March 2. Day 2.

A favorite travel snack of mine is sun-dried tomatoes.  They're bite size and the perfect tart saltiness.  Better than chips! 

When I woke up this morning, I decided to just eat my snacky stuff for breakfast and have a big lunch somewhere later.  I nibbled on the dried tomatoes while I got ready and ate a raw banana-mango bar as I walked out the door.  After a quick stop at Whole Foods, where I bought a small container of fresh pineapple and grapes for only $2.99, I checked my email at Starbucks while sipping a hot tea instead of coffee, thankyouverymuch.

So far, so good.

Lunch was supposed to be the super exciting part of my day today.  Why?  Because I used my "Vegan Steven" app and found Garden Fresh, a vegan Chinese restaurant!  I literally jumped up and down when I found this place, I was so excited.  I couldn't even decided what to get since everything on the menu was edible to me, for once in my life!

And then I made a horrible decision and entered into the great disappointment.  Check out this menu, it is insanely awesome.

Garden Fresh Vegan Cuisine

So many delicious options, and what do I choose?  General's Veggie Chicken.  The most boring, cliche, unoriginal, tasteless thing EVER.  I hate myself.  I apparently was so dazed by a whole Chinese food restaurant menu designed exactly for me, that I wasn't thinking clearly.  As soon as the plate was brought out to me, my heart sank and I almost felt tears come to my eyes.  All it was was a pile of fried dough balls (supposedly filled with soy chicken) covered in bright red goo, otherwise known as sweet and sour sauce.  This is exactly what I HATE about regular Chinese food restaurants.  I don't want to eat fried dough!  I want snow peas, water chestnuts, soft-tofu in a spicy, garlicky sauce.  Boo hoo.
I was so hungry I ate it anyway.  I mean, I couldn't exactly just get up and leave in a hissy fit, although that is kinda what I felt like doing.   I was so disappointed.  I almost ordered another dish, I was so upset.

The entire afternoon was spent deliberating how I was going to make this up to myself.  My next appointment was an hour away from Garden Fresh, so coming back for dinner wasn't an option. Should I just go to a regular Chinese Food place and order my usual veggie dish?  Sure, I could, but it just wouldn't be the same...  It wouldn't be from an actual VEGAN Chinese Food restaurant.  Sigh.

I eventually decided on ordering takeout from a Korean restaurant near my hotel.  I would surely not be disappointed with my soon tofu soup and banchan from Shin Ra.  This is one of my favorite meals in the world ever.  If eaten in the restaurant it looks like this:

Mine looked like that, only in a million styrofoam containers.  It's a hot, spicy soup loaded with soft tofu and fresh veggies.  The little side dishes are pickled vegetables like radishes, sprouts, cucumbers, and of course kimchee.  Soooo good. 

Finally my belly is stuffed and satisfied. 

Update: This is what my Korean takeout looked liked: