Pizza Fusion

Pizza is amazing. We all know this. Several of my friends appeared very distressed on my behalf when I told them I was going vegan, professing their dismay that, "But...you can't have pizza..."

Oh ho ho my lovely and well-meaning friends. Of course I can have pizza! Not only is pizza without cheese and loaded with veggies a fine option, there are some lovely vegan cheeses out in today's world.

Daiya has what I've found to be the best, most usable and cheese-like brand and I finally found a restaurant that would go through the effort of making a vegan pizza with it on my behalf! (I did not want to try the mozzarella version at about 5-6 dollars a bag without being sure I liked it first)

Pizza Fusion's hybrid delivery vehicles :)

Pizza Fusion is amazing, and for more than just the (absolutely phenomenal multi-grain thin crust) pizza. This hip little restaurant is all about going green as well as providing healthy, mostly organic and all-natural options for vegans, vegetarians, and omnivores alike!

They had several little signs around the place detailing their environment-saving efforts, which include building their booths out of reclaimed wood and using hybrid vehicles for delivery.

Even their bathrooms were green (in the environmental sense).

The place itself was very attractive and cool, and as I've mentioned the food was incredible and so satisfying. My mom order a vegan pizza as well and loved it! The leftovers were even better, in both our opinions.

I'd highly recommend this place. They have a few different locations, so look em up and see if you can try it out.

There's also apparently a pizza joint that offers Daiya cheese pizzas near my university ... I'll have to check that out sometime, but I just don't know if it will compare to the magic of Pizza Fusion ;)

Happy noms!

A Weekend With Mommabear

A review ... in noms. ;)

Homemade banana bread :)

My lovely mother was in town for a visit this weekend, which of course meant a weekend full of great company, and great food!

She rolled into town Friday around 3, which gave us plenty of time to grab dinner before my night rehearsal. We decided to go to Soul Veg - a completely vegan cafe downtown. I'd only had the pleasure of going once, and my mom had never been. Now, while she's not a vegan/vegetarian like I am, she loves her veggies and rarely eats meat anyway. So she was totally open for it!

We both chose their "live salad platter" option - I chose the toppings of seaweed, cous cous, and spinach. She's not such a spinach fan and chose bean curd instead. It all was served atop of salad of greens, tomatoes, and onions. (She also had a ginger-citrus punch that was.so.good.likeomg.)

As you can see, we loved them so much we plowed through them before I remembered to take a picture! Oops.

But I did take a picture of the amazing vegan apple pie we snacked on for dessert...

To quote my mom, "This is not missing a thing!" More proof that a vegan diet is not a boring diet!

On Saturday we tried out a new coffee place in town, where I decided to spoil myself by ordering a (definitely not vegan) nutella sandwich on cinnamon-raisin bread along with my traditional morning tea. Hey, you only live once, and there wasn't any Justin's Chocolate-Hazelnut butter around!

One of these days I'll remember: picture first, eat later.

My mom loved her Peru Coffee. Not so jazzed about her sandwich. Perhaps it was the extreme excess of onions...?

Seriously, the onions owned this sandwich. They probably planted a flag somewhere in there.

For lunch...it was Earthfare salad bar all the way (cuz I just had to get tons of healthy, yummy groceries while my momma was in town!). I won't even go into my three (!) bags of groceries, but om nom salad bar + juice bar.

Honestly there was a lot piled on here that I don't remember exactly. The highlight was the cranberry quinoa and kale. Sounds weird, was delicious. And I loved my juice (a carrot-beet-cucumber-ginger combo) as well. Oh oh, and the brussel sprouts. No, I'm not kidding.

For dinner Mom and I elected to cook a recipe from Peas and Thank You, Mama Pea's falafel with tzatki sauce.

Honestly...I wasn't super impressed. The sauce was too garlicky and the falafel not very flavorful, although I did enjoy it leftover dunked into ketchup. The biggest letdown was Food For Life's Brown Rice Tortillas...very chewy and stiff. But I saved the day by cutting the rest up and making them into delicious chips!

And for Sunday breakfast we had some good old oatmeal from the coffee place. I can always count on oatmeal. It is my bestest breakfast friend ;)

...and then she had to go back home. Boo! I love it when my parents are in town, and it's always sad to see them go. But hey, I'm an adult and that's how it is, right? Right. Totally an adult over here.

What are your favorite types of places to eat out or take your parents/friends/significant others for a treat?

Sonja