Vegan restaurants are dishing up an entirely new world of flavor for foodies, both good for our bodies and the planet. 

Vegan chefs and their new restaurants are the talk in most any town, especially Los Angeles. They’re sexy,  hip, and definitely full of foodies; creating some of the most innovative cuisine. Los Angeles-based Heather Goldberg of Spork Foods says, “Vegan is now a dining choice. People ask if they want Thai, Italian, Chinese, or Vegan tonight.”

I was getting vegan curious so I set out to adopt the lifestyle for two weeks. Although I failed after the third day – warm asigio bread broke me – it wasn’t for naught. Being vegan curious raised my awareness and introduced to me to a new foodie vegan world bursting with new interesting flavors and stunning dining options.

My first stop was Plant Food + Wine in Venice Beach, California spearheaded by French Culinary Institute trained Matthew Kenney. His restaurant was a Mediterranean oasis of fine dining. Not the white tablecloth kind but the garden variety. Fresh flowers picked from the garden garnished my drink. The cashew raclette, cacao pepe, sea bean caesar salad and parsnip cake with satsuma sorbet were palate pleasers. The clean plates proved it!

It was also a heart touching experience when our waitress shared her personal story. She lost over 130 pounds after being introduced to Matthew Kenney’s book “Everyday Raw Dexox.” Now, she commutes more than two hours to work at (or rather be inspired by) Matthew Kenney’s Plant Food + Wine and his desire to “bring together culinary art and ultimate nutrition.”

Vegans have more dining options now than ever. Kim Kessler, an Instagram vegan influencer @VeganTravelista, says, “I love being vegan in Los Angeles, which is full of nearly 60 plant-based restaurants. My favorites are Crossroads, Cafe Gratitude, Satdha Thai, Gracias Madre, and Shojin.”

The trend is that vegan and plant based dining choices are becoming more mainstream. Real Food Daily‘s founder Ann Gentry adds, “Vegetables are vogue….finally!  This I attribute more to mainstream restaurants placing an emphasis on vegetable dishes as they move away from being so meat-centric…. (you) can find some great choices in the realm of vegetables on menus everywhere.” In fact, @VeganFatKid tipped me off to Blue Star Donuts who don’t separate or advertise their vegan donut as vegan. They are just excellent donuts that happen to be animal product free.

Sanae Suzuki, owner of Seed Kitchen, reminds us that we can’t eat vegan donuts all day or just remove meat from our diet to be healthy. She and her husband and partner Chef Eric Lechasseur have created exceptional macrobiotic vegan cuisine that celebrities the likes of Madonna and Leonardo Di Caprio have dined on.

So, are you vegan curious?

Here are 5 great tips to dive into a whole new culinary experience.

1. Get cooking. Vegan chef Leslie Durso says, “There are so many dishes that are already vegan or so easy to make vegan, you won’t feel deprived at all.”

2. Get a cookbook. “Crossroads: Extraordinary Recipes from the Restaurant” will have you thinking about nuts and vegetables in an entirely new way. Think using a truffle shaver for walnuts. And coconut whipped cream.

3. Drink up! You can be vegan and drink alcohol. There are amazing cocktail recipes in the Crossroads cookbook and Matthew Kinney’s restaurant Plant Food + Wine reminds us that we can pair vegan cuisine with wine and cocktails beautifully.

4. Be open. You’ll experience new textures and flavors. Think of it like dining in new exotic country. It won’t be what you’re used to, but it will be new, surprising, and most certainly delicious!

5. Be creative. Going vegan for few days, weeks, or if you adopt the full lifestyle, I believe it will actually make you a better cook focusing on bringing out the natural flavors of the food rather than covering it with a sauce.

Go ahead. Indulge in your vegan tendencies and discover what delicious surprises are waiting for you. As in-the-know foodies are excited to ask their waiter what mouthwatering haute vegan cuisine options are on the menu.

Related on EcoSalon

The Alternative to the Alternative: 3 Nut-Free Vegan Cheese Recipes

Vegan Superfood Granola Recipe With Kale (Yes, Kale!)

Raw Vegan Lemon Custard Blackberry Pie Recipe

Images courtesy of Plant Food + Wine and photo credits Anna Schwaber and Erica Rae Brown.

The post LA-Based Vegan Restaurants Slough Off ‘Hippie Food’ Labels and Please Any Palate appeared first on EcoSalon.

An obstacle people often face when trying to eat a healthy, green, reasonably priced diet is a lack of cooking skills. Cookbooks don’t always help. Most food authors attempt to teach people how to cook real food (as opposed to opening packages, dumping and stirring) and assume the reader already knows something about cooking.

Other cookbooks are written as if people who don’t already know how to cook must not really want to know how to cook. These cookbooks seem to think that people should just be happy to combine processed foods in innumerable ways to create “quick and easy meals”.

