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I’ve spent more than a little time trying to figure out where the long list of National Something or Other Days came from.
My deep-seeded sense of conspiracy makes me wonder about a secret group meeting in a secure facility, perhaps a culinary offshoot of the Illuminati. Why, in recent weeks, they named Sept. 5 National Cheese Pizza Day and Sept. 15 National Cheese Toast Day leaves me boggled. But not nearly as confused as the dubbing of Sept. 23 as Hug a Vegetarian Day — oddly the same day that’s also National Snack Stick Day.
Unlike the other culinary days, Hug a Vegetarian Day has a somewhat condescending ring to it — as if vegetarians were somehow in need of a special request for both love and respect. That may have been the way things were a long time ago, when vegetarians were Birkenstock wearers with beards and loose cotton meditation pants. Back in the day, there was a vegan restaurant in San Francisco called Communion run by a religious group who walked to farmers market every day, did not permit conversation over meals, and had a cigar box in which you were asked to contribute whatever you wanted for your meal.
That’s how we thought of vegetarians back then. And the disparagement was general.
In his book “Kitchen Confidential,” Anthony Bourdain wrote, “Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living.” (And certainly his anti-veg attitude matches well with the current Cracker Barrel folderol involving their plant-based sausage. You’d think they were serving human body parts! Heck, if you don’t want the sausage, don’t order it.)
But for the most part, vegetarians don’t need a hug these days. There’s a long and illustrious history of serious, non-glib humans hailing the wonders of the meatless life. Albert Einstein, who was a lot smarter than most of us, said, “Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.”
George Bernard Shaw informed us that, “The average longevity of a meat eater is 63. I am on the verge of 85 and still work as hard as ever. I have lived quite long enough and am trying to die, but I simply cannot do it. A single beef-steak would finish me; I cannot bring myself to swallow it. I am oppressed with a dread of living forever. That is the only disadvantage of vegetarianism.”
And George Orwell, who saw the future with 20/20 clarity in “1984” and “Animal Farm,” was deeply hostile to vegetarianism, even though one critic condemned him as being part of “that dreary tribe of high-minded women and sandal-wearers and bearded fruit-juice drinkers who come flocking to the smell of ‘progress’ like bluebottles to a dead cat.”
(Should you want to study the history of hostility to vegetarians, I refer you to the large chapter in Wikipedia headed “Vegaphobia,” which is a new word to me. We discover, somewhat amazingly, that Britain’s National Health Service posted a job ad that said, “Occupational Therapists with vegan diets cannot be considered.” A primary school in England expelled a 5-year-old for drinking soy milk during lunch. Which seems excessive, and then some. Like I said, if you don’t want it, don’t eat it!)
So, I guess the bottomline is…vegetarians could use a hug. At least in England.
Here in SoCal, we love our veggies. We probably eat more fruit and vegetables than anyone else in America. And we do it with terrific creativity and style. Vegetables are our friends. Even if you don’t hug a vegetarian, hug a carrot. And not just on Sept. 23. Every day would be just fine — at great meatless places like these!
10345 Garvey Ave., El Monte; 626-579-1050
Thien Tam is a plain-looking restaurant in a plain-looking mini-mall in El Monte — a distance from the far glitzier mini-malls of Monterey Park, Alhambra and Rosemead. There’s a sense of going back in time on this end of Garvey Avenue, to before gentrification hit the malls of the San Gabriel Valley. But don’t let that discourage you.
Walking through the door at Thien Tam quickly removes you from the dullness of the street, and brings you into a cool, soothing storefront, with hanging plants, deep red walls, bits of art here and there — and some of the best vegetarian Vietnamese food you’ll ever have. Indeed, this may well be the only vegetarian Vietnamese food you’ll ever have because Vietnamese cooking is notably meat-ocentric. You don’t just get a hot steaming bowl of pho with beef — you get your pho with a choice of half a dozen cuts of beef, and maybe even more.
Vegetables tend to be a sidebar, a footnote, rather than a defining ingredient. Except at Thien Tam, where vegetables rule. And the results make you wonder why there isn’t more vegetarian Vietnamese cooking out there. The trick, as with so much vegetarian cooking, is for a good cook, a skilled chef, to be preparing the food.
There are good vegetarian restaurants of various persuasions out there — and there are ones that aren’t so good as well. When the cooking is good, it’s usually because the kitchen understands the subtlety and innuendo of flavor. The presence of meat doesn’t really matter.
