Upon looking back over my past entries in this blog, I’ve noticed a bit of a pattern. My writing is looking a little…corporate—a little characterless and not so personal. I ask a lot of rhetorical questions and then answer them but I never really talk about me. Maybe that’s a good thing but this week, I want to share a little something more.
My name is David Mattera. I live in Richmond, Virginia. While I do enjoy eating at restaurants, like the ones I’ve given a nod to in previous entries, most of the time I cook with my girlfriend and best friend, Erynn. While I am an omnivore, she shies away from eating meat. Technically, she’s a pescatarian or someone who will eat seafood but not land animals.
And she is certainly not alone in Richmond. If you get closer to the VCU campus, you’ll find an array of vegetarians and vegans who all need to eat somewhere. It’s best for them to know how to cook creatively and having lived with a vegan roommate for several years and then cooking with Erynn regularly, I have gotten this whole meatless gourmet thing down to a science. In fact, vegan desserts are some of my favorite, save for Italian cheese-heavy pastries.
Vegan Carrot Cake with tofutti cream cheese icing.
It is really not very hard to cook without meat. Erynn and I always joke about how children who don’t eat vegetables must be crazy and as a child, my favorite food was spinach thanks to my parents’ spinach fritters. If you cook a vegetable simply and know how to exploit its strong points, there’s no way a kid won’t like them. Guaranteed. That means no microwaving anything and calling it cooked!
Let me recount last night’s menu for example. Erynn and I are saving money for an international trip coming up so we wanted to eat on the cheap but not lose anything in the flavor or satisfaction department. After all, if I die in the night, do I want the last thing I put in my stomach to be dissatisfactory? So we had handmade black bean burgers—made from black beans, an egg, some parmesan cheese, whole wheat flour and ranch dressing and topped with all of the fixings of a real hamburger—baked beans—the Bush’s vegetarian kind are just as good as those with the slimy hunk of bacon fat—roasted green beans—all you need is a little salt, olive oil and pepper—and a green salad. A lot of beans means a lot of fiber! The complete meal for two cost us probably $5.00 and we had leftovers. If you don’t want so many beans, you can buy a boca burger, which is made of vegetable proteins and soy and spices or you could roast asparagus instead of green beans. If you cook a boca burger right, you won’t tell the difference although you should be careful not to eat too many processed faux meats since they’ve undergone a number of chemical processes to make them seem like meat. If you need complete vegetable proteins from soy, it might be better to have some edamame every now and then and skip the processed foods.
Vegan doesn't necessarily mean healthy! Boca burger with fries and an oreo milkshake. 100% vegan.
Not only is cooking suitable vegetarian meals less expensive, we don’t have a ton of options in Richmond for people who want to eat full and satisfying vegetarian meals at restaurants. We are lucky to live in the city though. The surrounding counties are dominated by chain restaurants, which don’t tend to cater towards vegetarians. I recall when I was a categorical vegetarian for a few months in Chesterfield. My family went out to Tripps steakhouse and literally the only thing on the menu without meat was a spinach salad without dressing. I felt like a brontosaurus munching away at my leaves while my family sliced up rare meat and salty bacon-filled potatoes.
However, in the city we aren’t so pressed for choices. Most Italian restaurants will be okay for a vegetarian. There’s pizza and pastas and plenty of fish if you are pescatarian. Chinese can be a little more difficult with the exception of Panda Veg on Grace street near campus and China Panda on Park and Shepard. Panda Veg, now Panda Garden, once offered a 100 percent vegan menu that would fool any meat eater. Now Panda Garden is more similar to China Panda, which has an extensive vegan and vegetarian menu. I’m not vegetarian, but I prefer to eat the mock beef lomein at China Panda over the rubbery utilitarian beef that they serve. I do mix though and I usually can’t resist their pork-fried dumplings.
Vegans can get a solid menu at Ipanema Café, also on Grace street near the VCU campus—not to be confused with Ipanema Grill which is the complete opposite and serves seared meats on skewers. Ipanema has a great grungy bar atmosphere in a dark basement with no written menu except the one on the chalkboard when you first enter. With an assortment of choices ranging from pescatarian to vegan, Ipanema suits the dietary and flavor concerns of its patrons no matter their level of meatless eating.
The new Ellwood’s Coffee near Ellwood Thompson carries a load of options for vegans and some great coffee as well (I should have mentioned them in my espresso blog!). Not only can you get fantastic prepared food there and a great atmosphere—like what Starbucks is trying to do but legitimate—across the street is Ellwood Thompson where you can find all of the specific food substitutions you need to make great vegan food at home.
Plenty of other restaurants feature vegetarian options too but it can be difficult to find choices that aren’t just an afterthought. You just have to know how to order creatively at those restaurants that aren’t specific. But when it comes down to it, if you don’t want to continuously eat green salads and cold vegetable appetizers, it is almost always better to cook at home if you have dietary concerns like vegetarianism or veganism. If you want to go out, try a place that caters specifically to vegetarians.
What I do personally is not draw dietary lines. I am an omnivore but I try not to eat too much meat, especially from cheap restaurants that I know cut corners on their meat. I don’t miss meat when I don’t have it and I don’t feel bad when I have it every so often from a place I know will do it right and use good quality meat. Plus, vegetables and beans and wheat are cheaper than meat or at least the meat that I would want to put in my body. Play it safe and eat fresh clean vegetables more often and save the meat for a special occasion.
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