This Weeks Restaurant Reviews

How do food bloggers do it?  Posting either everyday, multiple times a day, or at the very least every other day!  This week has been so insanely busy I felt like I didn't have a spare second.  On top of that I somehow messed up my back which has laid me up pretty badly over the past few days. I have not, however, missed out on some pretty great restaurants over the past week.  Warning: you may or may not have the reflex of slapping someone after eating at these establishments out of pure joy.
Let me preface this by saying J and I love to go out to eat, me probably more than him, but he's more than happy to tag along ;) I love the whole dining experience, which is probably due to the fact that I waited tables throughout high school & college; and I just really appreciate being on the other side of the table.  (Sidebar: I think that every single person that goes out to eat should have to serve for a little while - they will never act like a rude piece of crap at a restaurant again, but I digress)  Holy tangent, back to J and I loving going to restaurants - this had worried us a little when I started eating a strict plant based diet because we didn't know where we would be able to eat other than in our kitchen and sometimes living room (when we're feeling a little wild).  After doing some research I learned that Long Island is an incredibly isolated bubble with limited options for me and Brooklyn has some really great vegan restaurants.  So clearly when we went into Brooklyn last saturday to see James Katz play (check him out, he's awesome) we had to go find a vegan restaurant for dinner.  We had a recommendation to try Wild Ginger and I am so glad we did!

Wild Ginger - www.wildgingerny.com

Photo from brooklyn.about.com

The decor is a little cheesy, donned with string lights that resembled those from my college dorm room, but I kinda liked it.  We sat on benches towards the back of the restaurant, next to the two oddest girls.  They didn't say a single thing to each other the entire time - except, "this is good", and then back to silence.  I didn't like that - but don't worry I don't think they'll still be there ;)
We ordered indian pancakes with curry dipping sauce - omigah (in case you're wondering that was just my white girl 'oh my god', but really meaning it).  I guess anything deep fried served with a curry sauce would taste great, but this was pretty magical.   Then came our miso soups - which we're pretty standard, but who doesn't love a miso soup?  Of course we washed everything down with hot sake & Sapporos.

J going in for the dip - nice

For dinner I ordered General Tso's soy protein and J ordered a tofu green curry dish and both came with brown rice.  Mine was awesome, it was so crispy and yummy (and definitely far from healthy).  It tasted exactly like chicken - I need to learn how to make soy protein!  J's was good, but he said that my (Trader Joe's) green curry tofu was better, *swoon*.  

Bad food blogger!  Forgot to take the picture until halfway through:
Front & center: General Tso's soy protein, behind - J's green curry tofu

And for once, we had no room for dessert!  Next time we will have to make sure we don't completely gorge ourselves on dinner, the reviews I read raved about their dessert!

My Rating (because as you all know I am beyond qualified to rate restaurants): 

4/5 - we'll DEFINITELY be back!

Over the week J & I took a road trip to REI to pick up my new shoes - whatup Vibrams!  They're cute and you know it, don't hate.  While we we're out that way I really wanted to try a pizza place with tons of vegan options that I had read about.  Here it is again - OMIGAH.  If you are every anywhere near Rockville Centre you have to try this place - SO good.

3 Brothers Pizza Cafe - 3brotherspizzacafe.com

We ordered a small backyard BBQ pie with seitan; it had red onions, seitan, BBQ sauce, and Daiya cheddar & mozzarella on it.  To. Die. For.  We also split a plain (Daiya) cheese slice, for good measure.  

Backyard BBQ Pizza

The atmosphere was like any pizza place, which is fine by me.  

My rating: 

5/5 - I LOVE pizza, and we have to travel to RVC more often (confession: on our way home I told J that I wanted to move there just for the pizza, normal?)

I guess now it's time to get back to cooking some healthier meals and not surviving on left overs this week - but only because we're all out.  Big plans for today - hitting up Whole Foods & going to pilates in a few, I love Mondays when I don't have to work.  

Peas, Love & Thanks for reading!

-L