recently i got an email from a vegan restaurant consultant alerting me new animal-free options at larchmont bungalow. she explained that the vegan menu was small but expanding (we have it at the bottom of the post) and that the restaurant would love my feedback. i can’t wait to check it out! i haven’t made it over there yet, but one of my readers did. here’s D‘s review:

So the local hip larchmont eatery has adopted some new vegan friendly fare; Along with the purchase of one of these they ask for you to score a feedback card… and if you take part, you get a free coffee beverage. So it seems like they are taking it pretty serious.

green vegan enchiladas: marinated five grain tempeh, sauteed spinach, caramelized onions, vegan mozarella and topped with roasted tomatillo salsa with guacamole, pico de gallo and black beans. $13.55

I asked what was most popular and landed on the enchiladas… $13 ain’t cheap, but I got a free coffee which was nice.

Taste: The enchiladas are kind of a healthier, drier version of the enchiladas “special” you can get on occasion at flore. Not that that is a bad thing, per se. They were REALLY tasty. The tempeh was perfectly cooked, Daiya mozz on top, the house made tomatillo was great and the guac smoothed the flavor. As I noted on the aforementioned feedback card, I would give the dish a 4/5 for taste.

Glad to see some more vegan options around town. I was also told the vegan breakfast burrito is great, so I will have to check that out next time.
word.

here’s a look at the menu…

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so exciting! los angeles has a new super vegan-friendly restaurant with a huge menu full of specialty pizzas, salads, wraps, inventive appetizers, wine and craft beer. EVO kitchen opened up its doors last week in the old hollywood/weho pizza fusion location, and we’re already huge fans. it focuses on organic, locally sourced ingredients, and is family owned by the same folks who ran the previous restaurant. with the re-branding, the menu still includes our favorite items (what up, beer floats and wraps!) plus it has grown to include even more vegan (and gluten-free if you care about that) options, and the food is even better than before.

we hit up EVO for a slap up feast this weekend, and sampled as many vegan dishes as we could. we still didn’t get through half of them though—i guess that means another visit is in order! check out what we ate:

vegan garlic cheese bread with marinara dip. $4.99

we started off with a slew of appetizers, the first of which was the vegan garlic cheese bread. as with all vegan cheesy items at EVO kitchen, this came with a choice of soy cheese (follow your heart) or daiya. we opted for the soy cheese in this case, and the daiya cheese for other dishes (more on those later!). the cheese bread was phenomenal—crispy and pipin’ hot, dusted with herbs, and served with a pot of tangy marinara.

mini vegan bbq burgers: portobello mushroom with vegan soy or daiya cheese, roasted red onion and bbq sauce. $6.99

next up, one of my favorite dishes of the evening: the vegan mini bbq burgers. SLIDERS…

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what’s the best vegan cheese in america? you tell me. i go back and forth on this quite a bit. daiya was my favorite for awhile, and then the new stretchy teese came out. at first i wasn’t a fan of follow your heart, but hard times pizza completely changed my mind. i can’t decide! what do YOU think? vote below and let us know.

[poll id=”3″]

feel free to elaborate on your decision in the comments section!

shhhh! there’s a new secret item at m cafe. we already told ya all about the off-menu “loaded burger” which comes stacked with tempeh bacon and avocado, but now they’ve got even more stealthy eats up their sleeve…

chili cheese fries with daiya cheese, chili beans, and fresh parsley. $7.95

photo credit: m cafe

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this is GREAT news for the los angeles vegan world. kay ‘n dave’s, a mexican restaurant that we love in culver city, is now experimenting with daiya vegan cheese…and if it does well, they’re gonna carry it at all their locations!

yay for vegan cheese!

