Yeti Eats: Rudy’s Pizza

My sister kept excitedly mentioning a place called Rudy’s. I didn’t really care–we already so many places to go to, both old favorites and new places to try. But her enthusiasm would not be denied, so one Sunday, she and her boyfriend and I drove halfway across the city and tested out this place.

It’s about as unassuming as can be from the outside.

But the inside is cozy, the servers are friendly and well-informed (if not actually vegan themselves) and there are signs with all kinds of vegan information.

Not everything is vegan, but there is an impressive array of options. You can choose Follow Your Heart or Daiya cheese–I don’t really know the difference but they’re both good.

 

We showed absolutely no restraint and ordered vegan wings, cheese bread sticks, pesto breadsticks, and a half-and-half pizza. A lot of food and all of it awesome.

The vegan wings were not something I would have ordered but they were tasty. And it comes with a choice of vegan Ranch, Vegan Blue Cheese, Vegan Creamy Sriracha,
or Vegan Garlic Butter.

The pesto breadsticks only came as a mistake but were maybe the best part of the meal.

Finally the pizza! With 3 people there were dissenting opinions, but we went with my sister’s dream of taco pizza (which had beans on it, in proper fashion) and Vegan BBQ-Ru. Other than a lot of black olives there were no complaints at all.

Not having had pizza for a couple of years, I was really jonesing and this place was perfect. I think it leapfrogged Sizzle Pie and HUB as my favorite portland pizzeria. I’ll definitely be back.

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Yeti Eats: Measly, Mighty Feasting

Thanksgiving is not  one of my favorite holidays. Apart from the genocidal context, it’s pretty boring. I mean, I (really) like eating but I prefer holidays with a little more than just that. Especially because it takes hours of cooking and cleaning for 30 minutes of munching. Not the most efficient of holidays, but I can appreciate for a time to connect with friends and family and reflect on the goodness of your life.

But last year I made lentil shepherd’s pie for Nahid and she has repeatedly requested them again. I put her off throughout the summer, telling her it was an autumn food. With our limited cooking facilities (a hot plate and a toaster oven)  and my lack of dough making abilities, it’s a tall order. But if Tday isn’t the day for extravagant food, then I don’t know what is.

We just loaded up on veggies and I stir-fried eggplants, onions, garlic, bell peppers, broccoli, carrots, and King Mushrooms. I put that pan aside and cooked some lentils and spiced them with turmeric and sage. Then I made some dough with just flour/salt/baking powder and oil.

So I put down the crust, added the lentils and veggies, then topped with mashed potatoes. Then I put it in the toaster over for 15 minutes and actually it turned out really well.

For “pudding” I cut up some apples and added lemon juice, cinnamon, cloves, and other pumpkinish spices. Then put some crust on top, and then some apples on top of that. It didn’t come out as good as the Sheppard’s pie, but it was okay.

Most importantly, we’ve got leftovers for tomorrow. So maybe it’s not such a bad holiday after all.

Our cooking equpiment

Apples and ze poompkin

Sauteed Veggies and spiced lentils

Making the pie

Add the patooters

Here’s the mashed potatoes

Finished Shepperd’s Pie

Apple Crumble

Yeti Eats: Vegetus

There’s a new vegan restaurant open in Seoul, and it’s even conveniently located in HBC.

The space is nice, and compared to Plant, it’s positively palatial. There is a beer/cider fridge for those who want to wash down their meals with something intoxicating. The service is great too.

But for me it’s not a very good value. The prices are high and the portions are low and unlike Plant, it mostly tastes like stuff I can make. Take the Burrito Bowl, which at 12,000 won is not cheap. It’s almost entirely rice and lentils, with a little bit of sauce and cut up cilantro. For that price, it would be nice to have seitan or tempeh or well anything other than literally the two cheapest foods in the world.

I hate to be negative about any place, especially a vegan place, especially here in the land of omnivores. And the veggie burger was good. But I don’t know if I’ll go back, not when Marrakesh has a vegan sandwich for 5000 won just 5 minutes down the street.

