Dave's Gourmet Korean at the Farmers Market

I found Dave's Gourmet Korean at the Brentwood Farmer's Market.  Many of the items are OIL-FREE and LOW-FAT!  Everything is vegan.

Each of these sides are $5 and consist of marinated vegetables (low sodium soy / pear juice / spices are all listed on the labels).  Despite this being our 1st time with Dave we opt-d to go for $25 worth since it looked fantastic and it was worth every penny!  The Lotus Root was our favorite with the spicy tofu the runner up, but really the way all these little sides converged on the plate with a little bit of rice was poetic.

 

That's a Perfect Plate in my book!  Can't wait until next Sunday!

The Finest Vegan Restaurant in Los Angeles M.A.K.E.

M.A.K.E has the makings of the finest vegan restaurant in Los Angeles.  I struggle to find words that can compete with these photos, they in fact taste as amazing as they look.  The medleys of farm fresh flavors fight for the attention of your palate while your eyes are visually inspired by the artful presentation of shaved heirloom carrots. 

 We stood contemplating the menu as we had done many times before in the last month or so since hearing about a brand new raw vegan restaurant in Santa Monica place mall, our main stomping grounds due to their electrical vehicle charging stations.  This time M.A.tthew K.E.nnedy the owner came up to us and said "are you interested in a healthy vegan dinner this evening?"  haha, he asked THE Healthy Vegans if we'd like a healthy dinner, ok its on!  Oil-Free?  "No problem!"  The menu was ours to pick from and they would shave, chop, dice, blend, mix but not heat a dazzling selection of fresh produce into works of culinary art.  We picked two salads and the Nori Roll and partook in the wine cocktail menu.  Raw food has failed to ever impress me despite dining in nearly every raw vegan restaurant on the planet.  I went into this evening KNOWING I was shooting myself in the wallet and came out ready to become a Nori Roll regular.  If you'd asked me two days ago if I'd ever frequent a raw restaurant I'd have laughed up my baked potato.  The staunchiest starchitarian's palate has been melted by this rawesome restaurant.  The chefs here and the farms they frequent are truly a credit to their movement.

 

The zen like atmosphere of M.A.K.E. inside The Market at Santa Monica Place Mall takes a moment to settle into, but commotion of the shopping mall quickly disappears in this quite corner of the mall.  TIP: Utilize the free valet parking in front of True Food and get it validated with your bill to save on parking.     

MillenniuYUM Restaurant San Francisco!

We took our moms on a whirlwind tour of California this past week from Los Angeles to Napa.  It gave us some solid time in the car to talk to them about health and loosing weight.  We even joked that we were dropping them off at the McDougall Clinic!  Their favorite restaurant on the trip was Millennium in San Francisco.  They don't have McDougall items on the menu, but if you call/email in advance and Sous Chef, Stephanie Roston is at the helm you can get this amazing Gnocchi oil-free.  The veggies are sauteed in lemon juice (they look shiny, but not a drop of oil!)  The sauce is a golden tomato coolis.  This wonderful dish combined with the superb service and ambiance rocketed Millennium back up to the top of my rock star vegan restaurant list. 

http://www.millenniumrestaurant.com 

Craig's on Melrose, high end vegan dining options in Los Angeles

Our fancy summer house guest was busy sampling the Hollywood high life and stumbled upon Craig's on Melrose a fine dining establishment of the rich, famous and fabulous. She was quite surprised that such a stuffy place had such an ample vegan selection clearly marked on their menu.   A quick chat with the chef and she passed along to us that oil-free dining was not only possible, but they would be delighted to accommodate our crowd.

We had trouble convincing our vegan friends to come along for $24 healthy vegan menu items and thought we'd never make it alone, then we noticed fellow healthy vegan Kathy Freston tweeted a vegan meal from Craigs and we knew we had to go asap!
One trick to skipping the fancy rigameroll of five star dining is opting to eat at the bar. We quickly evaded the reservation line and snagged seats front and center. Now the wonderful thing about high end dining is high end service. We asked the bar tender if he could ask the chef what vegan items they could do w/o oil. The chef appeared and gave us our options in person :)

 Spaghetti Squash Primavera $26 (-oily marinara)

Believe it or not I have never had spaghetti squash and I couldn't wait to try it, but with nothing to compare it to I wondered if the spaghetti squash was wonderful on its own or the chef was a miracle worker with such a strange vegetable.

