Airplane Food: Really Not Worth the Hateration (thanks, Aer Lingus!)

/ Kelly / Leave a comment

I am back! S and I returned from our Ireland and Scotland adventure on Sunday. It was, in a word, glorious. I have so much to share because, as it turns out, Dublin and Edinburgh are just bursting with truly phenomenal vegan eateries. I’ll be spacing out my inevitably effusive posts over the next couple weeks, but in the meantime let me start by answering the question that’s on everyone’s lips: How was the airplane food?!

Well, dear readers, it was just fine. We flew Aer Lingus, and a couple days before our flight I called and confirmed that we wanted vegan meals for both legs of our flight. Even after the customer service agent assured me that it was all set, I was a bit nervous. Last time I flew overseas, the meal on the way back from Italy wasn’t vegan – there was some confusion because that flight was operated by KLM, not Delta. But Aer Lingus came through on both legs of our flight, so S and I didn’t have to break into the sizable stash of snacks I’d brought with me. And the great thing about ordering a special meal is that you get it before everyone else on the flight because the flight attendants heat the special meals up separately. Win!

Anyway, here’s what we ate for dinner on our flight to Ireland:

Mmm, scrumptious!

The main dish was a tomato-y chickpea curry with broccoli and carrot. Yes, singular carrot – I spied but one baby carrot in my dish. Despite the slightly mushy veggies and rice, this really wasn’t terrible, and it was more creative than other vegan airplane dishes I’ve experienced. The side salad was a cucumber and tomato deal with no noticeable dressing – fine by me. The meal came with a roll, some non-vegan margarine (whey fail!), and a small fruit salad. Not bad.

After we traversed the Atlantic and jumped ahead in time, we received breakfast. While the rest of the passengers got some sort of croissant sandwich, we received a bagel with blackberry jam and a little tub of orange juice.

Brekkie!

Again, not terribly exciting, but totally acceptable.

I didn’t photograph our food on the flight back, but you’re not missing much. Our lunch was an uninspiring pasta and veggie dish; it was limp and rather flavorless. It came with a typical side salad (no dressing), a roll, actually-vegan margarine, and more fruit salad. Sadly, we did not receive a special vegan pre-landing snack. The crew came around and offered another breakfast bread-y snack (croissant? roll? bagel? I don’t even remember), but it contained dairy, so we passed. Ah well. Can’t win ’em all.

In summary, Aer Lingus definitely passed the airplane food test. It also passed my “no delay” test – I have reallllly bad luck when I fly; nearly every flight I take gets delayed, gets cancelled, or goes horribly awry on one leg (or both!). But none of our Aer Lingus flights had any issues; other than the Chicago-Dublin round trip, we embedded a Dublin-Edinburgh trip that went equally smoothly. Hooray for that.

Don’t worry – this is the least exciting of my travel recap posts. I have much more exciting stuff to talk about later!

What have your vegan airplane food experiences been like? 

Restaurant Review: Julians Restaurant

/ Kelly / 9 Comments

I think I broke my mom’s heart a little tiny bit when I visited last week. On our first night in RI, my parents wanted to go out to eat – but not to our veg-friendly standard, the Garden Grille. Instead they wanted to hit up a local establishment that offers a variety of Asian cuisines. Our conversation went something like this:

Mom: So I was thinking we could meet at Seven Moons for dinner.

Me: I’m not sure Seven Moons has vegan options…

Mom: Yes, it does! They have pad thai! I get that all the time!

Me: Really? They don’t use fish sauce?

Mom: …fish sauce?

Needless to say, it was all downhill from there. Mom called the restaurant, they confirmed that fish sauce is everywhere, and my poor mother suffered a severe case of disillusionment. I might have spied a tear on her cheek when she hung up the phone.

Luckily, though, a quick Google search advised me of a promising but yet-untried (by me!) veg-friendly joint in Providence – Julians Restaurant. (And yes, there is a lack of apostrophe in their name. I know.) So, that evening, we all met up there to see what Julian had to offer.

While Julians isn’t a vegetarian restaurant (the menu includes various meats), it does offer more than a few meat-free options. And we’re not talking about your token Boca burger, either – these are creative, thoughtful dishes worth ordering. All of my family members chose something meat-free (if not vegan), and I passed the camera around the table and had them photograph what they ate. We’ll start with the Vegan Steak & Cheese Wrap, which both S and I ordered because neither of us was terribly hungry.

Wrapped!

Our wraps included house-made seitan, onions, mushrooms, peppers, and vegan cheese, and they were the perfect size for our less robust appetites. The house-made seitan was juicy and tender and they included just the right amount of soy cheese. My only complaint was that the seitan was just a bit too salty for my tastes.

After being foiled in her earlier craving for pad thai, Mom decided to go with a different flavor palette entirely. She ordered the Mediterranean Spice Fried Seitan Skewers.

Two skewers of seitan resting atop a bed of bulgar wheat, with green pea shoots in the background and cauliflower puree to the right.

Definitely not pad thai.

Fancy, right? These featured more house-made seitan alongside saffron-olive-portobella bulgar, pea tendrils, preserved lemon, and paprika roasted cauliflower purée. See what I mean about the creative dishes here? Mom enjoyed these, although she agreed that the seitan was a bit salty.

Finally, here is the last dish that got photographed. I’m not sure if it was dad’s or my brother’s – I thought both of them had snapped a shot, but apparently not!

A rather nondescript dish of seitan and noodles and broccoli.

Moar seitan!

I think this is my brother’s dish. He chose a special of the day, which was a seitan-based dish in a spicy peanut sauce. He liked it but commented that it wasn’t really all that peanutty – the spiciness overpowered the peanuttiness. Alas.

I’m not totally sure, but I believe my dad ordered the  House Corned Beef Seitan, which is served with roasted fingerling potatoes, maple glazed carrots and caraway stout braised cabbage. He gave me a taste, and I can vouch that it was quite tasty. My sister ordered the only non-vegan meal, another special of the day. Hers was some sort of tofu-based sandwich; I think it included cheese.

Beyond pleasing my taste buds with its yummy food, Julians pleased my eyes as well. The restaurant is decorated with all sorts of art and knick-knacks in its the cozy interior. The bathroom features a collection of action figures alongside an art installation – a TV showing images and sounds of trains. I’m not quite sold on that one. ;)

If my praise doesn’t convince you that Julians is worth a visit, let me also add that S is 95% sure he saw Ted Leo (of Ted Leo and the Pharmacists) enjoying dinner on Julians’ patio. He was slightly starstruck but decided not to say hello so as not to make an unwelcome dinnertime intrusion. :) I didn’t need the star sighting, though – the food was good enough to bring me back! In fact, the weekend after I left, my mom and aunt headed there for brunch. And Julians has some amazing-sounding vegan brunch options – Carrot Cake Pancakes with Cashew Cream Cheese?! Holy smokes! I know where I’m eating breakfast next time I’m in RI! :)

Have you spotted famous folks out and about in the wild? What’s your favorite local veg-friendly eatery?

This is a pre-scheduled post because I’m currently on vacation. If anything looks funky, blame the scheduling feature in WordPress. ;)

What’s in the Box? Summer 2012 CSA Week Five

/ Kelly / 6 Comments

It’s week five of my summer CSA! Want to see my haul?

An empty basket!

Gasp!

What devilry is this?! Don’t worry, our farm hasn’t gone under or anything. S and I decided to donate our share to a local food pantry this week. I’d be lying if I said we did it out of pure altruism, though – it was a very pragmatic decision. We are going to be out of town for about ten days starting Friday, and our food just wouldn’t last that long. Where will we be? We are going to Ireland and Scotland! Eee!

…I know, I know, we just took a trip to RI. And I haven’t even mentioned that I spent last weekend camping with college friends. But the Ireland/Scotland trip was in the works well before either of those trips, and summer is for travelin’, right? Yeah. I’m super excited to return to Dublin, where I spent most of a summer studying during college. And I’ve never been to Scotland, so I can’t wait to explore Edinburgh and check out some Fringe events. And – of course! – we are both very excited to discover what vegan eats Dublin and Edinburgh have to offer. I was vegetarian when I was in Ireland, but I’ve never experienced it as a vegan.

So, dear readers, if you’ve been to either place as a vegan, let me know where I should eat! And do share fun things to do in Dublin and Edinburgh. I’ve done many touristy things in Dublin, but I’m open to your suggestions, too! And, tell me – do you have any fun vacations planned this summer?

Twenty-Four Cupcakes and a Single Baby (not mine)

/ Kelly / 2 Comments

Returning to work after vacation is always unpleasant, isn’t it? Unless you really really really super love your job, you can’t help but feel a bit down. Luckily(ish), I had email to catch up on and lots of things to do when I returned from my RI trip on Wednesday of last week. I’m glad I had the distractions – I was in a bit of a bad mood after having to spend the night in Detroit thanks to some weather-related delays and connection missing. All that aside, I had a really lovely trip back home, full of friends and family and, duh, food.

Both of my siblings were also home when I was, so my parents hosted a big ol’ cookout for all of our friends and family. I love hosting events at my parents’ house – my mom’s vegan and my dad is super vegan-friendly, so we always have lots of options. At this cookout, we had baked beans, potato salad, regular salad, fruit salad, corn salad, and desserts. I don’t have too many great food pictures, though, because I was too busy relaxing, hanging out with friends, and meeting this little guy:

Such a curious little guy.

My friend Jess became a mama last month; she’s the first of my pals to have a baby, which is both bizarre and exciting. Her little Noah is beyond adorable, and I was so happy to meet him. My mom snapped that photo of us, and I shamelessly stole it from Facebook. Same goes for the next two pictures, hence the craptastic quality. Facebook photo downloads are icky and grainy, and I apologize.

Coconut-lime!

Vegan With a Vengeance came through again for my dessert-making needs – the coconut-lime cupcakes received raved reviews from everyone. I’d originally planned to make only this batch of cupcakes, but I had a ton of frosting left over so I decided to make some plain vanilla cupcakes to use it up.

Vanilla!

All 24 cupcakes were snatched up within minutes of us setting dessert out. I barely snagged one! Luckily, my aunt had brought a vegan blueberry pie, so my dessert urges were well satisfied. ;) As was my desire for delicious vegan food in general, both at this party and later at the other places we ate in RI and NYC. But more about those later!

What are your go-to vegan cookout options?

What’s in the Box? Summer 2012 CSA Week Four (Plus a Bonus Pukey Puppy Story!)

/ Kelly / 2 Comments

When we received our last CSA box, Madison was drought central. Soon after that post, though, Mama Nature decided to relent a little and granted us with a few rainstorms. Although the much-appreciated rain can’t undo the damage already caused by lack of water, they’ll definitely help some crops in the area perk up and start producin’. In the meantime, our farm continues to provide us with lots of tasty treats.

A big ol' basket of veggies - sweet corn and basil feature prominently among them.

I spy with my little eye… sweet corn!

This is one of our most bountiful boxes yet! We received:

  • Basil
  • Beets
  • Bell peppers (green & purple)
  • Cherry tomatoes
  • Cucumbers
  • Eggplant
  • Garlic
  • Muskmelon
  • Summer squash
  • Sweet corn
  • Sweet onion
  • Watermelon
  • Zucchini

YES! It’s the first of the sweet corn! We found nine ears in our box and demolished four of them last night. ;) S and I don’t have a grill, so we roasted them in the oven – so, so good, especially when paired with sauteed tofu, summer squash, and bell pepper. I was also pretty excited for those melons.

Close-up of a watermelon and a smaller yellow muskmelon.

Cheeky watermelon!

I wasn’t familiar with muskmelon, but after devouring about half of it last night, S and I agree that it’s indistinguishable from a cantaloupe. And really, who cares about the nomenclature when you’ve got a sweet, juicy melon to enjoy?

If it seems like S and I are being a bit gluttonous, making a decent dent in our stash on the first night we welcomed it home, you’re right. But we have good reason – like I mentioned in my last post, we’re heading to Rhode Island tomorrow, and we’ll be there for five days. So we want to eat up some of our goodies before leaving them to languish in the fridge. I’m sure most of the veggies will last just fine, but we definitely want to use up that eggplant tonight!

In fact, I had grand plans last night to whip up some sort of cold pasta or grain salad for lunch today, something that would use up a ton of the veggies, and I wanted to make zucchini bread as well. Feel free to insert your favorite cliche about the best laid plans or good intentions or whatever, because Moria had other plans for us. She swallowed a good inch or two of a corn cob (totally my fault – I let her gnaw on it and then didn’t watch her closely), which is apparently Not Good because corn cobs are not digestible and can get stuck in a doggie’s innards. I ended up bringing her to the emergency vet when I couldn’t make her vomit on my own with a dose of hydrogen peroxide (per the vet’s instructions!). After the vet gave her a stronger emetic, she puked that corn cob right up. She’s fine now, and never will I ever again give her a corn cob. ;)

Anyway, that affair took up most of the evening, so I nixed my plans to make a salad. I did make a zucchini bread, though, and put together quick fruit salads with watermelon and muskmelon. So that’s something!

