Coogie's

My friend group finally got our plan together and went hiking! It wasn't the full group event we wanted it to be, but 6 people is enough right? One in the trunk (Ben).... so yeah. We chose to do the Sara Wan trail loop, which is only 2.5 miles and is an easy and beautiful hike. Super empty too which was nice for a change. It's located in Malibu and had beautiful views of the canyon and the ocean. Add to your USC bucket list. Malibu is beautiful. 



Since it's the whole point of the blog, I'll talk about the food... My friends are all SUPER understanding and tolerant of my veganism. I haven't converted any of them (yet) but they'll always go out of their ways to make sure I have something to eat too -- thx bk8 :)

We searched "vegan restaurants" on google maps and Yelp and the closest one we found was called Coogie's. Doing that usually doesn't bring up restaurants that only serve vegan food but that's perfect for when we're all together. We ended up here, at "Coogie's Beach Cafe," and I apologize for the dark picture. I always forget to take pictures of the places before we go in to eat and by the time we leave it's always night... But it was pretty homey and not full but then again, it was a Monday evening so why would it be. The owner/manager kept coming over and taking care of us, asking us about USC and entertaining us. The place seemed very family-oriented. 

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They also had a super easy menu for me -- one vegan option! Usually when that happens, I don't even read the rest of the menu and just go with that, and I did exactly that with Coogie's. Also anything that is vegan and is pesto has my name written all over it. The boys didn't come in an eat with us because they wanted to walk along the beach so it was a girl's night, thankfully. 

THEY WERE SO GOOD. I was so impressed. Who knew this little beach cafe in the middle of a random strip mall in Malibu would have such a great vegan option. I was very, very happy with it. 10/10 WOULD eat again. It was basically this very soft patty of quinoa with pesto dressing and greens on top, and it was awesome. Great start to study days and a great end to our hike :) 

Blue Plate Taco

Of course we did the Santa Monica pier/3rd Street Promenade tourist day trip with Dad and Elisa. Duh. What would a day in LA be without shopping???? Actually, we didn't get anything ): but we did eat. The second best thing in the world.

To get to the promenade we walked along Ocean instead of through the parking garage and the Nordstrom area of the shopping strip. There are plenty of cute restaurants under all the hotels that have their own outdoor seating areas and my dad loved them. After we'd walked the whole length of the promenade, he insisted on returning to one restaurant he noticed with "taco" in the name. "Uh dad, I can't exactly eat tacos..." But we went anyway, he wanted to check it out.

I forgot to take a picture of the interior. Thanks Google.

On the way Dad made us stop in a few other places (like a seafood restaurant...) to check the menus and see if there was anything I could eat. Naturally, no. But we did the same in Blue Plate Taco and they actually do have one option clearly labeled "can be made vegan" which is probably the most helpful thing a restaurant can do. Needless to say, we stayed and ate there.

I'm not complaining, it was a good meal. I convinced them to order an appetizer (why would anyone ever pass up the opportunity to have chips/guac/salsa???). Which ROCKED. FYI they bring you more chips when you run out. Not salsa or guac, but dad ended up asking for more of one salsa and our waitress misunderstood and brought both... don't know if we were charged? Who cares, I wasn't paying and it was delicious.


Then our food actually came out really soon after that, even though the restaurant was packed. [We wanted a table outside but there was about a 30 min wait so it wasn't worth it. But they provide drug-rug blankets for anyone sitting outside -- what a great idea.] I got the one vegan option duh. I probably could have made the vegetable tacos vegan but I wasn't in the mood to ask if there was any sauce that wasn't vegan etc etc, and they made it easy to order something else.

Mine was the rice bowl, not the catch of the day. Just to clear up any confusion. Alright anyway, it was pretty good. Nothing spectacular honestly. There were mushrooms which I picked out and gave to Elisa (who was thrilled) but other than that I ate it all. Even the tomatoes, go me. I found it sorta flavorless... sorta bland? So I started putting guac and salsa in and it helped a ton, I would only eat it with salsa if I got it again. Not bad after that though! We skipped dessert and decided to head out (back into the cold ocean breeze) but it was all in all a good experience. Cute, clean bathroom. Good staff. Would go again! If it means anything, it's under the Shore Hotel and if you know which one that is, you know this restaurant has to be good quality to get a spot like that...

Flore Vegan

The last night my dad and Elisa were in town, I finally had the opportunity to expose them to a vegan restaurant. I chose Flore because Silver Lake is a great place for vegan restaurants (check the Restaurant Map tab) and because its been on my map for a long time.