Vegan Pizza $18 (-daiya - sauce -oil base)

Kristin opted for a flat bread (the bread has a little oil in it), but you can tell there is no oil on the base since it was burnt a little!

Craig's on Melrose
8826 Melrose Avenue, West Hollywood CA 90069 USA (310) 276.1900
Open Nightly from 5pm | Dinner Monday-Saturday: Until 11:30 Bar Open Until 12:30 Sunday Dinner: Until 11:30 Bar Open Until Midnight

Shima, Abott Kinney Macrobiotic Venice, CA

Shima - A Japanese Macrobiotic Adventure in Venice, CA

    Japanese restaurants always tend to have healthy vegan food. The Japanese culture is one of the healthiest and longest lived people on the planet. However, as Japan began sampling the fried animal carcasses of western cuisine after WWII their health began to decline. As a response to the declining health many Japanese began to revisit Macrobiotic principals developed in the 1800s by Japanese military doctor Sagen Ishizuka. Macrobiotic restaurants are wonderful when you can find them, they are basically vegan + fish. The macrobiotic diet focuses on grains, vegetables (many sea veggies). We are blessed with many wonderful macrobiotic restaurants in Los Angeles. We recently revisted Shima on Abbott Kinney (a trendy street in Venice, CA). Shima is smartly designed in minimalist modern, plywood walls and herman miller chairs. The entry is practically hidden from the street, but when you pass through the rope curtains into the sanctuary you know you are some place special. The Japanese staff is extremely accommodating to vegans (especially healthy ones!) and the food, presentation and DESSERT MENU are all stellar. Healthy vegans have an assortment of vegetable sushi and an entire page of vegetable dishes including tofu steaks & scrambles. We opted for the items that are already made with out oil to avoid causing too much trouble at our new favorite spot, but plan to dive deeper into the menu with each visit. Unfortunately, the soups all contain bonito (fish flakes). 

The meal starts with an organic beer and a warm towl.

We split the seaweed salad, but found it a little too adventuresome for our taste buds and hit a bit of sand..., however that did not stop the adventure.

 

The real star of the meal were the steamed veggies and the accompanying oil-free sauces.  You can see the vast selection of squash, okra, cabbage, turnip, asparagus, mushroom, round carrots, heirloom carrots & corn.  Dipping these in the spicy miso, miso & rice vinegar and ponzu sauce was a complete culinary delight!

Another oil-free item we decided to try was the Japanese roasted corn.  It is completely delicious, tangy, savory and juicy, we will order it along with the steamed veggies above every time we go!

Shima also has a small assortment of brown rice sushi.  Pictured to the left are brown rice cucumber rolls & burdock root.  The burdock root are especially interesting.  They also have vegan salmon rolls made out of nuts that are worth the adventure.  The steamed vegetables and corn are much more filling for the price, however.

Finally, I know what all our regular readers are thinking!  WHAT IS THAT?!   First, I have to say notice the TWO spoons :) haha, but seriously this is home made Japanese rice ice cream with home made chocolate pudding (caco powder, agave & soy milk) and granola with paper thin almond shavings.  If you look at the size of the raspberry compared to the rest of the dessert you'll realize its a small marvel of vegan dessert.  This has to be the best least unhealthy vegan dessert on the planet, the miracle parfait!

All of Shima's desserts are vegan!

Pogue's Run Grocer & Deli Indianapolis

When we set out for Indianapolis, IN we knew we were looking at our most difficult challenges for healthy vegan eating.  I emailed the local Veg Society (who have Dr. McDougall featured promptly on their website) and they said they didn't know of any healthy eating in Indy!  Yikes!  Our first inclination for situations like this is to check if there are any Co-Ops/Natural Foods stores with deli's and we found Pogue's Run Grocer & Deli. 

 

Pogues Run Grocer
2828 E 10th Street
Indianapolis, IN 46201
http://poguesrungrocer.org

Veggie $4.99 (Vegetarian/Vegan) Your choice of cheese, vegan cheese or no cheese, lettuce, red onions, cucumbers, green peppers, tomatoes, kalamata olives and our house made sundried tomato hummus.

