Veggie Galaxy

Happy Friday! I hope you all had a fabulous week!

I had a major moment of weakness last night. My dining hall was serving my FAVORITE dish: Sweet and Sour Chicken. And it looked SO good! And I stood in front of that station staring at it for a good 2 minutes before the annoyed worker finally said, "Do you want this?" And I just sadly bowed my head and walked away to the salad bar. So sad. One more day!!

But then the universe decided to make it up to me because today they had that same sweet and sour dish for lunch today only this one had vegan "meat"balls instead of chicken. Yay me! It was so good!

So yesterday we made the trek into Cambridge to visit Veggie Galaxy. It's a 100% vegetarian, 80% vegan restaurant. (Their sister restaurant is called Veggie Planet..where they do a million different kinds of pizza. I'll have to try them out sometime too).

We had a little bit of a late at prime lunchtime, but once we were seated the service was fairly quick. And it was good because we needed that ten minute wait to scan the menu and decide what we wanted. The stuffed french toast with vegan nut cream cheese and camamelized banana butter??? Omg it took every ounce of willpower not to order it, it sounded so good. But I decided on something healthier and more hearty. The vegan Cambridge Street omelet: $9.50.

It had black beans, red pepper puree, and sweet corn and apple salsa with vegan cheese and a tofu egg. It also came with home fries and wheat toast (which I did eat half a slice of, sorry! But I can't eat an omelet without toast!). This no doubt would have been ten times better if I could have had regular egg and cheese, but it was still pretty good. Vegan cheese freaks me out though...I'm sorry. I don't know how you eat that...it's unnatural. The home fries were delicious though!

I thought it had a really cute diner feel. And our booth was a two seater, but it was up in the air like a high table, but still a booth. I thought it was the coolest. And there was a giant mirror across from us begging me to take a picture. So I did.

For a drink, we got vegan Chocolate Malts ($6) because quite frankly..we deserved it! It was very good...tasted just like a regular chocolate malt with a hint of coconut. So good! And I'm going to pretend it was healthy because it was vegan.

They also have a bakery here with strictly vegan desserts. It all looked so good! But eventually we settled on the Sweet Potato and Carrot Cake with Vegan Cream Cheese Frosting ($5.25). Oh. My. God. It was literally the best carrot cake I've ever had. (Even better than mine...which I must say is pretty dang good). It was also the most moist cake I've ever had...those vegans really know what they're doing!

And can we take a minute (or ten) to talk about the vegan cream cheese frosting??? What is it made of?? Aside from pure heaven. It was so good! You could see the vanilla beans speckled throughout and it was so rich and cream cheesy and sweet and amazing. I don't know how they do it. I can't wait to come back here just to try their cheesecake next (and then every other piece of cake in their bakery!)

So overall: if you're vegan, I would recommend it. If you're vegetarian, I wouldn't waste your money here. It was really, really expensive. It came to about $20 a piece, which (even with dessert and a milkshake) is way too much for a lunch if you ask me. But I understand vegan ingredients are expensive, so I can't blame them. I wouldn't go to the restaurant part again though. Definitely the bakery though! For real....vegan desserts are delicious!

Have a great weekend!

Going Vegan and Eliminating Processed Foods

I have officially made it through 5 and a half days without any meat, eggs, dairy or processed foods. I am so proud of myself! And I feel good. I get ravenously hungry at really random times (like an hour after I ate a huge breakfast) but it usually passes. I'm also starving by the time I wake up in the morning no matter how much I try to eat the same amount of calories and get the same nutrients as before. But overall, I feel great.

You can eat so much more food this way! I can eat giant salads or huge bowls of sauteed veggies with a little bit of rice for the same amount of calories as one chicken finger pretty much. It's great to feel full without feeling gross like you do after eating junk. I'm definitely going to go back to meat after this, but I will be more aware. I'll try to avoid red meat (except pork because it is the bane of my existence) and cut back on meat overall. The one thing I've definitely taken from this experience is that I don't need processed foods!

My half eaten bag of pretzels has been staring at me all week begging me to eat them, but I've been fine without and really haven't had any major cravings. I also haven't had sliced bread (except a half of one slice) or bagels or anything like that, and I've survived. I've also solely been drinking water and hot tea (and Silk milk once because I had just lifted weights and needed the protein). It's really not that bad. I'm not saying you must completely give up processed foods, but you should seriously think about it. Be conscious of what you put into your body and how it's affecting it.

I also haven't had gum in a week!!!! Crazy!!! I went from like 5 sticks a day to nothing...that was probably the hardest (aside from peanut butter in my oatmeal). And on the topic of oatmeal...eating old fashioned oats was a bit of a change also, instead of just the pre-packaged instant oatmeal. It's hard to get good flavor, no matter how much cinnamon and stuff I added to it. It's just kind of bland and I feel like I'm only eating it because I know I have to. I recently discovered, though, that if I made it with cinnamon and water and then added some of BU's homemade granola at the end, it had a really nice flavor and texture.

My point is: you have to make sacrifices. But it is so so worth it! You are given one body to live in and you have to treat it accordingly. One thing I should try to limit is artificial sweetener because I let that be an exception this time around. But it really isn't good for you. While my sweet tooth has diminished quite a bit, I still don't think I'm able to drink tea or coffee without sweetener. But that's my next task.

Also I think there is a huge misconception about Vegans that they're always hungry or don't have any energy and this is definitely not true. You just need to make sure to get your protein from tofu and beans and soy milk and other sources. It's completely doable and the food still tastes great. I mean, come on...Bon Me is vegan!! As soon as I realized that I went out and got it for dinner and it was so good. I eat it all the time even when I am eating meat because it's just delicious!

And this morning me and my roomie went to a vegan restaurant in Cambridge (look out for the review tomorrow) and I am still full of the food! I had a vegan chocolate malt!!! So good and just as tasty as a regular one. I even got a slice of vegan carrot cake with cream cheese frosting to go which I am very much looking forward to for dessert tonight.

My recommendation: give it a shot! It will only make your body feel better, and hey..you might even realize that feeling better is worth giving up meat and dairy and stick to it. At the very least, it makes you conscious of what you're putting into your body. Remember...you are what you eat. And right now, I am a delicious, thick vegan chocolate malt!

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