Little Cooking going on….

Lately Neil and I have been so busy and out of town so needless to say little cooking has been going on. Last night we made grilled veggie wraps with hummus and this morning I made Vegan Crunk’s Peacan Waffles for her cookbook tester but when I went to take a photo of it my camera’s battery was dead.

Any ways here are some restaurant reviews from my Hubby wanted me post on here:
(transfered from old blog)
Since moving to Vermont from Fredericton, NB, Canada, I must say that I feel rather spoiled by the great options for veg*n dining throughout Vermont. In Fredericton, there were very few options available to vegans (for the most part french fries/salad and the occasional boca type veggie burger) and what was available was often bland and uninspiring. I’m not a food critic, so I won’t go into too many details, but here’s a quick run down of some of the Vermont restaurants that my my partner, Lindsay, and I enjoy eating at as vegans are:

Stone Soup
College St
Burlington, Vermont
This vegan friendly counter service restaurant has a great, always fresh salad bar, a number of veg*n friendly hot and cold sandwiches and fresh vegan baked goods! I love the vegan macaroons and the Vegan club sandwich!

Bee’s Knees
Morrisville, Vermont
http://www.thebeesknees-vt.com/
The Bee’s Knees is a small, locally run cafe in Morrisville, Vermont with a really welcoming, community oriented feel to it. They often have many different veg*n dishes including great salads and sandwiches. My favourites are the mock pulled pork (mushrooms and eggplant i believe) and the tofu breakfast sandwiches (I love being able to get vegan breakfast that consists of more than just homefries). The menu indicates which options are vegan friendly and which can be made vegan friendly on request. They have local music acts playing there fairly regularly as well.

A Single Pebble
http://www.asinglepebble.com/intro.htm
Classical Chinese cuisine in downtown Burlington. Offers many traditional Chinese dishes including many veg*n options including my favourites mock eel (made from mushrooms) and the Buddha’s Beef (made from seitan).

Pho Dang Vietnamese Cafe
Winooski, Vt
http://www.7nvt.com/7n/listing.htm?establishment_id=793
This Vietnamese cafe makes up for what it’s lacking in atmosphere by it’s great, fresh food. It has a very lunch room sort of feel to it but that really doesn’t matter once you taste their great tofu dishes (veggie pho isn’t vegan). The portions are huge and the prices are cheap.

Ocha/Royal Orchid
Waterbury/Montpelier, Vermont
These two Thai restaurants are owned by the same family. Both restaurants seem to have very similar menus with slight variations between the two. They have many veg*n dishes and are willing to make changes to other dishes to accommodate veg*n customers as well. The menu is split into curries, noodle dishes, rice dishes and vegetable/stir fry dishes with your choice of tofu or meat. We usually start off our meal with the fresh rolls which is a soft rice paper roll with tofu, rice noodles and just a taste of mint with a nice light sweet and sour sauce for dipping. It’s a nice light and fresh start to the meal. The entrees we have had are the pad ki mao (my personal favourite, a wide rice noodle dish with thai basil and chilli), brocolli and tofu in a nice creamy peanut sauce, penang and massuman curries (personal favourites at home when my parnter cooks them and both very well done by the restaurants) and the pad thai (with no fish sauce or eggs). The pad thai is closer to a traditional pad thai than what people in New Brunswick knew as pad thai (spicy peanut sauce with rice noodles). While the Waterbury location seems to be a bit pricier, it also has a nicer atmosphere than the Montpelier location and I typically find the food to be a little better. Entrees are typically in the $10 range while the appetizers are in the $3 to $5 range.

Pacific Rim
Burlington, Vt
Pacific Rim is one of my favourite spots to eat when we’re in Burlington. It is a mainly Korean Asian restaurant in downtown Burlington. There is a good selection of salads/appetizers and main courses that are veg*n friendly. The food is fresh, flavourful and very affordable. They also have a good drink menu with asian takes on popular drinks and lots of ginger! It’s a very informal seat yourself sort of atmosphere with fairly decent service considering how busy things can get there.
(*note Pacific Rim’s menu has changed since this review was created and the last time two times we have dined here the food has been dissapointing and not up to the same standards they once were)

Magnolia Bistro
Burlington, Vermont
Hidden away in downtown Burlington is Vermont’s only truly green restaurant, Magnolia Bistro. Magnolia focuses on eco-friendly, fair trade, local and organic foods and offers a twist on regular breakfast and lunch fare. They have many veg*n friendly options and the menu indicates what is vegan or can be adapted to be vegan. Some of the veg*n options you can order vegan french toast, substitute eggs for tofu in breakfast dishes or if you’re not in a breakfast mood go for a garbanzo burger. The food is fresh tasting, well seasoned and fairly affordable considering the quality of ingredients used.
(*note this review from fellow VT Vegan http://howtofeedavegan.blogspot.com/2009/01/recommendation-withdrawn.html)
Neil