We got there around 9 (since they were asleep until about 8:15 when I texted them asking if they were hungry yet... Thankfully, they only close at 10 and we, surprisingly, weren't the last group to walk in. Being a super small place, it's easy to overlook driving by, but it has a great intimate atmosphere inside. There are several 2 person booths and a few group tables but it's not ideal for a large group or party. There is seating outside and that would've been great if it wasn't cold! Our waitress was the only one working that late and she was very sweet. Elisa and dad were rather lost looking at the menu but thankfully they both love mushrooms and a popular vegan substitute is always mushrooms... We talked a little bit about how they were dealing with veganism and explained a few of the menu items but it didn't take long to order. 

I ended up with the "basmati brown rice bowl" with seitan. It was my first time trying seitan and maybe it was because it was teriyaki seitan, but I really didn't like it. The rest of the bowl was good though. It came with these two sauces, one being tahini and the other being tamari. Never had tamari, but it was good? I didn't try the bowl without the sauces so I can't say I would've liked it better but I still ate it all (except the seitan). 

I can't speak as much to their meals, but Dad got the portobello mushroom burger and Elisa got the portobello tacos.  ..told you they like mushrooms. She was going to get the quinoa chickpea burger but they were out of quinoa or chickpeas or something like that (I was considering it too) so mushrooms it was. They both ate their whole meals! I was so proud :) 

Above is Elisa's, I didn't get a picture of my dad's. Then dessert time! Anytime I go somewhere vegan I feel obligated to get dessert because I can so rarely have it any other time. So I spoiled myself. It wasn't on the menu but in the display case they had a banana chocolate cake ---- my favorite. I used to get the banana chocolate chip coffee cake from Tro Gro (now Starbucks ugh) weekly last year with dining dollars. It was a bit larger than I expected...... SO worth it, and there was some left over to take home for breakfast :D 

...let's just order Manas

Soooo it's like, 10, and you're hungry, and you don't really feel like cooking, or changing out of your pajamas. What to do? 

Order in order in order in! 

But really, USC has some great restaurants that do delivery, even into the wee hours of the early morning, if that's your thing. My friend group's personal favorite is Manas. They serve indian food and its perfect for when you're starving. TG Express is good too, but it has nothing to do with "express." It takes at least an hour to arrive... no. Manas takes more like 45-60 minutes and it's always worth it. 

Our usual order: 2-3 orders of vegetable samosas and assorted curries. Mine is usually chana masala (chickpeas)!! :) This feeds 2 people... 

If you use the Eat24 app/website, you can get $2 off! And you can split the bill and the cart with as many friends as you want so they can order from the comfort of their own homes then meet at your place when the food is ready. Do it. 


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For reference, here's a guide to delivery restaurants I found, actually outside of Soi 7. 

Little Spain

After LACMA and the La Brea Tar Pits on Saturday, I took the fam to see The Grove. Naturally, thankfully, there was some shopping beforehand and I actually squeezed some money out of my dad. Yay! But old people get hungry and they offered to go to a vegan place but since we would have to dive, I figured it would be best to try out the farmer's market and head somewhere nice for dinner. We wandered through it a few times over (showed them the Brazilian Steakhouse place that always has a line around the corner) and dad finally chose this spanish place. 

I told him I'd look at the menu and see if it worked for me, otherwise I would head somewhere else and bring my food to them. But, no worries, they made it easy for me! 

The food was nothing spectacular, honestly. I really appreciated that they had a vegan option (only in California, huh) but it wasn't the most delicious thing ever, I actually thought it was a little bland. Maybe that's because I'm not used to paella and expected something more like jambalaya, but I just didn't love it. Also, it was huge - not something I was looking for at 1 pm. Elisa and dad got smaller tapas plates, but most of them had meat or cheese in them so that wasn't an option for me. I'd still go back if my friends were interested.s

For reference, it's located in the back corner of the market when you've entered from the old gas station. Head past the popcorn and dried fruit stand, the tea stand, and its basically behind the French crepe restaurant. 

Soi 7

My dad was in town this weekend! He came to LA brought his new girlfriend - Elisa - to hang out. Woot woot.

They've both been to LA before but never had anything vegan... so it was my chance to convert them (didn't work at all). No but really, they got in on Friday morning, toured around the Science Center, and offered to take my roommates out to dinner. I scrambled the day before to find something vegan friendly downtown with their suggestions of "thai is great, indian is great." Awesome. Debating between Gill's Indian Restaurant and Soi 7, I went with Soi because it was closer to the metro and on the flashier part of 7th. 

Alas, Soi 7 it was. FYI Soi 7 has boba in the back! For anyone who doesn't love boba, whatever, but for those who do, this is a USC alum-owned boba place and it even serves alcoholic boba (Heineken?).

