A Vegan-Tastic Weekend!

This weekend was my first real test in eating vegan. It’s not that I was tempted by non-vegan foods, it is that I ate out 3 meals over the weekend and still managed to stay vegan.

On Friday, I went up to see Lindsay and she humored me by joining me at the Sunflower Restaurant in Vienna, VA. The whole menu was vegan (except milk for the kid’s meal) and it was delicious. Lindsay got a curry that had mock meat in it, and the flavor was delicious, but we agreed that the consistency of the “meat” could have been a little less…disgusting. I had the veggie sushi bento box and it was, if I may say, un-freakin-believable! It was so delicious and wonderful and it’s made me realize that I can make veggie sushi and still be happy. So next time I make sushi I am going to make both, and hopefully I can resist the temptation for the fish. I really want to, I feel so bad for still eating fish, but I haven’t seen any videos of poor treatment of fish and that is probably the only reason I can still eat the sushi. I also discovered jicama and it was quite delicious as well (I did almost cut off my thumb preparing it, and have a squat fingernail to prove it) so I’ll be using that more.

On Saturday after a disastrous drive to Arlington, Lindsay and I met some friends at the PF Chang’s restaurant. I’d verified ahead of time that I would be able to enjoy the Buddha Delight. It is described as a wonderful meal of steamed veggies that include baby corn, mushrooms, broccoli, carrots, asparagus, snow peas, and water chestnuts. I also requested that tofu be added to my plate as well. My meal arrived and I basically had a bowl of steamed broccoli. First of all, the tofu was missing, and the only other veggie I had in there besides broccoli was 1 piece of mushroom, 3 tips of asparagus, and some sliced carrots (which if I had been thinking would have asked them to omit b/c I don’t care for them all that much.) After prompting the waiter brought my tofu, which was good, but I’ll admit paying $7.50 for a bowl of steamed broccoli was a little ridiculous. I’m thinking this cook was a little off because everyone at the table was pretty dissatisfied, except Lindsay who had peppered beef and commented “if you can mess up peppered beef you probably shouldn’t have a restaurant.”

On Saturday night I went out with Mircea and some friends of his to what I referred to as “the testosterone crab feast”. It wasn’t enough that I was the only female, but I was eating vegan while they all ate crabs. I had some fried zucchini, which leads me to say “technically vegan” because although the lady said that they cooked all the veggies in one fry “vat”, I am pretty sure she was just saying what I wanted to hear so I could eat something at the establishment. They were really good though, and I made up for it with some long island iced teas (sans the splash of coke) so I was still happy. We then went out to the Dew Drop Inn, which was the Redneck “dance club” that Mircea and I met at. It was fun, and I even got my sweetie to dance with me for one song. I definitely learned a lot about guys at a bar, and thought that I was probably cramping their style. Notes to share with the females in the house: one of the guys there, who was supposedly going through a divorce, took off his wedding ring before we got to the Dew Drop. Now if he was getting a divorce I consider him single, but he apparently doesn’t consider himself single because he was wearing it in the first place. I tried very hard not to be offended by that, but I was. Jerk! I will say this, men just stand at the bar looking at women dance. It was a little sad. But we did stand in pretty much the same place I found Mircea a year and a half ago. I guess that’s his comfort zone.

Ok, enough rambling. I ran this morning before work (at 6 am) and it was really good. My knees hurt a little bit today, but I’m going to do some more stretching tonight and probably ice them as I have habitual knee issues.