Restaurants

Posted on August 12, 2011 by chicvegan — 6 Comments

Guest Post: Vegan Road Trip USA

Road trip!

Road trip!

This guest post is by Mandi Hoffman, a vegan blogger and activist hailing from sunny Portland, Oregon. She runs Chicvegan.com, a website for ethical ladies who want to do good deeds while looking hot and feeling fabulous.

Driving across country can be fun – especially when you can have all types of food adventures on your way! My boyfriend and I recently made the long trek from Portland, OR to Charlotte, NC. Admittedly, I did not do much planning for this trip. It came as an unexpected surprise and I hardly had time to get my shoes on before embarking on the journey, let alone strategically plan every stop. As a vegan, this was a bad idea. Since our trip was a rushed one, we had to grab things to eat at whatever place was open during the time we happened to be passing through. While we ended up discovering some truly great places, we missed out on an abundance of others.

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Posted on August 9, 2011 by Jill — 5 Comments

Vegan in Montreal for a Long Weekend

Viva Vegan Shop in Montreal, QC

Viva Vegan Store in Montreal, QC

Whenever there is a long weekend, John and I try to escape Ottawa and go on a mini vacation. We did just that a few weeks ago when we hopped on a Greyhound bus and headed to Montreal for a few days. Since my last visit, which I think was almost two years ago, a few new vegan spots have popped up. My favourite new addition is the Viva Vegan Store. This place is a little slice of Canadian vegan heaven. They’re well stocked with all kinds of rare goodies (rare to us deprived Canadians), like Field Roast products and Eli’s Earth Bars.

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Posted on July 25, 2011 by Jill — 5 Comments

Vegan on a Business Trip: Edmonton, AB

Padmanadi in Edmonton, AB

Gado-Gado salad with peanut sauce, wontons and hot & sour soup

Last month I headed off to Edmonton, Alberta for a work conference. I’d been there twice before, but always missed the chance to eat at the city’s most popular all vegan restaurant: Padmanadi. This place serves a blend of Indonesian, Chinese, Thai, and Indian cuisine. They have a variety of mock meat dishes, traditional soups like hot & sour, and fried goodies including the wontons pictured above. These wontons were super tasty! Instead of having real or even fake meat inside, they were stuffed with carrot, bok choy, mushroom and pesto. They were served with a delicious plum sauce and quickly disappeared from our table.

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Posted on April 28, 2011 by Jill — 15 Comments

Vegan Road Trip to New York City

IMG_1906

A few weeks ago John and I rented a car and drove to New York City with some friends. Oh boy did we take advantage of having three days to eat our hearts out! Last year we spent a week in New York and made a good dent in the vegan food scene, but didn’t even come close to trying all the hot spots. There are just so many vegan joints and more are popping up all the time, like Champs Family Bakery (176 Ainslie St, Brooklyn, NY 11211) which opened since we last visited. We ventured across the bridge and met up with some friends to feast on a sugary selection of Champs’ baked goods including cinnamon buns (best ever!), bear claws, donuts and cheesecake brownies.

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Posted on March 17, 2011 by Jill — 11 Comments

Vegan on a Business Trip: Washington, DC

Odwalla Smoothie for Breakfast in YOW Airport

Odwalla Smoothie for Breakfast in YOW Airport

Last week I spent three days in Washington for work. Looking back, it’s hard to believe I squeezed in so much (food) during the visit. John and I headed to the airport super early on Wednesday morning. Not having had a chance, or the appetite, to eat breakfast, I picked up an Odwalla smoothie after we cleared security. It’s awesome to see these smoothies are widely available in Canadian and US airports.  They make for a great breakfast or snack.

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Posted on February 26, 2011 by Jill — 9 Comments

Vegan on a Business Trip: Victoria, BC

Vega Shake and Go at the Airport

Airport Smoothie

Last week, I had a chance to visit Victoria, British Columbia, a beautiful city on the west coast of Canada. I traveled there for work but found some time to dine out and sample the local vegan options. I left Ottawa early on Wednesday morning, heading to the airport before having any breakfast. Before hopping on the plane, I tore open a vanilla Vega Shake & Go Smoothie packet, mixed the powder with some water, gave it a shake, and voila…I had a protein drink to get my day of travel started. This is really the only way to go when you can’t bring liquids through security. There’s a Booster Juice at the Ottawa airport but I try to avoid soy milk when I can.

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Posted on February 14, 2011 by Jill — 10 Comments

The Vegan Food Scene in Cairo, Egypt

Vegan Baked Goods from Sugar and Spice in Cairo, Egypt

Vegan Baked Goods from Sugar and Spice in Cairo, Egypt

I’m very thankful that we were able to visit Egypt during a more peaceful time, while locals were in ramadan and fasting for the sunlight hours. We ate a lot of homemade Egyptian food, but also ventured out into the streets of Cairo to find some vegan baked goods, ful sandwiches, kushari and Indian food. There aren’t a lot of places for vegans to eat in Cario; you really have to know where to look. We were fortunate that our hosts, Joey and Manar, were able to introduce us  to places like Sugar and Spice, where we bought this box of vegan baked goods. At this little bakery and cafe in Zamalek (an island that is known to some as the Manhattan of Cairo), we picked up a mini chocolate bundt cake, rice crispy square and two mini carrot cake loafs.

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Posted on January 7, 2011 by Sally - Home Sweet Orange — 16 Comments

Say Aloha to Vegan Options in Maui, Hawaii

Hawaii

This guest post was written by Sally Tinker Smith, a vegetable gardener who is very much in love with her husband and the sweet simplicity of their life. She blogs about her garden, vegan food and her travels at Home Sweet Orange.

As soon as I breathe in the moist, rich smell of fresh air, my body begins to unfold and adjust to island-time.  I live in San Diego, so beautiful beaches are not the main draw, it’s the amazing tropical fruit that brings me back to the Hawaiian islands.

Having been to Kauai, one of Hawaii’s islands, many times, we decided to explore Maui this time around.  A comedy of errors surrounding our condo reservation led us away from the pavement of Kihei, and up to the rainy and gorgeous north side of Maui.  There’s a lot to love about Haiku, one of Maui’s most beautiful communities.

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Posted on December 16, 2010 by Veggywood — 11 Comments

Veggywood Takes on Hong Kong, China

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Hong Kong, China

This guest post was written by Polly from Veggywood. She recently traveled to Asia and visited China and Japan. Now she is back and here to share her tips for vegans traveling in these countries.

As a vegetarian and then as a vegan, I’d always been nervous about traveling to Asia.  I’d heard horror stories about fish broth being in “everything”, carcasses hanging in shop windows, the prevalence of fur clothing… But when in the beginning of October, I was fortunate enough to travel to Hong Kong for the first time, I found an entirely different world:  one that was decidedly veggie-friendly and even more importantly, respectful of it. With the exception of fur (sadly, people wear a lot of real fur there, and it’s all over the shop windows, a sight I haven’t seen in awhile), I found Hong Kong and Japan surprisingly easy places to travel as vegan.

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Posted on December 14, 2010 by Jill — 6 Comments

Vegan Gelato & Sightseeing in Rome, Italy

Il Gelatone

Il Gelatone

We visited Rome from Sermoneta, taking the train in after breakfast and returning in time for dinner. We were so busy walking around Rome, taking in all of the sights and sounds, that we didn’t stop to eat at any of the city’s vegetarian restaurants. We did, however, make a special trip to Il Gelatone for some soy gelato. We went for ice cream not once, but twice…

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