LOLTofu's Profile
Good Detroit Area Vegetarian (Please don't say Inn Season Cafe)
Gah, I wish I'd seen this post earlier! I ended up at Angelina's Bistro downtown and it was awfully disappointing. I got a gnocchi dish that really tasted like little balls of soggy mashed potatoes, NOT gnocchi. My omnivorous boyfriend got a badly overcooked steak that was awash in capers. He said it was both weird and bad.
And while I'm sure Detroit has awesome Lebanese food, my family is part Lebanese and I'm pretty sure I will always like our versions of things best.
Good Detroit Area Vegetarian (Please don't say Inn Season Cafe)
Thanks for all these recommendations, everyone. My boyfriend and I are traveling to Detroit to check out some museums this weekend and I came to Chow with this exact question. I've now shortlisted Modern, The Fly Trap, Red Sea, and Diamond Jim Brady's Bistro. I also picked up Traffic Jam and Snug from another thread. Any specific recommendations from that list?
(And one reason I'd agree with Tokyo about not wanting Middle Eastern recommendations is because I feel like I can get great vegetarian Middle Eastern or Indian at home. When I go some place new, I really want to try food that's creative and less standardized.)
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Diamond Jim's
210 S Main St Ste 1, Crown Point, IN 46307
Fly Trap Restaurant
22950 Woodward Ave, Ferndale, MI 48220
Where to find excellent Mai Tai?
After reading this thread on my phone, I went on a bit of a Tiki Crawl in search of a great Mai Tai in NYC. I started at The Rusty Knot on all the recommendations I saw here. It was a fun looking bar with really cool, nice, easygoing bartenders, but the crowd was annoying (sort of frat-housey) and the Mai Tais, though tasty mixed drinks, weren't actually Mai Tais. They lacked orgeat completely. HOWEVER: if you go to the Rusty Knot, which I do really recommend, the spiced colada is absolutely fantastic. They also make their own ginger juice for their dark and stormy, so try that, too.
Otto's Shrunken Head came next. Great punk rock tiki atmosphere with a fun crowd, but sam1 isn't kidding about getting the right bartender. I got a different bartender than my two friends, and their Mai Tais were downright passable. Mine was a completely different drink, completely undrinkable. It had grenadine and possibly pineapple rum and it was a horrendous combination of too sweet and clashy flavors. I highly recommend snagging the bartender with the shaggy bleach-blond hair if she's there. If she's not, get a beer.
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The Rusty Knot
425 West St, New York, NY 10014
Otto's Shrunken Head
538 E 14th St, New York, NY 10009
So good that you make it over and over again (or at least 3 times!)
Epicurious's Vegetarian Pad Thai:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Vegetarian-Pad-Thai-240960
(I've tweaked the recipe considerably, but wow is it great and I'm thoroughly addicted.)
My grandma's meatless meatloaf, which sounds totally improbable from ingredients but tastes faaaabulous
Alton Brown's Old Fashioned Coconut Cake. I have to admit I use some shortcuts (like I don't make my own coconut extract), but it is the most perfect, succulent, and absolutely to-die-for cake I've ever eaten. It even wins over those pesky "I hate coconut" people, as it completely lacks the disgusting flaked supermarket coconut.
Millennium Restaurant's Italian Sausage seitan, which I have also turned into gyros and breakfast sausage.
Eating in Disney (or in the area)...
I don't know the area that well, but I stumbled into a surprisingly delicious tofu noodle bowl at the vaguely-Asian noodle stand in Tomorrowland. It included fresh cilantro, a lime wedge, and they even had bottles of sriracha at the condiment station! Expecting limp pizza and soggy burgers, I found it to be a surprisingly good choice for in-park fare.
Recipes You've Never Heard of Outside Your Family
Oh, it is! I haven't eaten the lamb version in years, but I missed the lamb version for far longer than any other meat dish. Even the vegetarian version is a show stopper. I highly recommend it!
Recipes You've Never Heard of Outside Your Family
My family has a passed down recipe from our Syrian-Lebanese side that I've never heard of any place else. We call it shish butter, but that may be some sort of bastardization. Basically, it's ground lamb with lemon juice, mint, garlic, and allspice folded into wrappers (we use wonton wrappers now), then toasted in a hot, buttered skillet, then simmered in a plain yogurt and butter sauce. We eat it (and its recently developed vegetarian counterpart) over Syrian rice (rice with toasted vermicelli, pine nuts, and allspice). Has anyone else every heard of this, or know its real name?
Bill Niman and Nicolette Hahn Niman: Experts in Residence!
Wow, that cheese stat is jaw-dropping. I feel like there is a lot of misinformation out there when it comes to nutritional know-how and the American public. I wonder what strategies could be employed to break down some of the eating myths to which many people cling.
breakfast/brunch in columbus
I second Northstar and Dragonfly. You may find Dragonfly pretentious, depending on your taste, but the food is unbeatable. It's very high end cuisine, all locally grown and sourced (much of it from the chef's kitchen garden behind the restaurant). Northstar is more casual (they offer brunch on the weekends) with sweet-potato-hash breakfast burritos and ricotta pancakes.
west side columbus, nothing fancy
I don't know how far west you'll be, but this place in central Columbus (they have two locations, but they're not a chain) is one of my favorites:
http://www.thenorthstarcafe.com/index.html
Lots of fresh, clean-tasting organic food with no fuss and reasonable prices. Feel free to go in wearing your road trip hair.
Banana Leaf - Columbus - great experience
Sooo much agreement. My boyfriend and I LOVE Banana Leaf, and I'm so glad other Cbusites (Cbusonians?) have found it. The chat and buffet is amazing, but if you're ever ordering off the menu, try the Paneer in Cashew Butter. You will die of happiness.
Bill Niman and Nicolette Hahn Niman: Experts in Residence!
What are your opinions about the volume and frequency at which Americans consume meat? Do you think it's responsible, environmentally and health-wise, to promote a "meat at every meal" mentality, and if not, does the conflict of selling a product vs. acting on conscience move this decision at all for sustainable meat farmers?
I'm mostly curious because I'm a vegetarian who isn't morally opposed to humans eating meat, but I have a serious distaste for the meat industry and thoughtless meat consumption. I know that you guys are not exactly the mainstream meat farmers, but I would love to hear discussion and ideas from the omnivorous side of the table.