It isn’t the meat that makes the food taste good, it’s the tastiness of the prep. It’s the old line about how it’s the skill of the magician that pulls the rabbit out of the hat — the rabbit has very little to do with it. And so, we have Thien Tam — where the dishes that emerge from the kitchen are a revelation.
Those of us who are new to the restaurant tend to goggle in wonder, as really good looking platters of food march by. So much so that I found myself (somewhat obnoxiously) asking various diners what they had ordered.
The regulars knew the menu well. They proudly told me that next time, I should try the No. 4 — a creation called pho ap chao, made with crispy rice noodle patties topped with a vegetable gravy and lots of stir-fried vegetables. Or perhaps No. 9 — mi xao nho thap cam, a massive pile of panfried egg noodles, once again under a thick layer of vegetables.
Of course they offer spring rolls; what proper Vietnamese restaurant doesn’t? There are two, one with shredded tofu, the other with veggie shrimp and veggie chicken. I’ve never been a great fan of faux meats; to me, they either are, or they aren’t. But dipped in the very good house peanut sauce, the veggie shrimp and veggie chicken are close enough for government work — in texture, if not in taste.
And yes, there are various faux meats on the menu, including a veggie grilled ham — and lots of dishes served with veggie fish sauce, which certainly does hint of fish sauce, even if the taste is not quite there.
There’s a multitude of noodle dishes, rice dishes — and lots of pho soup creations. I hadn’t ordered pho — but a bowl of broth arrived anyway, as a courtesy, I guess. And it was good to sip on between courses.
If there was a single dish I’d go back for … well, actually, there were many. The noodles with vegetables, simple as they were, were just so soul- and appetite-satisfying. And I loved the Vietnamese salad — the goi ngo sen dac biet. It was as complex as any salad found at any trendy New American, maybe more so. Every bite was an adventure, with fresh tastes and textures.
Thien Tam doesn’t look like much, but there’s much there. It’s an adventure worth taking.
10478 Valley Blvd., El Monte, 626-453-8876; 20657 Golden Springs Drive, Diamond Bar, 909-551-0700
At prices so low, eating at home seems a wasteful idea. Sweet Veggie is the Golden Corral of Chinese meatless restaurants. It’s memorable…and then some. The options for healthy plant-based eating are many at Sweet Veggie. The veggie sushi rolls are hard to beat.
And there’s fishless nigiri sushi (slices of “fish” over rice, wrapped with a seaweed bow) that look so much like albacore and salmon, I had to ask another fellow who was stacking them on his plate if they were actually meatless. He agreed that it was hard to believe.
There’s marinated seaweed, which is a snappy palate cleanser. Thanks to a salad bar, you can create a plate unlike just about any other — along with lettuce, there are marinated jalapeños, a chopped vegan pork option, long-cooked soy beans, a Chinese salsa, amended with steamed bok choy, and crispy fried oyster mushrooms.
And that brings me to what seems the dominant theme at Sweet Veggie — aside from meatlessness. And that’s deep-fried dishes, of which there are plenty. Fried rice, deep-fried vegan chicken thighs, deep-fried sesame flatbreads, deep-fried radish rice cakes.
Somewhat inexplicably — or at least unexpectedly — there’s pizza. There really is a quality here of tossing out everything they can, something for everyone, except maybe for those hungry for a sirloin.
Competing with deep-fried is the always tasty world of dim sum — this is veggie dumpling heaven, at least a dozen to choose from, not rolled out on carts, or ordered from a menu, but scooped onto your plate.
And that includes — yes! — the SG Valley culinary object of desire, the fabled soup dumpling xiao long bao. They’re as good as they are at Din Tai Fung, but in this case meatless. It’s an amazing bit of disguise, a dish that will fool most, and maybe all. But then, the point isn’t to fool us — it’s to offer an alternative. And goodness knows, that’s what they do at Sweet Veggie.
When it comes to “sweet” — there’s plenty of that as well. There’s a serve-yourself drink bar, where you can imbibe as much passionfruit juice, and pineapple juice, as you wish. There’s milk tea, made with soy rather than milk. And there’s a long counter of desserts, which seem more Western than Chinese — brownies and macaroons and heaps of sliced fruit.
There’s also shaved ice with a wide world of sweet jellies to pile on top. There’s a case of many flavors of vegan ice cream, self-serve and leaving you promising yourself just one more bite. Or, just one more visit. Or maybe many. At these prices, with this many choices, Sweet Veggie isn’t a place you go to once, it’s a culinary obsession.