Anyway, this’ll probably be my only post until next week – I doubt I’ll have time to post when I’m in RI. We’re also taking a day trip to NYC to visit one of S’s friends, and I’m really excited about that – I haven’t been to the city for maybe five years, and never as a vegan. You can bet we’ll be hitting up Lula’s Sweet Apothecary for some vegan ice cream, but what other vegan-friendly joints should we try? Blossom seems like a must-visit…

What delicious dish should I make with my remaining veggies? Where should I go in NYC? And what else should I avoid giving my dog?! (I swear I’m usually a responsible pet owner!)

Curious about what other folks are getting in their CSA boxes this time of year? Check out the What’s in the Box? link party for this week!

Sunday Snackin’: Medjool Date Granola

/ Kelly / 4 Comments

S and I didn’t enter into cohabitation lightly. We discussed what moving in together meant and we discussed how we’d make it work. Being the big nerds we are, we read books on the topic and came up with some plans in advance. For example, because we both fall on the introvert side of the spectrum, we knew we’d need to plan some alone time (or pseudo alone time) into our life together to avoid one of us (probably me) getting a little twitchy and eventually snapping. We told each other in advance that, hey, if one of us needs time alone, it’s not personal – it’s just necessary to recharge our introverted batteries.

We also build in together-but-alone time by switching off on dinner duties. While one person cooks, the other is free to go read a book or play Half-Life 2 (spoiler: it’s not me) in the other room. And I get some alone time every Sunday when S records his podcast in the bedroom – he shuts the door and I have the rest of the apartment to myself. Yesterday, I filled that hour by reading A Clash of Kings and making granola.

Top-down view of a small Ball jar filled with granola. It's sitting on a pink cloth with a spoon, and granola is strewn on the cloth around the jar and the spoon.

Ready for munchin’.

This granola was meant for the week ahead, but it’s so easy to munch a clump while walking through the kitchen that I admittedly don’t have as much as I wanted left over. But that’s okay. On Friday we’re heading to Rhode Island to hang out with my family, so I’ve got a four-day work week and don’t need full granola supplies. I will surely enjoy what remains, though – this is solid, simple, and delicious granola, a good base for any additions you might want to add. The only added fat is coconut oil, which I will exclusively use in granola in the future – it adds just the right hint of flavor without being overwhelmingly coconutty. And I’m a sucker for anything with Medjool dates – I can’t get enough of their unique caramel-y taste. The recipe is here, although I left out the chocolate chips, upped the spices, and used some agave along with the brown rice syrup when I ran out of the latter (pantry decimation, woo!). Next time I’ll add other dried fruits and perhaps some dark chocolate chips.

With any luck, I’ll have some granola left to munch during our travels on Friday. I doubt it, though. I’ll just have to make another batch next time I need some alone time. ;)

What’s your favorite granola recipe? What’s your favorite thing to do when you’ve got some alone time?

Pantry Decimation Challenge: Shiitake Mushroom Risotto

/ Kelly / 1 Comment

Once I found out that I’d have a couple days to move (not just a single night and a couple hours), the Pantry Decimation Challenge I so eagerly started last month became much less of a priority. I wouldn’t be refrigerator-less, so I didn’t think I really needed to clean out my fridge or pantry.

And then I moved, combined my food with S’s food, and realized that, whoa, we’ve got a whole lotta food, and maybe I shouldn’t have abandoned that Pantry Challenge so quickly. At the very least, I should’ve tried to finish off the irritatingly small amounts of various foods that were lurking in my cupboards – the dregs of a bag of soy curls, a barely-filled jar of arborio rice, that sort of thing. But it’s not too late. S and I are trying to use up those random bits of food as we hold off on purchasing pantry staples. So last Saturday night when I was in charge of dinner, I forced myself to use pantry goods only. After poking around in the shelves brimming over with pasta and spices and beans, I concocted what turned out to be a very delicious meal.

Close-up of a bowl of mushroom risotto - creamy rice with visible flecks of mushrooms.

A very brown meal.