We ordered this minus the hummus and used a little mustard. 

I Pita The Fool!  $5.49 (Vegan) House roasted tempeh in a vegan house made curry sauce, with dried cranberries, spinach and cilantro wrapped in a wheat pita.

I ordered this with mustard instead of curry sauce and minus the tempeh, but for oil free eats it was pretty slim. 

While these aren't stellar examples of healthy food, when you put them in context of just being able to eat some organic veggies and not resort to anything horrid, its living. To make these better Whole Foods carries Oasis fat free spreads in the mid west, unfortunately Pogue's Run doesn't carry them.

Kramers Health Food (Chicago, Il)

I'd like to take credit for this one, but our vegan buddy was out the door earlier than us and had already made a few laps of Chicago when he keyed in on Kramers for a quick bite & noticed there was a lot more going on than a corner health food store. He ushered us back there after our tour of the Roy Lichtenstein exhibit at the Art Museum and we ventured upstairs to the Cafe! Veggie Burritos and Wraps always jump off the menu at us first at places like this, so that's what we went with. We started asking the wonderful and friendly staff behind the counter what items were prepared with oil and if the beans/rice, etc had oil in them. Not only were they super helpful, they wanted to know more about our strange oil-free diet! Me not being one short on words gave them "I lost 100lbs following the McDougall Diet and its no oil and all the veggie burritos you can eat :)" They were really excited and FILLED our burrito with EVERYTHING OIL-FREE they had in the back! Carrots, sprouts, beans, steamed veggies, raw veggies, you name it, kitchen sink healthy burrito! It was so good it was one of those "gosh I wish we could eat here every day for the rest of our lives moments".

230 S Wabash Ave Chicago, IL 60604 Mon-Fri 8:30 am - 6:30 pm Sat 9:30 am - 6 pm

Chicago Diner - Healthy Grub @ a Vegan Diner

Chicago Diner had long been our mecca for gluttony in our previous midwest hometown of St.louis's barren veganless wasteland (STL has since come a long way).  When ever our vegan isolation meter hit its peak we'd hop in the car for a weekend in Chicago and most specifically Chicago Diner.  Chicago Diner is so amazing it even warranted an expensive cab ride from the airport during a layover a few years ago.  On a recent Healthy Vegan trip to Chicago we wondering if our old haunt could support our healthy demands and it passed with flying colors!

Avocado Tostadas $10.99 Fat Free Black Beans, seasoned quinoa, grilled onions and peppers, lettuce, tomato, avocado slices on corn tortillas with chimichurri, a cilantro based Argentinean salsa.
Order Hack - "Plain quinoa instead of seasoned (no oil), steamed veggies instead of grilled onions and peppers, no avocado, hot sauce instead of chimichurri.  please make sure there is no oil on anything."

We kicked it up with a side of steamed broccoli we split between the two of us.

AMAZING & COMPLETELY DELICIOUS!  They were out of corn tortillas, but the spinach flour tortilla (while it probably had oil), wasn't too bad considering the awesomeness of this meal.  Chicago Diner gets major healthy vegan points for doing such a great job, having such high quality plant based healthy options, and preparing and serving it all so delightfully, they were happy to help!  You can't beat midwestern hospitality!  We had the greatest time eating healthy in Chicago and we're happy to say we will continue to look forward to going to the Chicago Diner when we're in Chicago!  

Chicago Diner
3411 N. Halsted, Chicago IL
 ph 773-935-6696
http://www.veggiediner.com
Meat Free Since 83'

Cafe Gratitude - Venice, CA

Yes, there is a place where drinking the "kool-aid" can make you younger and more beautiful, welcome to Venice Cafe Gratitude!  My first experience with a Cafe Gratitude was 8 years ago in San Francisco where I got my first taste of RAW vegan food at the absurd price of 89$ for lunch for two people...  The new Los Angeles locations are a different owner, but the same mantra on self affirmation menu items and questions of the day asked to customers.  "What are you grateful for?"  The stand out difference for the Los Angeles locations are the cooked menu items.  The Venice location doesn't have as many as the Larchmont, but the most important item is there -

I AM GRATEFUL : Our community supported grain bowl shredded kale with quinoa and black beans and garlic-tahini sauce. Minimum donation is $3.00, Suggested value is $7.  Feed yourself and someone in need $14.