Just be ready to wait — and remember that patience is a virtue. It gives you time to peruse the small shop of items to go, with what may be the most extensive selection of Chinese meatless items in town. Like finding 99 Ranch inside a restaurant.
Camellia Square, 5728 Rosemead Blvd., Temple City; 626-288-9301, www.greenzonerestaurant.com
Even though Green Zone isn’t a vegetarian restaurant, it is a restaurant where veggies are respected and revered.
At Green Zone, you begin with the wonders of the beverage list — seven organic herbals teas, 10 organic traditional teas, seven organic hot drinks (the matcha latte is a joy, the goji berry, chrysanthemum and Imperata tea blend is amazing!), and more than a dozen cold drinks.
Try the organic cucumber mint refresher, which is just what it claims to be! And while you sip, there’s so much goodness to consider. I love the salmon triangles with their delicate salmon mousse filling, and a wasabi dipping sauce on the side. The Murasaki fries do not disappoint; but get them with the honey mustard sauce, not with ketchup.
Knowing that steaming is healthier than deep-frying, I lean strongly toward the combination of steamed cabbage gyoza, and steamed chive gyoza. And to keep things rolling along in the healthy lane, there are 10 exceptional salads — including a terrific mixed mushroom model with a miso lime dressing, and an Argentine red shrimp salad with flax seeds and dried berries. There’s a kale salad too. Because kale salad…is the law.
You can do well with the grilled organic chicken with Vietnamese coleslaw, and the poached Hainan chicken rice, flavored with ginger-scallion paste. Chicken or beef satay comes in a hot pot with enoki mushrooms — which comes with, or without noodles. The noodles here arrive in a wonderfully savory broth of pork and chicken bones, which have been cooked for a minimum of 15 hours — long enough for them to melt away.
1402 Huntington Drive, Duarte; 626-256-4404, www.janetscuisine.com
Like Green Zone, Janet’s isn’t strictly vegetarian. But there are enough vegetables on the menu to come close enough, for those who want to put meat aside for a meal.
Service at Janet’s Mediterranean Cuisine, a sprawling kebab and hummus shop in a Duarte mini-mall, is so fast, I swear they must read minds. Either that, or they’ve got their systems so totally down that everything is pretty much ready to go, just moments after it’s requested. However it works, I sure as heck didn’t have to wait — just minutes after walking through the door, I was digging into hummus, rice, salad, pita bread, and some of the moistest, most succulent, most addictive chicken kebabs I’ve ever tasted.
Foodwise, this eatery is a real joy. And reasonably priced to boot.
The term “Mediterranean cuisine,” though often used, is broader than what’s served at Janet’s. Though they’re on the Med, there’s nothing on the menu of France or Italy, of Spain or Portugal, of North Africa, and much more. I’ve long identified this cooking as Armenian, Lebanese and Israeli, with lots of influences from the surrounding nations. There’s lots of it to choose from, probably twice as many dishes as you’ll find at other Mediterranean eateries, with 14 appetizers, 14 entrees, six salads, three soups and 11 pita wraps.
As far as I can tell, it all flies out of the kitchen with Olympic runner speed. Indeed, it will probably take you longer to decide what you want to eat than it will for Janet’s to assemble it all onto a tempting plate. Which exudes so many tempting smells, it was hard to drive home without pulling over, and snagging a chicken kebab. I mean, I’ve got Wet Ones in the car; I can clean up the mess. Sort of.
Though definitely not if I decide to scoop up some of the world-class hummus, creamy and succulent, and topped in one incarnation with a mix of paprika and cumin…and in the other, the Hummus Special, with beef shawarma and chopped almonds. Hummus on steroids!
There’s a perfect fire-roasted eggplant, tahini, garlic and lemon juice baba ghanoush (mutabbal). The mouhamara (sometimes spelled muhammara), made of chopped walnuts and spicy red pepper paste is a dish found on some, but not all Middle Eastern menus. While the mousakaah is found on very few indeed — eggplant fried and stuffed with garlic, onions, tomatoes and bell peppers. There’s tabbouleh and stuffed grape leaves…yogurt with mint lebni, and yogurt with cucumbers jajiki. And of course falafel, along with fried kibbeh — a dumpling of cracked wheat filled with ground meat.
If you’re undecided what to get, order the Appetizer Sampler of hummus, baba ghanoush, tabbouleh, feta cheese, kalamata olives, grape leaves and pita bread. Always pita bread, ubiquitous on all the dishes.
This is very soul-satisfying food — and very filling.
Should you have hopes of fitting into your jeans the next morning, you might consider one of the tasty salads — chicken, beef, falafel, fattoush (many veggies, and fried pita, which is turned into a mix of a chip and a crouton) and an Armenian salad (cucumber and tomatoes, with lots of dressing). The menu has little green circles next to select dishes. All the meat dishes are “100 Percent Halal” — the Arabic equivalent of kosher. Some dishes — those with yogurt and feta — are vegetarian. Others are vegan.
Unless I missed it, an alternative pita that’s gluten-free isn’t noted on the menu, which is not to say it doesn’t exist. But this isn’t a cuisine that projects trendy. If anything, it feels ancient, as if the forebears of the people of the Middle East were suddenly to appear, and order a meal. They might not understand the rituals of takeout, but they’d recognize the food — recipes for hummus first appeared in 13th century cookbooks in Cairo. Pita bread dates back to the Natufian people of Jordan 14,500 years ago.
There’s so much history in every bite — so much ancient history. And it taste so good too.
168 W. Colorado Blvd., Old Pasadena; 626-639-6818, www.truefoodkitchen.com
The sprawling space at the corner of Colorado Boulevard and Pasadena Avenue has seen more than its fair share of restaurants over the years. Long ago, it was home to the late Amy Pressman’s wonderful Old Town Baking Co. In the years that followed, it was occupied by Clearwater Seafood, 168, Sorriso, Picnik and Punch.
Now, it’s a branch of the True Food Kitchen chain. And from what I can tell, this one is going to be around for a while. Based on the crowds flocking there from Day One, True Food Kitchen has roots — in more ways than one.
True Food Kitchen is the creation of healthy living guru Dr. Andrew Weil, along with Arizona restaurateur Sam Fox. But it’s not Sam Fox’s face that’s on books for sale at the entrance. It’s the Santa Claus-like visage of Dr. Weil, and director of the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona — a major spokes-doctor for holistic health, and a proponent of the anti-inflammatory diet, which the menu describes as, “a blueprint for a lifetime of optimal nutrition.”
His food is a combination of Mediterranean, Asian and Californian, with plenty of dishes on the menu marked with “V” for Vegan, “VEG” for Vegetarian and “GF” for Gluten Free. There’s no beef or pork on the menu. But there is bison and seafood, cheese and alcohol — the last of which is found in a selection of quirky “Libations, Presses & Punches,” with names like “Spontaneous Happiness” and “Thai Grapefruit Martini.”
Terms like “organic,” “bio-dynamic,” “responsibly source” and “The Environmental Working Group” pepper the menu, making us all feel as if we’re in the presence of righteousness, goodness and holiness. Even if we just dropped by for a pilsner and some edamame dumplings.
The notion of kale and avocado dip with spiced pita chips while watching Dodger baseball is an odd one. But hey, any food works with Dodger baseball. (The night I was there, one of the big screens was showing a poker tournament. That was very strange with shiitake and organic tofu lettuce cups.)
The servers, so relentlessly upbeat you wonder if they’re drinking too much matcha green tea and honey lemonade (a Green Arnie), is dressed in t-shirts that read, variously, “Spiritual Gangster,” “Grateful” and “Warrior.” The place is mellow — but so noisy; all that “organicness” doesn’t quiet the echoes and the bounce. Which means you may have to shout to be heard over your “inside out” quinoa burger with hummus, tzatziki and feta cheese. Laidback and high volume are more than a little contradictory. But no one seems to be complaining.
And then there’s the food, which is certainly a step up from most of the V, VEG and GF chow around town. It’s good, even better than good. But it isn’t great. What they do best are salads — no surprise there, for this is Salad Cuisine.
The organic Tuscan kale salad, with a dressing of lemon and parmesan, could almost make me like kale again. And I probably will, when it stops appearing on every cool restaurant menu in the known world. (I suffer from a serious kale overdose.) There’s an heirloom tomato and watermelon salad with goat cheese and cashews. A worthwhile Mediterranean chopped salad (though for the record, quinoa ain’t Med, not even close), a chopped chicken salad with jicama and manchego cheese.
Even better was the plate of “street tacos,” with a topping of avocado and cotija cheese. And the Moroccan chicken was good, though it consisted of a pretty small piece of chicken.
I let the server (a Spiritual Gangster) talk me into the Super Berry Tart, made with blueberry and sea buckthorn, which was okay. But next time, I’ll hold out for the low-fat lemon-ginger frozen yogurt. It’s gluten-free and vegetarian. Stop the presses!
Merrill Shindler is a Los Angeles-based freelance dining critic. Email mreats@aol.com.
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