S heaped praise on this Shiitake Mushroom Risotto, and I didn’t even bother to deny it – it was that good. I don’t have a very precise recipe, because I mostly just threw things together and hoped for the best. If you’re nervous about making risotto, don’t be! It’s actually super easy as long as you’re willing to stand by the stove for about twenty minutes. You don’t even have to stir constantly; you can simultaneously tend to whatever else you’re cooking. You just have to give the rice a good stir every minute or so and keep an eye on it. Anyway, here’s a rough list of what I used and what I did:

Ingredients:

  • Dried shiitake mushrooms
  • TVP (I had a tiny bit left at the bottom of a bag)
  • Herbs (I used a homemade poultry seasoning mix with a dash of extra thyme)
  • Arborio rice (I probably used a little over 1/3rd of a cup)
  • Mushroom stock (I used maybe 1/3rd of a carton by the end)
  • Diced onion (Maybe ¼ cup?)
  • Earth Balance

Method:

Put the dried mushrooms and TVP in a bowl and cover them with stock. Set them aside to soak and rehydrate as you prepare the risotto.

In a small pot, add the rice and stock. For the stock, you probably want to start with 1.5 the amount of rice – so, if you use ½ cup of rice, add ¾ cup of stock. (I don’t bother to measure the liquids for risotto, though – the goal is to keep adding stock as the rice soaks it up.) Bring the liquid to a boil and then turn it down to medium-low – keep it simmering, but not boiling. Stir it frequently to ensure that no rice sticks to the bottom, and add more stock as necessary.

After you’ve got a good handle on your risotto (about when you’ve first turned it down to medium-low), heat some Earth Balance (or olive oil) in a small saucepan on medium and add the diced onion. Sauté the onions until they’re translucent, giving them the occasional stir in the pan. In the meantime, don’t forget your risotto!

Check your TVP and mushrooms. When they’re hydrated and the onions are translucent and fragrant, add the mushroom and TVP mixture (broth and all) to the saucepan with the onions. Depending on how thick your mushrooms are cut, they might take a little longer to hydrate. I added mine when they were soft to the touch. Add your spices, too.

Keep stirring that risotto and adding broth as you sauté the onions, mushrooms, and TVP. After you’ve been cooking the risotto for about 20 minutes, give it a taste – the rice should be soft and creamy, not terribly chewy. Test your mushrooms as well – you want them to be soft too.

Remove the risotto from the heat when it’s done. Add the onions, mushrooms, and TVP when they’re ready and stir everything to combine. Taste and add salt or freshly ground black pepper if necessary. Enjoy!

What’s your risotto-making technique? What’s your favorite use of dried mushrooms (we’ve got a ton!)?

What’s in the Box? Summer 2012 CSA Week Three

/ Kelly / 5 Comments

It’s our third CSA box already! To be honest, S and I still have some veggies left over from our last box, which we received two weeks ago. I blame moving.

Before I show you what’s in the box this week, I want you to look at something else. This is what my backyard (by which I mean the “quad” outside my apartment building) looks like right now:

A large expanse of dry, yellow grass with a few trees. In the distance is some green grass. A small dog is in the foreground.

Moria surveys the drought.

This is what happens when the Madison area undergoes a drought. It’s not pretty. You can see, in the distance, some green grass – that’s where the sprinklers are. But the grass that doesn’t get water is more like straw – it’s yellow, bone-dry, and crunchy. Not good. Unsurprisingly, many small farms in the area are not doing well. CSA farms without proper irrigation aren’t able to provide their share owners with many veggies… and it doesn’t help that we’ve had record heat this summer, upwards of 100 degrees. Luckily, though, my CSA farm has the infrastructure in place to keep its crops irrigated, so my box this week was not at all lacking:

A large pile of veggies on a kitchen counter.

More colors than just green this week!

So – what’s in the box?

  • Basil
  • Beets
  • Bottle onions
  • Broccoli
  • Cucumbers
  • Fennel
  • Garlic
  • Head lettuce
  • Rainbow chard
  • Summer squash
  • Sungold tomatoes (!)
  • Zucchini

Not a bad selection at all. If you can’t tell by that exclamation mark, I’m very excited for the tomatoes. :) Please excuse the shoddy photo, though. I had to take it indoors at 10:00 PM last night because I was out late doing a volunteer project (more about that later).