Yeti Daytrips: Vegan Fiesta in Hongseong Village

Improbably, it was a facebook add that informed me about a Vegan daytrip. Well, FB must know I’m vegan and in Korea, but still it kind of surprised me. It was through a website called Playplanet, which I’d never heard of but looked kind of cool. The daytrip was expensive, but these things are in Korea, and just look at that menu. It looks like something my sister would eat in Portland, not the kind of grub available in Korea.

 

It started off with a long bus ride, then some “Traditional Korean dying” (which we hippies called tiedye.) The coolest part was for the yellow die we just used turmeric, which smelled pretty awesome. We then met some village elders who told us they used actual Ducks to eat the pests and thus go organic , and it is working well enough that 2 million tourists a year descend upon the town of 230 people to witness it. There are little statues of ducks throughout the village too.

Then we went to a fashion show put on by disabled Koreans while we drank lotus tea and ate Hangwa (Korean traditional cookies.)

 

The food, when it came, was pretty great. Buffet style in a historic Joseon dynasty house with no electricity and live musicians playing violin and a traditional korean instrument that sounded suspiciously like a kazoo.

 

 

But the whole thing was kind of weird too. Like, early on we learned that none of the people hosting the event were vegan or even interested in veganism. Frequently they filmed us and asked us questions about what we thought about s0-and-so. The people acted a bit strange and it almost felt like we were going to be recruited into a cult. While we were eating, the brought cameras and lights on us and asked us to sum up the experience in one word. So strange. In the end, we suspected (strongly) they were secretly making a promotional video for a catering company. Or something like that.

I dunno. It was a fun trip, and the food was good, but the bizareness of it kind of outweighed the postives. So all-in-all, pretty much your prototypical Korean experience.

Vegan Seoul – 2016

The last time I blogged about being vegan in Korea, it was 2011 and the world was a different place. Veganism was growing in popularity in Seoul. There were vegan buffets, more every month it seemed, Loving Huts with all kinds of options, Purely Decadent had dedicated stores and was even available in some convenience stores. It was an exciting time.

But in many ways, it seems the  great vegan experiment is over. All but two Loving Huts are shuttered and gone. The buffets are closed and forgotten. The top 5 restaurants I blogged about in 2011 are all long gone. And it’s not a surprise. Korea isn’t really a place that vegans prosper. It’s more surprising that it even tried to catch on here.

Honestly, even though rents are expensive I think the market for veggie and vegan food is ready to expand. A restaurant that sells vegan mandu and ddukbokki could make a killing, I think. Plus there aren’t any mock-meat Indian, Thai, or Chinese restaurants that could clean up. It may take time, and the vegan market will  skew away from Koreans and toward foreigners for a long time, cutting out so many potential customers. But the opportunity is there.

Anyway, until then, here are some of the best places to eat as a vegan in Seoul. It’s not a comphrensive list, but all of these places are pretty awesome.

Plant

Location: Itaewon

This is probably the most famous vegan place in Korea, and it’s as tiny as it is delicious. Although it can be hard to get a seat, and the portions are, too my taste, both a bit expensive and a bit small. But it’s a great haven and the baked goods are incredible. I got my birthday cake here and it was so good it impressed my omni friends.

Menu Changes Biweekly

Chickpea Sandwhich and Lentil Soup

Baker’s Table

Location: Gyeongridan

I haven’t actually tried the vegan sandwich, but the baked bread is so good. The Focaccia (tomato or garlic) might be my favorite edible thing in the whole city. You can also get hummus at High Street Market (about a 20 minute walk away) for a tasty little sumthin’ sumthin’.

JULY 2016 UPDATE: I actually will never go to the Baker’s Table again. Last time I went, the focaccia was so old and stale that I could barely eat it. Well, no worries. I went back and ordered the vegan sandwich. They cooked the vegetables in bacon grease, like a lot of bacon grease. I can’t recommend them as a vegan option anymore.

Onion …

or tomato

Taco Loco

Location: Sinchon

Thanks to some friends who introduced this place, it has become my favorite Mexican in Seoul. There aren’t too many vegan options, but if you order the veggie burrito without cheese it’s totally happy. It’s a bit cheaper than other Mexican places, plus the burrito comes with avocado.

