Atlas Cafe
3049 20th St. SF (415) 648-1047
What: Sandwich, salad, soup, and coffee drinks
Eat This:Tofu sandwich, Roasted Beet and Kale Sandwich, Vegan Soup-of-the-Day, and Ginger Lemonade
Lots of rad weird sandwich combinatons, like the Beet and Kale. Wow. Wash this all down with the homemade ginger lemonade. If you go on Thursday nights or Saturday afternoon, you get the added bonus of free live music, usually bluegrass, jazz, ragtime, or blues. Great spot to do homework, have a date, or sit on the patio in the sun browsing their huge magazine library.
Christ, let me see the menu: atlascafe.net
Arizmendi
1331 9th Ave. SF (415) 566-3117
What: Bakery with daily pizza specials
Eat This: Breadsticks and Foccacia Specials
Be forewarned...foccacia doesn't come out until 11:30, but it's worth the wait. This bakery is a cooperative with the nicest staff you've ever dreamed of. Discounts are given if you have a fast pass or ride your bike there!!! Always love to save a few extra pennies. So about the food, it's mouth watering. A steady stream of stuff is coming hot out of the ovens into the self-serve cases. Nothing like a hot breadsticks to make your day. Their daily pizza is awesome! (Check out the monthly menu on their web site, almost never vegan though. Bummer.) You can get the pizza "half baked" to take home for dinner too! Right on. It is always insanely busy at Arizmendi, but the line moves fast and people are great.
Christ, let me see the menu: arizmendibakery.org
Cafe Ethiopia
878 Valencia St. SF (415) 285-2728
What: Ethiopian Food
Family-style food. Everything is served on inerja (think spongy sourdough crepe). Great lentil, garbanzo beans, and spinach food stuff. Get ready to eat messy and have crusty fingers. No utensils, you use the inerja to scoop up your food. This is a several napkin meal that will fill you up for the price of a movie.
Truly Mediterranean
3109 16th St. SF (415) 252-7482
What: Mediterranean food: falafels, swarmas, hummus, tabouleh, etc.
Eat This: Mediterranean combo plate (hold the feta) and falafel deluxe
Walk four steps into the restaurant and you're already almost at the end of it. There are 5 barstools against the wall, where you can eat. That is if you don't mind watching yourself in the huge mirror ten inches in front of you. Heck, just order the Med. combo plate and head to Dolores Park. You can sit and watch the dogs while you feast on dolmas, grilled pita bread, hummus, babaganoush, tabouleh, falafel, and seasoned onions. This dishes feeds two! Order extra pita, though, so you don't have to share. If you go down the falafel road, order a deluxe so you can get the extra potato wedges and grilled eggplant.
Papalote: Mexican Grill
3409 24th St. @ Valencia, SF (415) 970-8815
What:Mexican Food with a California twist
Eat This: Soy chorizo burritos
The guacamole is booming with their tasty homemade chips and spicy roasted tomato salsa. Each plate gets a little spoonful of their homemade papaya salsa. Slurp. The rice and beans are vegan and they have soy chorizo (like spicy sausage) for tacos or burritos. My vegan pal got this, so I got to take a bite. It passed with flying colors. Papalote is young, hip, and brightly colored. Crazy kites dangle from the ceiling, that seem to have nothing to do with Mexico (check out their web site to get the skinny). Salsa, jazz, and funk pumps out of the stereo in the corner, creating a nice musical enviroment. But one of my favorite things about Papalote are the windows. Huge windows line the whole eating area, so you can gawk at all the groovy hipsters passing by in the Mission. I've got to be honest, the first time I went, I thought it was great, the second time I thought it was good. Still, a nice cheap(er) eats option with lots of menu options. Good people watching makes it worth it too.
Christ, let me see the menu:
Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison. This is like the vegetarian Joy of Cooking: it is huge, heavy, and full of it all. Lots of information about nutrition and tidbits on different food. Her recipes are easy to follow and don't call for any hard-to-find ingredients. This is not a picture cookbook, but there are a few included to get your salivary glands going. One of my favorite dishes of hers is the Butternut Squash with Sage Galette. This book is an investment, but is should be on every vegetarian's bookshelf.
The Book of Vegetarian Cooking by HP Books press. Soups, salads, appetizers, entrees, and desserts... it's all in here. The HP Books' cookbooks are cheap and portable. I haven't yet been disappointed with anything I've tried from this book, so go on and do them yourself...if you want to. Tomato Olive and Bread Soup , Broiled Grape Leaves with Goat Cheese,Baked Egg Cups with Mozzarella , Panzanella , and Sweet Potato Wedges.
Otsu: Vegan Stlye
3253 16th Street @ Guerrero, SF (415) 255-7900
Can you say VEGAN? For those unhip people, or folks who don't live in California, vegan means living life without any animal products. No leather belts, no cheese puffs, no angora sweaters, no ice cream. Lots of NO's, but you wouldn't notice that at Otsu. This miniature store is packed with tons of cooooool stuff, all made without Bambi or Hilda the cow. You can buy belts, shoes, bike messenger style bags, cute lunch satchels, rad crochet dolls, good lookin' books and journals with kick ass graphics. I strongly suggest that you look at their web site to see their style, cause it rocks!!
OHHH wanna see some of that vegan stuff:
Home Cooking Vegan-Style
Note: Subsitute margerine for butter on recipes
Limeade
Bruscetta
Sweet Potato Wedges
Basic Mexican Salsa
Roasted Tomatilla Salsa
Smokey Chipolte Chile and Tomato Salsa
Tabouleh
Panzanella (Bread Salad)
Thai Cucumber Salad
Curried Coconut Soup
Stuffed Acorn Squash
Tofu Turkey
Vegan Chocolate Cake
Hopia (Hawaiian Coconut Pudding)
Indonesian Style Fried Bananas
Classic Sugar Cookies
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