We order it saying "We'll have the $7 I AM GRATEFUL minus the garlic-tahini" we also get a side of their house made kim chi $3.5  Its a far cry from from the expensive raw food! 

They have beer and wine, too!!!  The new location is so beautiful, close to Whole Foods Venice with outdoor seating.  As you can imagine the crowd is as good as the food and vice versa!  Thank you Cafe Gratitude I AM FULL! 

http://cafegratitudevenice.com/

512 Rose Ave
Venice, CA 90291
Lunch and Dinner 11am - 10pm

Native Foods Healthy Vegan Taco Update! Chicago & LA

Well it took a trip to the new Native Foods in Chicago to experience it in a whole new way!  We've been lamenting the loss of the Tijuana Taco's from the menu for many months now and have struggled with getting a healthy plate of beans, rice, veggies and salsa from our local Native Foods to the point of being BANNED from ordering side items!   The kind midwesterners (new owners of the franchise) really did up our healthy taco substitution.  We thanked them a million times and told them they really are giving the Los Angeles locations a run for their money! 

Roasted Chile Taco Trio
Housemade refried beans, spiced with roasted jalapenos and layered with brown rice, mango salsa, guacamole and cilantro in three crunchy corn tacos.  Oh my gato!  7.95  GF

After banning us from ordering side items they make customers play the substitution game.  Once you get this right SAVE YOUR RECEIPT and use it to order next time.  

Order "Roasted Chili Taco Trio - Sub black beans for refried beans, sub red beans for guacamole, sub crunchy corn tacos for whole wheat tortilla"  Its always good to throw in a "nothing with oil"

TADA!

Don't forget to add some hot sauce!  Also, we're in love with their bottomless watermelon fresca and on a hot Chicago day (100+) they were ON IT with the refills!  The Clark Street location has a top notch team unrivaled by any other Native Foods I've visited!

http://nativefoods.com/locations/

218 South Clark Street
Chicago, IL 60604
(312) 332-6332
Hours:
Mon-Fri: 10:30am – 8pm
Sat: 10:30am – 4pm

Amitable - An Oil-Free Restaurant in Chicago

Being in constant search of healthy vegan food a certain restaurant has been on my radar for over 10 years...  Through various errors on many trips to Chicago I have never made it to Amitabul, one of the only OIL-FREE restaurants on the planet.  

FINALLY, while attending my first all vegan wedding I had paramount on my todo -visiting Amitabul.  It was everything I had dreamed of, but I was so sad that I've wasted 10 years of not eating there!  I just still can't believe an oil-free establishment like this has existed since the late 90s...  Chef Bill was fantastic, the food insanely tasty and spicy.  Korean food is my favorite on the planet.  I love KimChi and the sweet and spicy flavor combination.   

Kristin and I both opted for a cooked Kim Chi dish.  I've only ever eaten it cold, so Kim Chi & rice/noodles and veggies was a no brainer.  We also started off with steamed dumplings.  Amitabul does use flavor oils like sesame, but just request w/o if your menu item has them.  Everything is steam fried!

  Mandoo Vegan Dumpling (12 pc.)  It was so nice to split open a plate of vegan dumplings and not see piles of oil spill out!  These were delicious and made better so with the house dipping sauces.

 Kimchi Tofu Stir Noodle (minus tofu / no flavor oils)
Spicy and tangy flavor of Amitabul’s Original kimchi steamed stirred with chunks of healthy tofu and veggies to fulfill your desire of a s spicy noodle dish. Choice of rice or wheat noodle

I was so full after the dumplings I could barely put a dent in this dish, but it was so good and spicy I drank about three glasses of water trying.  I boxed it up and polished it off in the hotel room later that night, it was even better later!  Oh how I wish I was there now trying the rest of the menu! 

Amitabul Resturant

6207 N. Milwaukee Ave

Chicago, IL 60646

Phone: (773) 774–0276

amitabill@gmail.com

http://www.amitabulvegan.com

Pita Jungle, a healthy vegan oasis

We first discovered Pita Jungle on a road trip in Flagstaff Arizona where we stopped to fix a flat tire!  Now we have one in California, albeit on the other side of town in Pasadena.  We are members of Huntington Garden and took our family to see the surreal succulent garden over the holidays and stopped in old town Pasadena to fuel back up at the new Pita Jungle.