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since pitfire pizza started carrying daiya cheese about a month ago, it has become one of our favorite places to dine. with their amazingly crispy brick oven baked pies, nice selection of craft beer on tap, fresh healthy salads, and four locations in los angeles, there’s certainly a lot to love about pitfire.

be an artist pizza with daiya cheese, mushrooms, onion. $11.95

recently, i’ve been hitting up the north hollywood restaurant pretty regularly with my omnivore parents and they both agree that this is the best vegan pizza they’ve ever eaten…

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whew! yesterday was the first annual vegan pizza day, and it was insanely fun. people all over the world were eating loads and having a great time…all in the name of our favorite food: vegan pizza. huge thanks to teese vegan cheese by chicago soydairy for sponsoring this event with us. i know that everyone is already looking forward to next year.

check out the official vegan pizza day facebook page for a huge pool of mouthwatering fan photos, and be sure to upload your own. here are the pictures that readers sent in to us. if you’d like to have yours posted on the blog, shoot us an email. beware, graphic vegan pizza photos to follow. you’ll wanna be sitting down for this.

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vegan pizza day is less than 2 days away! how are you going to celebrate it? if you are in san francisco, i can highly recommend the vegan pie at escape from new york.

the small chain has 6 locations in SF, and has recently started carrying daiya. we found them by accident when we were vacationing last month, and the haight restaurant was just steps away from our hotel. the pizzeria is very new yorky-themed, from the name of the business, to the statue of liberty logo, to the massive thin ny-style pies and pizza by the slice.

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I mean… seriously! One of the best pizzerias in LA now stocks vegan cheese and makes it available on all pizzas.

We vegans are getting so many good options these days! My omni friends have often raved about Pitfire Pizza, A local chain of artisan pizzerias serving top notch ingredients, prepared in that most coveted of pizzeria paraphernalia: A pitfire kiln, able to cook a pizza in searing temperatures over 900 degrees.

Once you’ve had a pitfire cooked pizza, you’ll not want to go back to the spongy crust of lesser pies!

With just four locations (North Hollywood, West LA, Downtown and Culver City), Pitfire Pizza seems to have focused on creating a quality product with individuality rather than rushing for scale, and I’m pleased to report that their vegan offerings maintain – and even enhance, an incredibly well thought out menu. Pitfire Pizza ain’t your typical pizzeria, in oh so many good ways. Here you’re dealing with familiar ingredients combined in a novel ways and cooked to perfection. The addition of vegan cheese (in the form of Daiya) elevates the experience for vegans (and health conscious vegetarians/omnivores alike) to something that’s every bit as good as the regular menu, yet 100% cruelty-free.

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in celebration of the upcoming vegan pizza day (which you should all be spreading the word and blogging about), i’m gonna make an effort to post more about pizza on the blog throughout january…which shouldn’t be hard, because we eat a lot of it!

berkeley vegan: marinara sauce, vegan cheese, veggie burger crumbles, zucchini, tomatoes, mushrooms, red onions. (no bell peppers)

there are TONS of vegan-friendly pizza joints in los angeles, and we think zpizza is one of the best. we even added their amazing tuscan pizza to our vegan bucket list, it’s that damn good. another awesome thing about zpizza is, they’re a national chain and every location offers vegan pizza! so even if you aren’t in LA, you may very well have a zpizza near you.

recently we had a little zpizza shindig with us and the team from clara’s cakes, which meant not only was tasty pizza involved, but also mouthwatering desserts…

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hey everyone! this quick bite comes to us from quarrygirl reader anderson who is visiting southern california on vacation and recently hit up cheezy pizza in colton. i’ve never been to colton, but apparently it’s in the san bernadino valley and about an hour away from los angeles. after seeing these pictures, i think i NEED TO GO THERE SOON! OMG. check out the crazy pizza, jalapeno calzones and garlic bread below…along with mini reviews for each item!

vegan bbq chicken pizza with daiya

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daiya vs cheezly. cheezly vs daiya. it’s an epic battle, and i don’t know who would win. have you tried both? do you have a favorite?

daiya pizza on the left, cheezly pizza on the right

i recently had the chance to eat both a daiya and a cheezly pizza back to back…and choosing between the two would not be an easy task. if only the new teese (which i love) would have been there, my mind would have been blown.

so which one looks better to you:

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oh god, i love NYC. it’s freaking vegan paradise, lemme tell you. i have that happycow app on my iphone…you know, vegout? it’s this cool little thing you fire up and no matter where you are, it uses GPS to tell you which vegan-friendly restaurants are nearby. in LA, it usually results in a few pages of restaurants, depending on where you are in the city. in manhattan though, the app almost crashes…there are SO MANY VEGAN OPTIONS. it’s crazy. there are more vegetarian places per square foot in nyc than anywhere i’ve ever visited. anyways, this post isn’t supposed to be a vegan love letter to NYC…i am here to talk about kate’s joint!