I admit, I edited the picture of the exterior of the restaurant, it's not actually in the Land of OZ or anything, sorry. 

I've been in here several times before for the boba but never for the restaurant at night! Turns out: I like both. 

I apologize for such a dark menu, but you can find it here too. The place was pretty cool! Not super crowded but that was actually nice because there weren't many waiters. They were attentive, filled our water cups constantly, and were super nice. Elisa has had thai food before but was a little lost looking at the menu... They have a particular pumpkin vegan curry but I asked and the other ones are fine too when you don't get meat. So, red curry for me. But first, Rachel took charge and ordered appetizers for the table -- vegetable summer rolls (with PEANUT SAUCE). 

 

We hadn't even finished our summer rolls, or rather, I hadn't, because I ate 2, when the rest of our food came out. Here's the red curry and yes, you do need to ration your rice because there's so much more vegetables and curry. But it was very good, very filling :) We would definitely come back! 

Veggie Grill -- UCLA

USC takes UCLA!

Just kidding, 4 of us just went to visit some friends there. Not a big deal. No rivalry. Ok. 

We got a nice tour of the campus while it was still light out -- SO many hills, awful -- and then explored Westwood! It's obviously much nicer than the area around us (not an arguable point) but we all agreed that there's something we love about the grunge here. Then again, none of us would have complained if we had that much food and shopping around campus... Obviously we went into Urban to shop around dinner (thankfully didn't spend any money) and would've gone to thrift stores too if they weren't far. Fast forward past the shopping (which Mark hated), we made it to Veggie Grill.

There are 2 vegan places in Westwood - Veggie Grill and Native Foods Cafe. Been to Native Foods (highly recommended) so it was great to get to try Veggie Grill! 

fighting on forever

I wish I could tell you where this is, but I was pretty lost in Westwood. It's next to Nekter though! Near 800 Degrees Pizza, if any of that helps. 

Ever been to Noodles & Co? (One of my favorite places to eat in Maryland....) Well you walk in and pick up a menu on the wall to your left and order at the counter at the front. Order dessert (located on the back of this menu) at the same time. They didn't have chocolate chip cookies when we went -- not gonna lie, I was pretty bummed ): It was pretty empty when we went so ordering was quick and easy and we helped ourselves to a bench table. I'm not sure if it was because it wasn't a peak hour for them or if they're always like this, but the food came out really fast! Like within 5 minutes. 

This was mine! The Bombay Bowl. This is more the kind of thing I'd have in mind when introducing someone to vegan food -- it was kale, beans, quinoa, carrots all in a delicious curry sauce. Seriously, so good. I loved this dish. My one complaint would be that it was actually kind of small and we were all pretty hungry, so it wasn't filling enough. Scrumptious, I just wanted more of it. Especially for $8. 

Here's what Irene got, just so you can see more of the food they offer. They have an option to get 2 small portions of two things so she got a salad and a side: don't know what the salad was but something Mexican, with onion rings. According to my amigos, they had great sweet potato fries and ketchup (neither of which are my particular favorites) if you're into those! 

Great casual place overall, and they have cool teas and juices :) 

Cafe Gratitude

Last night my PAWS friends and I went to Cafe Gratitude. (PAWS is my club at USC that supports animals in shelters -- join us on Facebook to volunteer with us!) Nick, our grad student friend, goes there all the time and offered to drive (its far), and Kevin has never had vegan food before. 

----> NOT a great place to have your first vegan meal if you're just trying it out...

We didn't realize that it would be super popular on a Friday night for dinner at 7... oops, duh. So they were only taking people with reservations and we had to wait in the back. The wait only turned out to be around 10 minutes which was no biggie, and we got to hang out near all their random merchandise..

It's much more vegan than I am.. if that makes sense? Much more health-oriented, not as casual vegan-friendly. Like, I'm not into kumbucha or detox juices or cooking things with coconut oil because of its specific heat quality. But it was an interesting place! We were seated at a long table with two other groups -- one happened to be USC kids -- and we had an adorable waitress. Everyone at the table thought the best description for her was "granola." That's the kind of place this is. 

Of the USC kids, Nick happened to know one of them so we all got introduced, but the group on our other side was super annoying. We were right next to them and had to listen to one man's story about his grandmother and how his cousins are some famous man's grandchildren. It was too close for comfort -- who cares. Their food looked good though! Most of it is served in bowls with the idea being to mix it all together so we got some ideas of what we wanted from the groups on either side of us. 

^^ A lot of options.  