I tried a new dish, the Macro Plate, which was smashingly healthy!   Beans, steamed veg & rice, HUGE plate, enough for two!  Add hot sauce, soy sauce, sirracha to bang it up!

 The garden wrap!  Next time I'll ask for it w/o foil!  (haha in addition to no oil!)  Its probably easier on them to request steamed veggies, rice and beans in a wrap to avoid them getting sauteed by ordering this one.

 Healthy Vegan Jeanette enjoyed the 1000 beans (which is a bean pita pizza, my personal fav)

 Another pic of the Marco!  It was totally awesome.  Ask for it w/o Tofu, though! 

 

Let me add to how awesome Pita Jungle is in the way they handled the mix up in the Garden Wrap and made it with oil, we kindly requested a new one, not only did they make a new one, they didn't charge us for it and comped my meal, too!  That is INSANELY nice.  I tried to explain that was beyond what we needed and we love Pita Jungle and are just happy they are willing to make oil free items for us and we're sorry food was wasted.  They strive for perfection and customer satisfaction!  Rare GEM of a place!  For everyone who is stressed about asking for "no oil" go here!   

Dansk Kobenstyle Chili Red 6 Qt Casserole

Sharky's Woodfired Grills 20+ locations!

Its always good to come across a widely available healthy vegan option. We've been eating at Sharky's for over a year now and can't figure out why its taken us so long to share this quick, cheap, easy & delicious option with everyone. Sharky's gets bonus points for using organic produce, as well!   20+ LOCATIONS All throughout Southern California & one in Washington!

The Sharky's Healthy Vegan Oil-Free Steamed Broccoli Tacos!



































How to order;
 3 California Chicken Tacos 3 No Chicken
 3 Sub for Corn Tortillas  3 ONLY Broccoli 3 ONLY lettuce 3 ONLY Tomatoes (you can add onion, too)
2 Add rice& beans (no cheese!)
Depending on who enters the order this should be about $10, but our totals vary widely.  We had 6 tacos + 2 sides of rice and beans yesterday for $15.

 notes: if you are getting it to go OPEN IT UP and make sure they didn't put cheese on your beans!

They have amazing salsa, you then just toss your beans and rice into the veggie tacos (you get two shells per taco, so you can make 6 out of three, too!)  Cover with various salsas from the salsa bar and its complete healthy vegan heaven!

Finding Healthy Food On the fly! FreeBirds & Tutifrutti

Kristin and I are often on the go, and finding healthy food or nonpoisonous food has become a lifesaving & life enriching skill set.  Eating out is expensive and potentially dangerous.  We refer to all food not prepared in our kitchen as "street food".  Street Food is unreliable, where its from, what water it was cooked with, cross contamination, undisclosed or misrepresented ingredients are common problems.  That being said, one has to eat, especially while traveling or living a busy lifestyle.  The more you eat out the more skillful you become at avoiding animal products and oils.

FreeBirds is a nation wide burrito chain.  A new one just opened up withing biking distance from us so we decided to give it a try last weekend.  They are famous for their super monster burrito...  Its intended to be split, but we saw people eating 10lbs of food on their own!!!

 

The good news is that their corn tortillas, black, pinto, roasted green pepper mix, salsas, do not have any oil, but the rice and wheat tortillas do.  We went with two tacos and a hybrid burrito, but the tacos are the way to go.  The fillings are the same and you save the fat from the tortilla, which isn't as good as the corn.  Additional toppings like lettuce, tomato & jalapenos are available, too.

 

Overall, I give FreeBirds about two stars.  I wouldn't rush out to eat there, but if there is one nearby a healthy meal can definitely be had for $5 (two veggie tacos).  I wrote corporate to beg them to remove the oil from their Spanish and white rice blends.  If the rice was edible I'd be really excited.

Next to FreeBirds I noticed a TutiFrutti with a large "Soy Bean Ice Cream" sign.  Always curious I went inside and asked for the ingredients and they handed me the bag of the mix and it was water, soymilk, sugar, guargum and maltodextrin (something to that effect).  It is also no fat according to the label, as well.  Not a bad treat for a long bike ride!  TutiFrutti's are worldwide so check and see if there is one in your area (over 580 stores as of their blog post).  They have other dairy free items, too, but read the ingredients.

