• cruzer to become LA’s first ALL VEGAN PIZZERIA!

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    December 11th, 2009quarrygirlcruzer pizza, LA restaurants

    vegan pizza at cruzer

    hey people: i’ve got some breaking los angeles vegan news, so listen up! lucky for us, cruzer pizza and pasta in los feliz (the first place in the western US to start carrying daiya cheese) has made the decision to turn into a 100% vegan establishment. they are using up their remaining meat and cheese supplies, and expect to be completely animal-free by monday. not just that, but over the holidays they are revamping their menu and adding loads of new stuff—all vegan, of course!

    do you understand what this means?! this is HUGE. an all vegan pizza place, that delivers, right here in LA!!! there are barely any vegan pizza joints in the country, and to get to the few there are, you would need to take a plane journey. i am soooOOOOOooooOOOOOOOo excited about this. go eat at cruzer now to show your support…they offer huge fluffy and delicious pizzas covered in daiya cheese and mock meats like gardein. and if you see the owner give them a kiss from me, because this is the best news i’ve heard in awhile.

    PS: the glendale cruzer location offers vegan stuff as well, but there are no plans for it to go completely animal-free. just fyi, this is only for the los feliz restaurant.
    PPS: cruzer is in the process of changing their delivery hours, so call ahead.

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33 responses to “cruzer to become LA’s first ALL VEGAN PIZZERIA!” RSS icon

  • That’s awesome! I just made the jump to being vegan about a month ago, and live in delivery range of Cruzer, so I’ve already been taking advantage of them being awesome — but having even more menu options rocks.

  • although this is good news, i’d be happier if i wasn’t sick for two days the first (and only) time i ate there ๐Ÿ™
    hopefully being meat free this is less likely to happen but i still doubt i’ll be going back.

  • yes and too bad daiya tastes like barf. maybe they will add some other vegan cheese flavors with the new vegan options, although i doubt it.
    yeah i know everyone else loves the stuff, but yeah…

  • THIS IS THE BEST NEWS I HAVE HEARD ALL DAY. I love Cruzer more than Zpizza because they have so many fake meats to choose from. An all vegan place sends a great message!

  • This might be blasphemy around here, but the best Daiya pizza I’ve had so far was the fake-meat lover’s from Cruzer. This is fucking great news.

  • That is kind of cool. Hopefully the food cost savings will be enough to not impact the meat eater customer loss. And yeah missalix, you are not the only one who doesn’t care much for daiya. Though I don’t hate it, I just think its nothing special and tastes like that laughing cow cheese. I prefer a cheese less pizza with loads of veggies.

  • For some reason, the longer I’m vegan, the “closer” I feel to “Vegan-Only” establishments. So yes, “WE LOVE YOU CRUZER PIZZA!!!” (well, the los feliz location at least)

  • get out!!!!!!!!! this is extremely good news!!!!

  • Awesome! Another place I will now frequent and make one of my faves.

  • Terrific! Going this weekend…

  • I polished off an entire vegan Cruzer pizza the day after my birthday in the aftermath of hangover. It was DERN TASTY. so this sounds like a good idea to me!!!

  • Oh HELL yes!

  • i will give them another chance for this. they’ve fucked up my order too many times!

  • amazing news! hopefully this becomes a trend . id be so stoked if my current favorite local pizza place ( that carries daiya) went %100 vegan ! . i could only hope ๐Ÿ™‚

  • love love love this blog!

  • “too bad daiya tastes like barf” hahahahahhahah! Mad props to Cruzer, though, start carrying all the vegan cheeses and put tons of cool cheeseless pizzas on your menu, too!

  • I refuse to believe that a cheeseless pizza can be anything other than cheeseless (i.e. good or flavorful or interesting, etc.).

  • I will definitely give them a try next time I am out there.

    To Your Health!
    James Reno (editor)
    Raw-Food-Repair.com

  • I think Mark has to be the most annoying vegan I have ever encountered.

  • @missalix Daiya only tastes like barf if you cook it wrong, try to eat it and it puts you off for life. Ain’t that the real truth here?! ๐Ÿ˜‰

  • An all-vegan pizzeria is great news!

  • I’ve only had it once and it was…aiight. Not fab, but aiight, in an “oh-I-miss-generic-Dominos/Pizza Hut-pizza” kind of way. However, I agree with Oscar – an all-vegan eatery gets my money over one with “options” even if the food/service/whatever isn’t up to my standards.

  • Matt, I was under the same opinion of cheesless pizzas until I went to Italy, where solid ingredients displace the need for cheese! Also, i’ve been eating Hell Pizza in New Zealand and Australia (supposedly Montreal, too) which has the best Vegan pizza I’ve ever had (thanks to a quarrygirl forums member who hooked me up) Instead of Cheese they use Fat Free Refried Beans, tangy salsa, mexican style… As soon as I’m back from my trip I’ll be adding Montreal to my low airline fares alerts because I’ll be craving it so much.