kate’s is an all vegetarian spot that our friends have been recommending to us for quite awhile. i’d heard nothing but good things about the restaurant, so when they showed up on the vegout app as “less than a mile away” while we were drinking in the east village, i knew it was gonna happen.

lemme preface: kate’s has an enormous menu, but it feels more like a bar than a restaurant. they’ve got tap beer, cocktails, and a huge bar lined with stools in the main area; dining tables are lined up along the windows. this actually got me pretty excited, because i love bars much more than real restaurants. so the fact that i can think of this place as a bar with an all vegetarian menu makes me love it even more.

we hit up kate’s on a friday at around 5pm, and it was pretty slow. i had heard they made vegan white russians (my favorite drink ever), so i ordered one right away. the waitress had no idea what i was talking about, but she went to check with the bar and immediately came back with one. SCORE! it was so good.

vegan disco fries: covered with mama's vegan gravy and daiya cheese. $6.25

next up, we decided to order some appetizers. we started with the decadent “disco fries,” another legend i have been hearing about from several peeps. disco fries are ridiculous: french fries topped with GRAVY AND CHEESE. WTF, why didn’t i think of this?!?! these have been at kate’s forever, but are only recently vegan-friendly. not long ago, kate switched from a casein-containing soy cheese to daiya! thank goodness, because why would a VEGETARIAN RESTAURANT have a real cheese option, AS WELL AS a non-vegan cheese option?  that makes no sense. anyways, the disco fries are available vegan now and they are amazing. by far the best thing i tried at kate’s.

hummus rolls filled with spinach, roasted garlic, tomatoes, tahini and lemon. $6.95

after that deep-fried, cheesy, creamy starter, we were in the mood for something lighter and shared the hummus rolls. these babies were basically little tortilla pockets filled with hummus and vegetables including spinach, garlic, and tomato. nothing earth-shattering, but damn good.

vegan un-turkey club: un-turkey, fakin bacon, lettuce, tomato, and vegan mayo. $9.95

we had such honorable intentions of ordering like 5 entrees from kate’s, but after the two appetizers, we could only manage to share one main course. we went with the un-turkey club, another popular item that we’d heard people rave about. the club was delicious, but IMO we have better clubs here in LA. what took this sandwich over the edge was the side of mashed potatoes, served with kate’s deadly homemade gravy (the same stuff that was on the fries). it was phenomenal.

next time i go to kate’s, i am gonna starve myself in advance and arrive completely sober. the menu is way too drool-worthy, and the drink selection is too tempting. to say that we have unfinished business with kate’s would be an understatement.

kate’s joint
#58 Avenue B, New York NY 10009
(At 4th St)
(212) 777-7059

this is just a quick post to let you all know about figueora produce, a small little grocery store in highland park that’s bringing you high-quality foods at discounted prices. in an area that lacks a whole foods, this place has got most our favorite products including gardein, daiya, teese, and so delicious. plus, they are always willing to take suggestions from vegans about what they should carry.

we popped by the store over the weekend, and i was so excited to see the shelves stocked with so many vegan items.

silk and so delicious right there with the normal milk…

stinkey monkey pudding and blissed out chocolates (two very good, yet hard to find vegan products)…

several gardein frozen products…

along with teese, tofurky, and daiya…!

i was actually pretty excited to see teese on the shelf, because i’d just suggested to figueroa produce via twitter that carry it a couple weeks ago. they sure didn’t waste any time!

but it’s not just bloggers that figueroa produce listens to. my friend recently moved to eagle rock and was shopping at the grocery store when one of the owners, ruben perez, introduced himself and welcomed her to the neighborhood. he gave her his email address, and said if there were any vegan products she’d like to see, to let him know. she emailed him to suggest they carry field roast sausages, and with in a few days she got a response saying they had been ordered and would be in stock soon. WOW! talk about customer service!

if you are ever in the area, be sure to stop in and check figueroa produce out. it’s a real gem in the highland park neighborhood with a wonderful staff and great vegan products. oh, and be sure to follow them on twitter! they are always announcing deals and discounts. in fact, TODAY is twitter tuesday…meaning, if you go to the store and mention twitter, you get 10% off your check! so go do it!

