Anniversary Weekend!

We celebrated our first wedding anniversary this past weekend and I was surprisingly lucky with some pretty amazing vegan dishes!

First stop:  Catalina Island
We wanted a quick snack when we first got off the fairy and happened to find grilled artichokes at one of the restaurants.  It was so amazing and covered with fresh garlic – yes!

For lunch later, we at a Avalon Grill which had two vegan options:  carrot soup and grilled veggies with quinoa.  I almost ordered both of them because they both looked so good.  In the end I just went with the grilled veggies.  This was pretty much my dream meal.  Veggies and quinoa?  How can you go wrong?  It had some kind of sauce on it, which was amazing.

For dinner we ate at the restaurant in our hotel back on the mainland and there were tons of veggie options.  After much deliberation of the menu, I finally decided on the noodle stir-fry with veggies and tofu.  The menu clarified that this was a vegetarian option, but when it arrived, there was chicken in it!  I took the picture before I noticed the poultry, so unfortunately, this is not a vegan picture.  However, I did send the dish back and they brought out another one that was chicken-free.  It was a good dish, but I think the whole experience was tainted by the whole chicken debacle.  I did enjoy the vegetarian kim chee that I ordered as a side dish.

The next day we had a few snacks at the Getty Museum before eating a huge lunch at Native Foods in Westwood.  This restaurant is completely vegan, so I was free to choose absolutely anything I wanted to from the menu!  YES!  I chose the nachos and W got the Scorpion tempeh burger.

Native foods uses a mixture of cashews, seeds and grains to make their “cheese,” and it was amazing.  I loved it. I really can’t express how good it was, because I am pretty much in heaven with any kind of meal that includes, chips, rice, beans, guacamole, and tons of fresh veggies. 

W said his “burger” was amazing and he’d it something like this every day.  I don’t make this stuff up, people.  The meat eater has spoken:  he loves the tempeh burger.

There were several other meals of course on our trip, but none were as exciting as these that I have mentioned.  Let’s just say I was pretty much a happy vegan on our anniversary.