  • Wow! That’s HUGE! As much as it literally HURTS to say this…you guys have GOT to go in often and keep them goin’. So….yeah ALRIGHT go to Cruzer every other pizza night. Really though, I SO completely get why vegans make that lifestyle choice so know it must be hard to witness others’ disregard for animal lives as they gorge on flesh right next to ya. I’m sure a 100% vegan place is more a more pleasurable dining experience. My place won’t be doing that. I thought about it HARD at one point but the reason I got so into providing vegans good pizza in the 1st place is the same reason I can’t take the other kind away. I have this ridiculous need to provide people something they can’t get anywhere else yet should be able to get all over. So when I got to know vegans and that no one had a good pizza for ’em, I set out on a quest to give them the best they could ever have because a life with no pizza, just ain’t worth living through… I’m glad that there are now so many choices out there and KNOW it’s QuarryGirl’s blogging about us so much that made it happen. I really am glad that whatever it took, people caught on. For me though, that damn “need” to give people what they cannot get anywhere else means I gotta have my omnivore pizzas. Believe it or not, we offer a unique enough variety, and style, (that I constantly play with to find more,) that I have a ton of people that have to have our pizzas a few times a week, and drive MILES in order to get one. I’m NOT taking that away from them. Before I had this place I was PICKY on pizza, had only one place I would go to, in Redondo Beach, so…I get these types of folks and am happy I am able to be that for them. So…sorry, Alex! The vegan menu offerings will NEVER go away at Purgatory no matter how many places you can now get it, no matter how much our regular pizza sales grow larger. The vegan offerings matter to me and will always be changing to add new things I discover and think you’ll like. So if you’re on the Eastside, we remain an option for ya always. Still our immediate neighbors that must have a pepperoni pizza that isn’t Dominoes, and those that drive from as far as Long Beach for our Terrestrial, get to always have that too.

    I commend Cruzers and urge you all to make this work for them. So eat there! The better they do, the more places will catch on and getting a nice vegan meal will become as easy at stopping at a McDonalds one day. (ok, maybe not quite and McDonalds is disgusting, but you get my meaning.) I wish them the best with this and am SO amazed and happy at how many options keep growing in vegan dining. I used to feel SO bad like everyplace was ignoring all of you. Now, not so much. That is NICE!!!!

    Go Cruzers!! ๐Ÿ™‚

  • Alex: if that link is typical of a Mark encounter, I agree! It could not be a worthy CHEESE replica were fat and cholesterol avoided. Cheese is not what one eats when concerned with that. Most of us treat that sort of food as an occasional thing. In moderation it ain’t an issue and makes life better. Had there been something non-vegan in it he’d have something but my take on veganism is that it is more often motivated by the critters than one’s personal health. No breaking news that I saw there…

    Lanny:
    Vegan products FAR outweigh my carnivore purchases cost wise. They are hugely more expensive and just as difficult to obtain. The only things I have ever read about Cruzers were from vegans. I do not know if their regular pizzas draw people away from the abundance of other pizzerias in that part of town. Going all vegan makes them special and apart from the rest. Would be a difficult thing to do with normal pizza when Two Boots is only a couple miles away so away. Smarter to not go for the Two Boots crowd but to find a group being grossly ignored by the masses. Costs will most likely go up, not down which is why it is up to you people to fill the joint! I’m optimistic for them and am very familiar with the power of The Quarry Girl. They should do splendidly!

  • Hey Everyone!

    I have been ethical vegan for more than 20 years and I am responsible for the vegan changes at Cruzers Pizza. Yummy vegan food is not only important to me, it is the fiber of my being and I want to share it with the world, and with you.

    Our soft opening is tomorrow (come eat! I’d love to see you- 4pm!). I will be working my Sass off to make sure our Grand Opening (after new year) will be complete with items approved by not only QG but the leaders of the vegan movement and even 3 of the worlds best vegan Chefs.

    We want you to enjoy your food and your life, saving lives.

    Sass

  • This is amazing news!!!!!

  • Daiya Cheese is better than real cheese!! I will definitely come to your place when I’m in LA. My daughters and I wrote a vegan book “Happy, Healthy, Vegan Kids” by Tracie DeMotte (and my girls). It has some vegan recipes in it. You can purchase it on amazon.com

  • Thanks for the update, I just reported it on Go Dairy Free.

  • This is such good news. I can’t wait to try a pizza. Hopefully, I’ll get there this weekend.

  • Wow, it’s nice to see business owners talking here about these decisions. I’m glad to see that you guys actually “get it” and that vegan options aren’t added just to open yourselves up to more customers and money.

    Your candid honesty has earned yourself a customer, Purgatory! Though I’m admittedly not downtown often, I’ll check your stuff out as soon as possible.

  • Not to be a buzzkill, but Daiya’s ‘Italian Blend’ which is what is used for the pizzas is 70% fat. Read this before you take a slice:
    http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2008nl/dec/fat.htm


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