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Fatty’s and Co

Black Lentil Strudel from Fatty’s

The worst pictures of the trip were taken here, at Fatty’s and Co in Pasadena. I had to battle the romatic low-light ambiance with nothing but a camera phone. My apologies.

First up was my meal, their Black Lentil Strudel: crispy wedges of strudel balanced on freshly steamed broccoli, surrounded by a nut based bechamel sauce. It was topped with a balsamic reduction and little purple flowers. The whole thing was delicious, and I nearly licked my plate clean.

Stewart ordered the Cacciatore:

I’m still uncertain as to what the little sand castle-like structure actually consisted of, but it seemed to be vegetables (specific, I know) that were tossed in a marinara sauce that Stewart was quite fond of.

The vegetables were surrounded by a barbeque sauce and wedges of zucchini. He said both parts of the meal were good on their own, but not mixed together.

We didn’t have room for dessert, but we ordered the Apple Pie A La Mode anyway:

It was a very decent specimen of apple pie. Delicious and served warm, but not by any means spectacular. The soy ice cream was standard, no surprises there either.

Add comment December 2nd, 2006

California Vegan

Orange Chicken Dinner Special from California Vegan

I got the Orange Chicken Dinner Special. I was really excited when the put it down in front of me. The orange chicken looked perfect - just the right color and an appetizing glaze. Upon tasting it, however, I was disappointed.

I’ve had a lot of meat analogues, but never I have I tasted one like this. The texture was fine, but it had a strange aftertaste. It wasn’t bad, but it was off-putting enough that I didn’t finish it.

The fried rice was decent but on the bland side, the salad was also decent with a pleasant peanut dressing, but the spring roll was by far the best part of the dish. It tasted vaguely crab-like (even though I think the last time I had crab was 15 years ago) and I wished I had more than one.

Stewart got a Chicken wrap which he didn’t like at all:

A side of perfectly executed french fires:

And we shared the Banana Spring Roll for Dessert:

The banana spring roll was tasty, if a bit oily. They lined won ton wrappers with shredded coconut and placed a whole banana inside, wrapped it up, deep fried it and served it with chocolate and cherry sauce. It was pretty good, but I ended up scraping out the coconut from the last piece because I’m a terrible dinner date.

Oh well!

Add comment December 2nd, 2006

Lychee and Blackberry/Raspberry gelato from Angelato

Lychee and Blackberry/Raspberry gelato from Angelato

While in Santa Monica, Stewart and I stopped in at Angelato after reading something online about them having a variety of soy gelato flavors.

We were disappointed to see that they only had vanilla and chocolate, but the wide array of vegan sorbetto lifted our spirits. Here is my Lychee sorbetto and Stewarts Blackberry Raspberry.

This is “two scoops” according to the sign, but I counted at least four. Super tasty, but I couldn’t finish it all.

Add comment December 2nd, 2006

French Toast Platter at Real Food Daily

French Toast Platter at Real Food Daily

Ah, much better. Real Food Daily on a Sunday morning with plenty of light for bloggers.

Here’s the French Toast Platter. The french toast was OK, but not great. In fact, my french toast is better, and this statement is backed up by my unbiased vegan husband. Theirs was just fine, but I think they made a poor bread choice. It just seemed sort of soggy and maybe even a little gritty. A thicker slice of sturdier bread would have been much better.

The potatoes came absolutely smothered in their cashew cheese melty sauce. The server even said, “I’m sorry, he’s not usually putting so much cheese…” when he set it down in front of me. They were pretty tasty, though. Stewart had the same potatoes sans cheese and declared them boring. The tempeh bacon was salty and bordering on too crunchy - it was nearing cardboard in terms of texture but I still ate it all.

Here is Stewart’s plate, The Weekender:

You can see the same french toast, the same tempeh bacon (peaking out in the back there), the same potatoes… The difference here was the tofu scramble that he ordered with avocados and cashew cheese. It looked a little watery and he said there were too many onions. He declared mine to be the better meal.

1 comment December 2nd, 2006

Supreme Burrito at Real Food Daily

Supreme Burrito at Real Food Daily

Real Food Daily was Real Dark. I apologize for the photo quality; you should have seen them before I adjusted them!

Here lies the Supreme Burrito. Brown rice, cashew melty cheese, crunchy tempeh bacon and various veggies served with a caesar salad. The burrito was really tasty, and the salad was decent but went mostly untouched.

Stewart had the Thanskgiving Teaser which came out not only dark but blurry as well, nevertheless:

It consisted of roasted vegetables, mashed sweet potatoes, their own version of tofurkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce. He seemed to enjoy it, even though when he tasted it he said, “This is really good stuffing” and I pointed out that he had just tried the tofurkey.

Perhaps the best part of the meal, however, was sitting directly to the left of this shot: Yes, the one and only celebrity we saw in LA, and it could not have been a better one if I do say so myself…

Mr Ed Begely Jr.

He spent the whole dinner telling his wife (girlfriend?) some strange story about Paul Riser and Peter Falk. Yay LA.

Add comment December 2nd, 2006