This is the Cool smoothie! It was easily my favorite thing we ordered (Kevin was clearly more skeptical). It tasted very fresh - much mintier than normal mint-chip ice cream but I was very satisfied with it. This is about the point in time where our neighbor started talking about his family line and all the stupid stories associated with it... hard to ignore when you're sitting next to the guy. P.S. Kevin was a great sport about trying all this vegan food :) Unfortunately, the smoothie was $8.50... so we split one 3 ways. Very expensive. Wow. 

It's definitely a nice-looking place and it even has a cute outdoor seating place but that was full when we got there too. Our food finally arrived and it was not what we expected to see. The way their menu works: give everything a normal, familiar name, like "kelp noodles with pad thai sauce" or "curried lentils," but not make it familiar at all. Which is why I wasn't a huge fan of it, and why I wouldn't recommend it to anyone skeptical about veganism. Personally, when I was just getting used to being vegan after being an omnivore all my life, I wanted things that were already familiar but easy to make vegan, like curry, or veggie burgers, but this was very out there. 

Here was mine: the Raw hawaiian pizza. To say the least: not what I expected. First off, I expected more food? But I guess it's a fancy restaurant aka they give you small portions but make them look pretty... Not about that. The pizza was fine, but I was glad it was small so that I could finish it -- I didn't like it enough to finish a large pizza. The caesar salad that came with it was mintier than any typical caesar salad, but I definitely preferred it to the pizza. 
Hearty, $14 

Here was Kevin's. His was kelp noodles with raw pad thai sauce and it sounded really good on the menu. All three of us considered getting that dish but after trying it, none of us really loved it. It was just generally sour, which was unexpected and not like normal pad thai? That's what I mean when I say it's average foods that taste different. I get that it was raw and that probably had a lot to do with it, but it was still unexpected. He actually did eat the whole thing too (what a champ) but it was a slow process. 
Terrific, $13

And here is Nick's bowl. It was curried lentils with vegetables which sounded like the safest of our selections, but it also didn't impress me. It was a dry curry, from my couple bites. I didn't try any of the vegetables on top since we just had Nick's leftovers, but he seemed to like it. It was more filling than mine or Kevin's dishes because of the lentils (it looked like brown rice though?) at least, but I wouldn't order it if I went back there. Not anything spectacular
Humble, $14

Overall, we weren't in love with our food. Nick likes it all, he goes often, but Kevin and I were more hesitant to praise it. Not to mention that I paid $22 for dinner (that includes splitting a smoothie 3 ways). 

Cafe Gratitude is located at: 639 N Larchmont Blvd and is open Sun-Thurs 8am-10pm and Fri-Sat 8am-11pm. If you go for dinner, make a reservation, it's popular! 

Sloopy's: A dog in Manhattan Beach

It may not look like much, but Sloopy's is a wonderfully refreshing lunch spot. Located on Highland Ave in Manhattan Beach, it seems to be a popular cafe with the locals. 

Saturday, a group of 5 of us were originally heading to Huntington Beach for the annual corgi (yeah, the dog) party they host every year at their dog beach... but we found a stray that morning! So the 5 of us and Doge went to Manhattan, a closer option, instead. Turns out dogs aren't allowed on the beach or bike path in Manhattan so we walked along the strand instead, and eventually got hungry. The hungriest among us - one of my roommates, Rachel, found Sloopy's online. 

 After no easy or short walk up the hill from the beach, we made it. But the place didn't disappoint. It's the kind of place where you order at the counter when you're ready, sit, and wait for them to call your name when your order is ready. Easy peasy. Which was perfect so we could sit outside with Doge. The interior is really really cool though, it's like an oasis. There are plants on the walls and around the tables, and next to where this picture was taken there is a huge fireplace, which I assume they light at night. Very family-friendly place and adorable, and great for both vegans and their omnivorous friends.

I forgot to take pictures of the whole menu, but I got the Tree Hugger sandwich with the #1 juice. I've wanted the juicer for a while and I would definitely make mine again, it was delicious! The woman also recommended #5, so if I make it back there, that's what I'll get to compare. And the sandwich was awesome, it was one of the better vegan sandwiches I've had (asked for it without cheese of course) because it was so much more flavorful than a lot of sandwiches I've gotten. 

It had sprouts in it, but it wasn't just a sprout burger. The hummus and especially red pepper were what I liked most about it (and the french fries were TOO good). Most sandwiches I've ordered have fewer ingredients than this one, so that was my favorite thing about it -- that it was different and had more in it. I don't even like cucumbers or tomatoes very much and I ate them and they were great! Goes to show it was a great combo of flavors.... Good thing I took a picture of the menu so I can make it at home :)