Figueroa Produce Market
6312 North Figueroa Street
Los Angeles, CA 90042
Phone 323-255-FOOD (3663)
Fax 323-255-3030
Mon – Sat 7am to 9pm
Sunday 8am-8pm

pizza cookery in woodland hills has been on our radar since way back in november when we learned that they had a separate vegan menu. however, we resisted making the trek out to the valley just to eat there for quite some time, because the restaurant was using follow your heart vegan cheese. i’m not a huge fan of that product, and with all the vegan pizza available much closer to my house, i just couldn’t justify the trip. anyways, those days are over now because pizza cookery now offers both follow your heart AND daiya…so everyone can enjoy some vegan pizza! we finally hit up pizza cookery recently, and found their vegan food to be absolutely fantastic—this place is definitely one of my new favorite spots.

an amazing vegan pizza

pizza cookery is your normal old school pizza joint in almost every way. they’ve been around since the 70s, with their sawdust-covered floors, pitchers of tap beer, huge private booths, and delicious food at a good value. the fact that a place like this is catering to vegans (and also gluten-free diners), is almost unbelievable.

the moment we were seated, we were presented with both “normal” and vegan menus, and a plate of complimentary rolls were placed on our table. we asked if they were vegan, and our waitress apologized that they weren’t…and offered to make us a dairy-free batch. we took her up on it, and i’m so glad we did. wowza.

the piping hot rolls arrived in one huge clump at our table about ten minutes later, and they were visually stunning. gooey vegan cheese was bubbling out of them and glistening in the light, i don’t think i’ve ever seen such beauty. shockingly, they tasted even better than they looked. they were filled up with melty follow your heart cheese, which actually worked well, and brushed with a thin coat of oil. if you go to pizza cookery, you GOTTA REQUEST the free vegan rolls! they will blow your mind to bits.

we also ordered a small salad as an appetizer–the caesar with vegan dressing and daiya cheese. we loved it!

vegan caesar salad. $8.35

i’m glad we ended up going with the small, because the salad was huge! the large would probably be enough for several people. plus with all those rich rolls, we barely had any room for pizza. we ordered a small 11″ pie to share with daiya cheese, tomatoes and mushrooms, and it was more than enough. in addition to loads of vegetable toppings, pizza cookery offers vegan pepperoni and chicken as well–both of which i’m looking forward to trying. please note, if you order vegan pizza at this place it comes with follow your heart by default. daiya lovers (like myself) need to specify.

the pizza itself was exceptional—by far some of the best vegan pizza in LA. super top notch crust, flavorful sauce, nicely melted cheese, and fresh vegetables. basically, it was everything a pizza should be and more. it would have been PERFECT, but they slice it up strangely at pizza cookery, so it was a little difficult to eat. (i like my pizza slices shaped like triangles, thank you!) but anyways, that’s a small complaint considering how incredible the pizza was.

pizza cookery also serves wine, and has beer on tap…which is very important. the selection isn’t great, but it sure hits the spot. everything is pretty cheap too—we had 2 drinks, salad, and pizza for around 25 bucks!

when you visit pizza cookery, and i really hope you do, be sure to wander around and check out all the relics scattered around the restaurant. they’ve got some really neat stuff in there like vintage soda machines…

gumball dispensers (remember those?)…

and even a cigarette machine advertising the vegan menu. lol!

i seriously love pizza cookery so much. the atmosphere, the food, the prices…everything there is wonderful. and i will be dreaming about those damn vegan bread rolls for months!

pizza cookery
6209 topanga canyon blvd.
woodland hills CA 91367
(818) 887-4770

PS: there are a couple other pizza cookery locations in the valley, but they are not affiliated with this one, and don’t have vegan options. so beware.

PPS: has anyone ever been to earth, wind, and flour in santa monica?!?! it is SO MUCH like pizza cookery on the inside (right down to the playing cards glued to the ceiling), and the pizza tastes very similar. i can’t find any tie between the 2 pizzerias online, but i’m just throwin’ that out there.