Cafe The Bread Blue

Location: Sinchon

A weird name, sure, and it’s a little expensive. But this place is cool; like a typical Korean bakery but everything is edible for vegans. They have cool little cups of parfait and soy milk for all their coffee drinks. The cafe is cozy and a fun place to, say, play a board game.

Subway

Location: Everywhere

Not the first place you think of, but given that most of the vegan places in the city are either in Sinchon or Itaewon/HBC this place is a bit of a oasis. In order to get a vegan version, order a veggie sandwich with no cheese with Italian bread and hot chili or sweet chili or sweet onion sauce. This is a cheap and cool option and Subway has saved my fakin’ more than once.

Petra Palace

Location: Itaewon

A long time ago

There are a couple of other restaurants I’ve been to but don’t have pictures of, including Jack’s Bean in Hongdae. Also, at least some Paris Baguette’s carry a Quinoa Lentil Bean Salad.

Also every vegetarian or vegan who lives in Korea probably knows about Iherb, but it’s an awesome source for nutritional yeast, Braggs, herbal tea, quinoa, oatmeal and so much more. Here are some of my scores this year.

 

While it’s harder to be a vegan in Korea than it was even 5 years ago, there are plenty of places to go. Especially in the Hongdae/Sinchon and Itaewon/HBC area. It’s not 2011 anymore, but hopefully it’s better than just convenience store apples and pringles.

 

Yeti Eats: Vegan Sweden

I was only in Sweden for a week–less time than I spent in either Denmark or Norway. And so I may be over-generalizing, but I got the distinct impression that Sweden is far more vegetarian and vegan friendly than its Nordic neighbors. (According to a recent study, one in ten Swedes is a vegetarian or a vegan).

The stores were stocked with tofu, faux-meat products (very cute ones at that), falafel shops abounded, and there’s a vegan buffet in Stockholm.

There’s also a Swedish oatmilk company called oatly thats slogan is “Like Milk. But Made For Humans.”

In short, from my experiences I think I can say that Sweden is far more vegan friendly than either Denmark or Norway.  Take a look for yourself:

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Yeti Eats: Vegan Denmark

Astrid och Apurna

Express Pizza

The “secret” vegan menu

Express Pizza — pepperoni

Astrid och Apurna – Veggie burger

Astrid och Apurna – Sausage with Cashew Relish

Astrid och Apurna – Sausage with cucumber relish

Homemade Vegan Pizza

Denmark is a land in love with dairy. The 133rd biggest country in the world, it’s one of the world’s top five dairy exporting countries. Meat too is popular, in the traditional meat and potatoes sense, but dairy is on a whole ‘nother level. Yogurt and milk are consumed at high levels, and at popular music festivals people drink nearly as much chocolate milk as beer.

But on the other hand, factory farming hasn’t set in yet like in North America, and there are efforts from Dan Jørgensen, the minister of agriculture, to further reduce it. What’s more, Denmark has banned ritual slaughter of live animals, with Jorgensen declaring that “Animal welfare takes precedence over religion.”

And so it’s not as hard to be a vegan here as I might have thought. Vegetables are cheap (especially if you shop at a market like Netto or Aldi) and pastas and rice are readily available. In my experience, tofu was difficult to find, and forget other faux-meat products, but cooking at home was easy and, for Scandinavia, quite affordable.

Eating out is another story, but Copenhagen does have some great vegan places. Most of the popular vegan places now skew toward the raw and the expensive, neither one of which I’m entirely down with, but I did get to try out two really good places. The Swedish chain Astrid och Aporna (which means something like “Astrid and the monkey”) offers burgers and sausages and a really good jackfruit wrap. The relishes here include things liked sliced cucumber and cashews and it’s about 8-9 USD for a burger. Not far away, Express Pizza looks like your average pizzeria but has a secret “vegan” menu if you ask for it. They were out of the kebab pizza when I was there, but would be great to try next time.

With lots of cheap veggies and a growing number of vegan restaurants, the dairy-friendly Denmark isn’t nearly as challenging for vegans as you might think.