I’m glad that my CSA is continuing to produce lots and lots of yummy veggies, and I’m glad I invested in it and threw my lot in with my CSA farm. Because that’s really what the CSA model is all about – shared risk and, hopefully, shared rewards. Folks like me who shell out a couple hundred dollars before the growing season even begins in earnest make it possible for our CSA farms to do what they do. We share in their successes, but it also means that we have to share in their failures, too. If my CSA didn’t have the irrigation infrastructure it does, I might have received a very different box yesterday. But that’s just the way it goes – farming is not a guaranteed success (duh), and when we purchase a CSA share, we’re acknowledging that fact.

So what about you? Is there a drought in your area, too? Have you noticed its effects in your CSA share or at a farmers’ market? And, of course, what would you make with these veggies?

Curious about what other folks are getting in their CSA boxes this time of year? Check out the What’s in the Box? link party for this week!

Chicagoin’ it Up

/ Kelly / 2 Comments

WHEW.

That was me giving a big huge sigh of relief. My move is complete! We are safely installed in our new place (thanks in part to some hastily hired movers who hauled our two sofas up to the third floor when we utterly failed to do so ourselves)! I can now settle in and enjoy living with two of my favorite people, S and Moria. Yes, Moria is people.

I’ll talk a bit more about that settling process eventually, but for now let me take you back in time. In the midst of our moving preparations, S and I escaped to Chicago for a weekend to visit some friends who moved there a couple months back. I really enjoy Chicago, especially when I’ve got a place to stay right in the city and I’m hanging out with folks who have done all the touristy things already. This trip was pretty relaxed – we saw a movie, went suit-shopping for our friend Aaron (and helped him select one snappy number!), waxed nostalgic at the American Girl Store (I had Addy and Molly, and I loved them both to bits), and just hung out and enjoyed each other’s company. We also ate food. Duh. Half the reason I travel is to try new vegan eats. ;)

First, we headed to Standard India Restaurant for a late dinner on Friday night. I didn’t take pictures (mostly because I wasn’t feeling well at that point), but let it be known that this restaurant is incredibly vegan friendly. The servers are courteous to a fault (seriously – the service was a hair overbearing) and know exactly what vegan means. They typically bring out a small starter soup before your meal, and our server exchanged the non-vegan soup for a delicious chana masala for S and I without our even prompting him. Then, when my pakoras took longer than the rest of the food to arrive, the server gave me a samosa on the house to tide me over.

We all ordered from the a la carte menu rather than do the buffet or thali meal, and I only had the pakoras because I’d actually already eaten dinner. S enjoyed samosas, while our dining companions had something meaty. :) I wish I’d been hungrier, though – the buffet had clearly labeled vegan options that looked fantastic. The food was delicious, perhaps even more so because the restaurant is BYOB and our server kept our wine glasses filled at all times. ;) The only slightly unpleasant aspect was the very irritated reaction a server had when we asked if he could prioritize running our credit cards because we were running late for a movie. I think it was because the restaurant is fairly traditional and prides itself on its slow, impeccable customer service, and he perhaps felt offended by our rush to leave. Still, his knee-jerk look of irritation was off-putting. Beyond that, though, it was a pleasant experience with good food and attentive service.

The next morning, we broke our fast at Handlebar, a vegetarian and very vegan-friendly hipster-tastic establishment with a great variety of sandwiches, breakfast foods, and traditional (and not so traditional) bar food (fried pickles?!?). I enjoyed a cup of coffee and these melt-in-your-mouth tender slices of French toast:

Toast-tastic.

This was remarkably filling, for being only two triangles of toast! It was actually a side order, and I complemented it with a side order of breakfast potatoes. They were perhaps the least memorable part of my meal, because the toast was just so delicious and the potatoes were pretty average. I love that the French toast came with pure maple syrup, too. So yummy. S also wholly enjoyed his breakfast – biscuits and gravy:

Vegan Bloody Mary in the background!

That seitan sausage gravy was a savory, meaty treat! I’ve never really encountered biscuits &andgravy before, but now I see why so many people love this meal – more on that later! S thoroughly appreciated the opportunity to consume a veganized version of this meal, and I felt the same way about my delicious French toast. If only Handlebar had a location in Madison – I’d be brunchin’ it up all the time!