That’s where this new book comes in. Cook Food – which is earning rave reviews – can teach people how to cook simple, tasty, nourishing, whole foods quickly, cheaply, and above all, intelligently. If you know someone who cares about the environment, their body, animals, and taste, yet nobody has ever taught them to cook, give them this book.

Lisa Jervis, who is perhaps best known for being the Founding Editor and Publisher of the magazine Bitch: A Feminist Response to Pop Culture, has written a slim, no nonsense book with a can-do attitude. Don’t expect glossy photos. This isn’t aspirational food porn. This is a manualfesto!

Vegan Approach to Sensitive Cooking and Eating

Jervis’s  book is entirely vegan, with very occasional suggestions for adding dairy products if desired, but that’s not really the point, so don’t stop reading just because you don’t happen to be vegan. The book’s main message is that cooking for oneself shouldn’t be challenging, expensive, or time-consuming.

Jervis stresses cooking and eating consciously for your health and the planet. Whether we are meat eaters or not, we all need to eat our vegetables. And most of us could lower our meat consumption for the sake of both our bodies and the planet. Knowing how to prepare tasty veg-centric meals and getting in the habit of eating more of them is a great skill to have.

A Look at Our Food System

By way of introduction as to why the recipes in the book are vegan and almost always seasonal and unprocessed, the author gives a succinct primer on what’s wrong with our food system with many nods to authors like Michael Pollan and Raj Patel.

She touches on complex issues such as why processed soy products aren’t as good for the environment as some people think, and how affordability is relative, and why we shouldn’t worry too much about micronutrients, or (gasp!) salt – all of which serve to get the reader thinking deeply about food.

But Jervis doesn’t want us to think so deeply that we become paralyzed about our food choices, so she ends with a very smart bit of advice: “In the end, we can all only do the best we can, which actually means a lot.”

A Well Stocked Kitchen

Before getting down to cooking, Jervis wants you to have the right supplies. The entire first section of the book talks about what tools, spices and pantry items you absolutely need and which ones you can actually do without. There are different tiers from “must haves” to “nice to haves” to “splurges,” and as a cook, I can say the advice is solid.

Just as solid are her explanations of cooking techniques. Using a friendly, approachable style, Jervis sets out to teach you how to cook. I mean really cook. She defines and describes sautéing, blanching, roasting. She tells why to salt early in the process, how caramelization builds flavor, and how dried herbs behave more like spices and therefore should be added at the beginning, while fresh herbs lose flavor if cooked to long.

The tone is matter-of-fact rather than pedantic, and none of the techniques are dumbed down in the least. Simplified, not stupid. Rather than just imparting recipes, she teaches how to build flavor in a dish, merrily dispensing variation suggestions throughout in order to coax cooks into trusting their own instincts.

Roasting Veggies

My favorite part of the book is the section on roasting vegetables. People are always shocked by how good roasted vegetables done properly with olive oil, salt, and high heat can taste. It’s such a simple thing, yet there is a lot of technique involved that most experienced cooks just do unconsciously, and most cookbooks don’t even attempt to explain.

Jervis’ mini-treatise tells why not to crowd the vegetables (they steam) why you should use a dark pan (they brown better), how to cut (so as to have lots of surfaces to brown) and why to toss them in olive oil with your hands (so the oil penetrates into all the cracks and crevices), and more. Next time someone asks me how I get my roasted vegetables to taste so good, I’m just going to hand them that section of Cook Food.

What You Will Learn From the Book

In the end, the reader gets simple food prepared with solid techniques that can be used for a lifetime of cooking.

Even experienced cooks might learn something from Cook Food. In the recipe for Ginger-Garlic-Sesame Tofu with Spinach, I learned why my tofu doesn’t ever taste all that great when I marinate it and sauté it – because I’ve never pressed it. Turns out that removing all the excess liquid lets the tofu absorb the marinade better and leads to more efficient caramelizing.

I also love the three recipes for Beans n’ Greens (Italian style, Indian style, and Chili style) because such recipes are a great way to eat. Filling, healthy, streamlined, green, efficient. You can feed a lot of people or just yourself all week long with one dish.

My only quibble: I think both the flavor and texture of dried beans from scratch are so superior to canned that it would be a service to readers to tell them that it’s mostly the planning that hangs people up, not the actually process. You don’t have to do anything to the beans while they are cooking, other than to stir and check them occasionally, and you can use a crockpot, making it even easier. And then you have the beans around to use for quick meals. But then, as the author of a cookbook devoted entirely to dried beans, I would say that!

I’d like people to cook more dried beans so they can experience how good they are, but at the risk of making the perfect the enemy of the good, I’ll agree with Jervis. If the best you can do on any given night is open a can of beans, that’s okay, “because it actually means a lot.”

Main Image: Amazon

Image One: East Bay Express

This is the latest installment in Vanessa Barrington’s weekly column, The Green Plate, on the environmental, social, and political issues related to what and how we eat.

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