce. What we didn’t know is that after the competition, there would be a huge buffet of delicious foods set up. Oh crap. Match Vegan Meats was one of the sponsors and provided volunteers with some of their vegan meats for the buffet dishes. My favorite was the swedish meatballs. Definitely comfort food. I think it’s the one in the middle of my plate. No, I didn’t clean this plate, but I sure as hell tried everything.
We also got to sample one of the creamiest vegan ice creams I’ve ever had from the Raw Ice Cream Company. That’s right, it’s also raw. Amazing!
All in all, this was an amazing event. A bunch of like minded people eating tasty food in a beautiful space (an art gallery exhibiting never seen before photographs of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones) for a bargain price of $20. We are totally going to have to start one of these in Atlanta.
Saturday after the wedding was another day of a ridiculous amount of eating. It started out innocently enough. We knew we were going to meet a bunch of folks for brunch at Counter around noon. But both of us are early risers and weren’t going to make it all the way ’til noon. So we went by Cafe Pedlar for coffee again and then got bagels.
Then later we headed over to Counter to meet up with a ton of people. We basically took over the back of the restaurant.
Now, I’ll give them a break on the service since we were such a huge group and arrived in waves. But again the food wasn’t worth the hype. I got the tofu scramble. It’s mostly up under the toast. I will say the potatoes were awesome. Nice crisp on them, soft inside. The tofu scramble was bland and uninteresting. How do you mess up tofu scramble? You can make it an infinite number of tasty ways. It’s inexcusable really.
Kevin thought his french toast was pretty good. But there should have been more of it.
Anyway, my overall impression from my two visits to Counter is that it isn’t worth the hype.
After brunch, we grabbed the rented evening clothes and headed downtown to return them. I’m glad I went with Kevin because I was able to see Trinity Church Cemetery.
Oh, we’re not done eating yet. Coming up, pizza and Veggie Conquest!
Friday after breakfast, Kevin was busy with wedding stuff so I wandered around a bit on my own. I did a little shopping in Union Square.
After that, I hit up Mamoun’s for a falafel. $2.50??? What a bargain!
Then I headed back to the apartment to rest and get ready for the wedding. Somehow I managed to pass by Babycakes. Hmm…I wonder how that happened? Chocolate crumb cake and cinnamon toast loaf. Yum!
I didn’t take any pictures at Danielle & Matt’s wedding. There were professionals handling that. I’m sure the pics will be up soon. Meanwhile, the smile booth photos will give you an idea… Also, Leigh grabbed some pictures of the food.
Friday morning we had breakfast at Atlas Cafe again. Hey, at least we tried different things, right?
This time I decided to try a savory crepe, the vegan unchicken crepe. I’m not sure what they use for the chicken, but I think it was one of the standards you can get in a grocery store. The salad was a nice touch. My only complaint is that the tomato stuff inside had little or no flavoring.
Oh, whoops. I guess I also got a blueberry muffin. Vegan Treats, I think.
I can’t remember what Kevin got. Looks like some kind of deli slices on there.
On the way to breakfast, we spotted this. So true.
Thursday was somewhat less eventful. Wednesday was crazy, right? I don’t seem to have a pic of breakfast. It must have been a bagel. Oh, I know it was. Then we headed uptown to hang out with Kevin’s parents. Ended up having lunch at a terrible Mexican restaurant. Oh well. That’s what happens when you don’t want to walk around in the rain.
The rehearsal dinner was that night at Spring Street Natural. Although there was no rehearsal. It’s not a vegan restaurant, but has some vegan options. There were set choices for our dinner. I had the stuffed acorn squash. It was…okay. Cafe Sunflower’s is much better. I didn’t hear how people liked their stir fry so I’m not sure how that is. It was too dark in there so no pic.
What did we do afterward? Lula’s Sweet Apothecary, of course! This time I got a single scoop of peanut butter fudge with hot fudge on it. So fucking good!
Kevin is now in love with malts:
And we seriously packed the place out as they were about to close. Whoops! They were very good sports about it though.
After lunch at Pukk, we chilled for a while waiting for a long night of festivities. Kevin went off with the boys to Wild Ginger for dinner, then Lula’s Sweet Apothecary then they met up with the girls. The girls headed to Soy and Sake for dinner, then Local 138 for drinks and games, then we met the boys at the Slipper Room for baudy entertainment.
At Soy and Sake I think we sampled most of the menu. Plates of food just kept coming out! I was really bad at taking pics this evening. Here is a nice assortment of some of the things we had.
This plate is very fake meat heavy. The restaurant space is gorgeous. And all of the food was good. The lettuce wraps might have been my favorite.
Next we grabbed some cabs and headed to Local 138. It has a back room where we had our party. The bartender was crazy slow, and possibly a little fucked up, but made a perfect martini. So I can’t complain. In the back room we played games and ate boxes of dicks. Delicious chocolate brownie dicks and vanilla cream filled dicks provided by Vegan Treats. Since they are, well, dicks, I’ll hide the pic behind the “more” tag in case you don’t want your screen filled with dicks when your boss walks by. Read the rest of this entry »
Other than Mamoun’s, this has to be the best deal in New York. Pukk has a bunch of lunch specials for $6. For that you get soup, an appetizer, an entree and brown or white rice. Dinner prices are also reasonable, but this is an amazing bargain.
Soup and vegan thai iced tea:
The Thai iced tea was much better than Loving Huts. More like what I remember. I think Loving Hut just needs to brew the tea stronger.
I think I got the Massaman Curry, but the online menu doesn’t say anything about tofu. So it could be the Panang. The appetizer is the square noodle roll. I will almost always order something with fermented black beans in it given the option. Also, I totally failed to ask for the extra spices, so I don’t know how good their wheel of doom is.
Kevin got the Red Curry Duck and the spicy spring rolls.
Just walking in for lunch here seemed to be no problem, but the space is tiny so there may be waits for dinner. The space itself is tiled all the way around including the ceiling. My picture sucks so I’m not adding it, but I encourage you to click through to their site to have a look.
Wednesday morning, we looked at the internets at Cafe Pedlar. Then we walked over to Atlas Cafe for breakfast. I had the fake BLT on an everything bagel. The micro greens were a nice touch. The fake bacon reminded me of the peppered Tofurky slices. No matter, it was tasty.
Kevin had the strawberry banana crepe. Really good.
Hey, how ’bout a chocolate doughnut covered with sprinkles? Don’t mind if I do! Vegan Treats of course. Atlas has a bakery case stuffed with Vegan Treats.
And here’s the outside. One thing about New York is it’s amazing how much restaurants get done in small spaces.
After this, we stashed the computers back at the apartment and headed towards Chinatown. We passed a pickle shop. Saw some crazy accident or something that seriously fucked up traffic and had roads blocked off.
Then we just headed back on Bowery towards lunch. Lunch, I will cover in another post.
i have a serious brain disease. please give me a cat.
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