Sticking to a healthy diet is difficult in a world full of temptations.  Having access to less deadly alternatives in you reach is a wonderful way to stay on course and really enjoy life.  Being adventurous isn't easy and w/o setbacks, but keep at it and you'll discover and perhaps create an entire healthy world at your fingertips.

The Green Temple, Redondo Beach

The Green Temple

1700 South Catalina Avenue # 103

Redondo Beach, CA 90277

310-944-4525

Another episode of healthy eating out with The Healthy Vegans!  Funny story, back when I was a fat vegan I walked into Green Temple, looked at the menu (beans, rice, lettuce, etc) and decided it was too healthy for me :)  many years later I finally sought to remedy that misguided day and now The Green Temple is my new favorite restaurant!  

The Green Temple has that 1970s good karma vibe type of vegetarian restaurant.  It has indoor and outdoor seating (I believe you can call ahead and reserve a table, which on a cold windy day might be a good idea).  They have heat lamps for their outdoor seating, too.

I started with the vegan soup of the day (no oil!), which was an Italian minestrone.  (note the bread contains honey, check the menu and ask)

Savory Wrapped 10-inch organic sprouted wheat tortilla filled with organic rice, organic beans (black turtle or pinto), garden mix vegetables and salsa. Topped with organic tofu sauce. $11.00 $8.50 (Jr. portion) The tofu sauce contains safflower oil, so order with the enchilada sauce instead (its amazing!)  I ordered the junior size, which was perfectly filling with the soup. I'm so sorry Green Temple for missing out on you all these years!  It was definitely my loss.  The staff is so helpful and kind!  You won't find a better vegetarian restaurant.     http://www.greentemple.net/

Menu Hacking : M Street Kitchen

M Street Kitchen

2000 Main Street | Santa Monica, CA

M Street Kitchen is a newer restaurant in Santa Monica that features organic and farmer's market veggies.  "Organic" & "farmers market" veggies are always good key words for a seasoned menu hacker to hone in upon.   There is a chance they won't murder you or your veggies.  We opted for the veggie tacos and had our server ask the chef if the beans and rice where oil free and if there was a veggie they could steam for us.  We ended up with the above feast.  Salsa, steamed broccolini, beans, rice, lettuce, tomato and HOT fresh made corn tortillas to wrap them all up in!  This all went really well with beer & K tried their house made sangria.  Eating out healthy is always possible, chefs don't always have to be instruments of fork and knife assisted suicide.

M Street Kitchen is wildly popular and reservations are wise any night of the week.  The atmosphere and service are top notch.  If you go w/o a reservation you can always try to sit and order at the bar!

Design and Roll Sushi U Sushi

You Design, they roll!! I can't tell you how many Sushi parlors have SCOFFED at my request for custom Veggie rolls. In Japan I had trouble getting even a single cucumber roll. Some sushi chefs treat it as an insult since they've gone to such trouble to get daily uneco rare fresh fish parts via fedex from all parts of the world. U Sushi uses machines, we're not talking quality or art, its the Subway Sandwich of Sushi. Everyone reading this blog knows to skip the fish. The $6 Veggie rolls are huge, more like burritos and you get to choose four veggie fillings, white or brown rice, seaweed or soy paper. With fillings like jalapenos, blanched spinach, cilantro, sprouts, carrot, cucumber, asparagus, pickled radish & mango you can make endless creations.

 

No, these sushi machines don't replace real sushi artists, but U Sushi is on par with grocery store sushi and you get to pick what's in it!  No poking out fatty bits of avocado with your chopsticks any more. 

