Any Vegans here?

LOL, yes. It’s one of the reasons we haven’t gone. The name is confusing, especially since there is a bar called Little Bar right next door that looked like it could be the same place - is it a bar is it a coffee shop wtf? Well, it’s a coffee shop with tasty eats with a bar next door and a pasta place across 8th St. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: Anyway check out my Fried Chicken Rundown. I did a report. I’d link it but I don’t want to blight the Vegan thread. :wink:

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Little Bar has been around for a long time and is a Boston sports bar. The corner places are some new age coffee spots that don’t know what they’re doing (from like 1 visit that they failed) lol

I’m roasting mushrooms, cabbage, potato and garlic right now back on the vegan subject (conveniently forgetting the chicken)

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Depending on who answers the phone, Grandview Palace in Pasadena - the one on Raymond, not the one on Colorado Blvd between Altadena and San Gabriel - should be able to make this. (Unless they have revamped their menu, like the one on Colorado Blvd.)

http://www.grandview-palace.com/

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thanks @ElsieDee ! It’s really interesting to see some of the differences between East Coast Americanized Chinese Food and West Coast. Where my husband and I grew up (him in the suburbs of Philly, me in the suburbs of DC), most fast Chinese restaurants always have an option of subbing fried tofu for meat in the usual dishes – General Tso’s, kung pao chicken, sesame chicken, orange chicken, beef with broccoli, etc. I’ve done a lot of searching and haven’t found many places that advertise that here, or you have to ask specifically and even then sometimes they don’t do it. You would think with the perception of LA area being so vegetarian/vegan friendly, more places would do the tofu substitution!

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Have you had the house special tofu at Jade Wok in Chinatown?

Do you guys think a Chinese or Vietnamese vegetarian/vegan place will do well in the Echo Park/Silver Lake/Los Feliz area?

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Isn’t Pine & Crane vegetarian leaning? Business was decent (well, before the pandemic, at least)…

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Oh yeah damn I forgot about them. I was thinking more along the lines of Happy Family SGV

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Pine & Crane opening up eventually in South Park

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Kartman will be so happy.
kart

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Green Leaves Vegan has been going strong for years. It’s heavy on Asian dishes (not just Thai) but has more of a global menu, so to speak. :slightly_smiling_face: Including American fare like pancakes and onion rings. Love the onion rings. It’s not exactly but similar to the Happy Family restaurants.

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I love that dish but that’s definitely a meat based sauce on it. Can you get it vegetarian? I’d certainly try that

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Yes they do have a veg version! Never tried it though! It’s so good over just some rice. I’ll hit that place up before a Dodger game

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Viet Noodle House. Very popular with hipsters.

I could not get myself to go back.

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Hell yeah, I really want to try that now.

Jade Wok is great - they were the first place we went to when we picked businesses to try and support during the shelter in place mandate.

Maybe you can answer a question I’ve had for a while: do you know what the origins of that tofu dish is? I’ve never seen anything quite like it (and I’ve kept an eye out because it’s freakin’ delicious). It’s kind of like fresh tofu dishes I’ve seen elsewhere but the combination of the giant piece of tofu, the deep frying, the meat sauce, etc. is really interesting.

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Jade Wok is traditional Cantonese so it’s interesting with that tofu dish. I remember talking to owner about that dish in Chinese, like where is it from. I think I remember she said Sichuan.

IMHO I think the inspiration is Sichuan with Cantonese taste buds and possibly a original homestyle dish (with Chinese food there is probably numerous homestyle dishes that are unique with no real “name”). Unfortunately I am not in LA/OC anymore (just for a few years, 2-3).

If you guys are hitting up FTC LA favorite PRD, hit up Jade Wok and try out the tofu dish. The small Shanghai ribs are also well done.

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Yeah, I thought this might be the case, also. Thanks for clarifying that it’s a Cantonese restaurant. I’m terrible with accents (much less language) so I wasn’t sure if they were Cantonese, Hoa, or something else so that further muddled looking into the dish.

Literally second on our list of places to frequent during shelter in place!

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Repost from my Jan visit. I think they just take out the ground pork and use mushrooms

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Yeah, we love Pine and Crane, but sometimes we want greasy Americanized Chinese food but with tofu instead of meat, lol. I’m not that far from SGV but Chinatown is a lot closer. I checked the menus of a bunch of the places in Chinatown and sadly not many of them had what I was looking for. I have gone to Happy Family and a couple other vegetarian Chinese places in the SGV, which were good.

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Do you guys think a Chinese or Vietnamese vegetarian/vegan place will do well in the Echo Park/Silver Lake/Los Feliz area?

Yes! But it has to be good and not watered down and flavorless (aka Viet Noodle Bar which is not vegetarian but has veg options). If a place like Vinh Loi Tofu opened up a location somewhere around here it would be packed. I know he opened a second location in Cerritos, but man I would love a location in Central LA.

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