Because we brunched around 11:00, we didn’t have a full lunch. Instead, we stopped at Big Bowl after finishing our suit shopping for some refreshing drinks and appetizers. A couple of them are vegan; S and I shared summer rolls and… something else I can’t remember. But we ate light because we were saving our appetites for dinner. We’d intended to head to Karyn’s on Green for a fancy-pants meal, but the timing didn’t work out so we decided to hit up Native Foods instead. I never say no to Native Foods!

My stomach wasn’t terribly happy by the time we got there, and I knew I needed something loaded with veggies. The Soul Bowl was the perfect choice. It’s a big gigantic bowl of brown rice, red beans, steamed broccoli & kale, ranch sauce, BBQ sauce, and a couple pieces of Native Chicken. And by “a couple pieces” I mean one normal piece lying atop the bed of veggies and one skewered, BBQ-slathered piece proudly standing tall like a fake-meat tower:

A majestic sight.

Insane, right? And a HUGE amount of food! I barely got through half this bowl, which meant I had lunch ready for work the next Monday. Win! It was just what my upset tummy ordered – veggie-rich and delicious. I could’ve done with a little less ranch sauce, but I’m a big weirdo who’s not actually very fond of ranch.

S and one of our dining companions ordered the Portobello and Sausage Burger, which happened to be the special, so S enjoyed a free side of sweet potato fries. We all shared the Native Nachos as an appetizer, and they were fantastic – the Native Chipotle Crema and Native Cheese made for an appropriately cheesy platter, and the entire dish was loaded with guac, veggies, black beans, and taco meat. Perfection.

S and I rounded out our meal with dessert to go – a Peanut Butter Parfait for S and a Double Delight Brownie for me. We saved them for later and enjoyed them while watching a movie. The brownie was nothing to write home about, but it was certainly worth $2.95. I very much appreciate the accessible prices at Native Foods – no $7.00 desserts there!

The next morning, we all brunched at The Chicago Diner before S and I headed back to Madison. I was extremely excited to finally eat there – it’s a veggie institution, but in all my visits to Chicago I’ve never made it there! (Although S did bring me back a treat that one time.) We all sat in their semi-outdoors back patio area, which is fully covered by a yellow tent. Hence the lack of pictures – the tent gave my pictures a hideous, radioactive mustardy glow that made all the food look very unappetizing. However, it was very appetizing indeed. I stuck with my brunchy theme of ordering sides and had a bowl of fruit and a small plate of biscuits and gravy. Y’all, I’m totally sold on this biscuits and gravy dish – it’s so perfect! It’s got a carby element that’s undeniably welcome at breakfast time, it’s savory and filling, and it’s incredibly satisfying to mop up that salty gravy with a flaky biscuit. S also had the biscuits and gravy, and rated them on par with those at Handlebar.

After our meal, S and I got two cinnamon buns to go, and we stickily devoured them on the drive back. They were melty, sweet, soft, and totally perfect. Chicago Diner, I think I like you.

For a two night, one point five day stay in Chicago, this trip was full of noteworthy eats. Our hosts were incredibly gracious in accommodating our veganism, never once complaining about being forced to eat mostly meat-free for a weekend. Our friend Aaron remarked a few times that the non-meat in his meals was good and not really noticeably fake, and I think both our hosts enjoyed all our meals. So hooray for Chicago and its omni-friendly veg eating establishments!

Where have you traveled lately? How do your omni friends react to eating at veg restaurants?

What’s in the Box? Summer 2012 CSA Week Two

/ Kelly / 6 Comments

Oh my – it’s already been two weeks since we received our first CSA share! This share is a little less bountiful than the previous one, but I’m not complaining – we’re moving tomorrow/Friday (!), and I’d rather not have to transport loads of produce to our new place. This week, everything fits in my basket:

A large basket filled with produce.

So green!

So… what’s in the box?

  • Arugula
  • Broccoli
  • Cabbage
  • Cucumbers
  • Head lettuce
  • Kohlrabi
  • Parsley
  • Pearl onions
  • Snow peas
  • Zucchini

I’m very excited about that cabbage – you can’t really see it in the picture, but it’s huge! I’m very fond of this humble vegetable, and I’m looking forward to using it in a big batch of Mexican Cabbage from the Happy Herbivore Cookbook. And last week S used our first kohlrabi in this surprisingly tasty kale and kohlrabi dish, so we might have to recreate it with this week’s kohlrabi.

What would you make with this haul?

Curious about what other folks are getting in their CSA boxes this time of year? Check out the What’s in the Box? link party for this week!