U Sushi

168 S Beverly Dr

Beverly Hills, CA 90212

Neighborhood: Beverly Hills

(310) 777-7655

u-sushi.com

Going Back to the Basics @ Real Food Daily

Real Food Daily

514 Santa Monica Blvd.

Santa Monica, CA  90401 

(310) 451-7544  

Hours: 11:30- 10pm Daily

Real Food Daily is one of LA's oldest Vegan establishments and the 1st all VEGAN restaurant Lex & I ever indulged in together.  It was still my top place to go up until recently when I found out all my favorite dishes where drowning in OIL :-C  Which leaves me to THE BASICS ~~Basic Two 7.95 • Basic Three 9.95 • Basic Four 11.95 • Basic Five 13.95

At first I rebelled against the basics, trying desperately to get something reminiscent of the amazing menu items, such as the beet burger with the works, but an obscene amount of oil in each one (1TBSP+fat from cheese and fried tempeh bacon) led me to rekindle my relationship with the Basics.  For under $10 I enjoy greens of the day, beans of the day and grains of the day with bottomless hot sauce :)  To liven it up I ask for a side of corn tortillas and make a little healthy taco.  You can't beat the quality for the price.

 That's steamed Greens, Quinoa and Millet & Black Beans with corn tortillas and a good beer not deliberately hiding behind the hot sauce!

There is also a West Hollywood location (filled with celebs!) and another soon to be open at LAX.

Sometimes simple is perfect!

Roy's Hawaiian Restaurant

Rad watermelon sushi like salad MARINATED in citrus!

Many people lament that being vegan bars you from enjoying the tastes of other cultures.  Let me assure you that aside from Eskimo's all cultures ate mostly vegan until the Western World ruined them with processed foods and animal bits.

I had never heard of Roy's until my trip to Hawaii.  I was surprised to find out they have many locations around the USA.  I'm pretty sure most of them have vegan options. Although I am not sure if all of them have the Vegan Prix Fix Menu, but its worth asking and just showing them our blog post if not!

We dined at Roy's Waikiki, (state vegan & oil-free restriction with reservation).  Let me tell you, Roy's knows how to treat their guests.  They fold the napkin when you get up to use the bathroom, bombard your table with an army of servers, refilling your glass, whisking away plates, etc.    I've only encountered the same level of service at a Michelin Five Star restaurant in St. Louis.  We went for Kristin's Bday diner with our friends who happened to be a few hotels down from us??? what are the chances!?  They also chose the Vegan Prix Fix menu with wine pairing (though not vegans) and thoroughly enjoyed it.  It is $57 a person for the Vegan Prix Fix Menu, which included three wines and four dishes ($36 w/o wine) or you can order the dishes separately.  Since it was a celebration we went all out.

I could dish about how wonderful the service is at Roys, the waitress was wonderful at communicating with the kitchen and timing all the dishes to perfection.  They also brought out a special Happy Bday plate for Kristin!  Not even getting into the supreme quality of food, I could gush about how much I enjoyed Roys endlessly!  Now to the eats!

Check out this extremely rad watermelon salad!  WHAT?  Yep, those cubes are watermelon that has been MARINATED in citrus...  I could have lined up 100 of them and eaten them all they were so tasty.

For round two we had HOT hearts of palm.  Thinly shaved hearts of palm in a searing hot sauce made the speedy water refills all the more appreciated.

The main course were even HOTTER mushrooms w/ a side of Jasmine rice.

Dessert was a soy ice cream in ginger beer float!!!  AMAZING!

Roy's you won me over and knocked me out!  Everyone there deserves a pat on the back!

 Mahalo!

Peace Cafe: Honolulu, Hawaii always has one Oil-Free Option!

Usually we hack together an oil-free dish at vegan restaurants, on this day we scored big! Other Oil-Free people have paved a nice way for us!  We really didn't expect the answer to our question to be met with such a relaxed affirmative, like it was nothing out of the ordinary.

Lex:  "Can you recommend anything that would be easy for you to do without any oil?"  Peace Cafe: "The Morrocan Lentil is our Oil-Free dish today"  Lex: "Do you have a lot of people request oil-free"  Peace Cafe: "Yes we have a lot of Oil-Free customers that's why we always have at least one menu item that is prepared with no oil"

This Moroccan dish was so fantastic we went back two days in a row to have it!  On top are an assortment of pickles. 

Exterior shot, its easy to drive right past it, you need to have ESP and turn just before it so you can park for free in back!

Another photo of the Moroccan dish, brown rice, salad and pickles.

House made ice cream with berry sauce!

 

Zen interior, reclaimed lumber furnishings.  

Peace Cafe

2239 S King St, Honolulu, HI 96826-2346 

(808) 951-7555

www.peacecafehawaii.com