Bay Area Vegetarians

Bok Choy Garden, a vegetarian Chinese restaurant in San Francisco’s Richmond district, is closing on Thursday, July 31st.  Thanks to Michael for the update.

Interestingly, Bok Choy Garden is one of the older vegetarian restaurants in San Francisco. It changed ownership in November 2006.  Shortly after this, Layonna’s, also a Chinese Vegetarian restaurant, opened directly across the street.   Layonna’s closed in November 2007.  Now, eight months later, farewell to Bok Choy Garden.

Ultimate Guide information - Bok Choy Garden

An update from Millennium (7/19 via mailing list)

Convert A Carnivore: Now twice a week instead of monthly.  25% discount when dining with a carnivore.

Millennium is no long serving bottled water for environmental reasons.  Instead, they are offering filtered water.  “A charge of *$1/per seated guests affords an endless supply of fresh carbon & UV filtered water served chilled, room temperature or sparkling.” and “*This dollar ensures regular visits from the H2O Technicians of Natura, the highest quality of carbon filter changes & UV light bulb maintenance.  Regular tap water will not longer be available.”  (Highlighting added)

I wonder if you can take home your leftover water  ..  waiter, can you please fill up my 5 gallon jug …

Millennium - read it, rate it, review it!

The East Bay gains another new vegetarian restaurant with Tofu Yu.  Tofu Yu goal is to introduce international vegetarian tofu food to the East Bay and San Francisco Bay Area communities has opened in Berkeley, and plans to open a 2nd location in the next few weeks in El Cerrito.

Tofu Yu in the Ultimate Guide - read it, rate it, review it

Thanks to Sara for this update.

For anyone planning to dine at the Usual Suspects Cafe, due to staff changes, please call ahead to confirm they are open. We know how disappointing it is to make a special trip to a new restaurant and find them closed, etc.
Now serving vegan Russian homestyle foods.

Usual Suspects Cafe: Ultimate Guide information - read it, rate it, review it

Thanks to Warren for the update.

Udupi Palace, a vegetarian Indian restaurant with locations in Berkeley, Newark, and Sunnyvale, and other cities outside the Bay Area, has opened this week in the Mission District in SF.  (Happily, that is not a typo!)  It has long been a lament in the vegetarian community about the dearth of vegetarian Indian restaurants in SF while they abound in the South Bay. This is great news for all those folks.

Udupi joins the original Herbivore, Cha Ya, and Cafe Gratitude as the 4th vegetarian restaurant in the Mission.

Udupi Palace - Ultimate Guide: read it, rate it, review it!

Thanks to Winnie for the update.

Local coastsiders, especially those at BAVeg headquarters in Montara, are rejoicing at today’s opening of New Leaf Community Market, a large natural foods store which also has several stores in the Santa Cruz area.

New Leaf Community Market - read it, rate it, review it in the Ultimate Guide

Juicey Lucy’s has closed it’s SF restaurant in North Beach. They are now exclusively focusing on selling at farmer’s markets. We don’t have any more info than that, but once we do, you’ll read it here!

Cafe Soulstice is now in Palo Alto, located in the Equinox fitness center. Serving organic, raw foods. Mostly all vegan, although some food items are sweetened with honey. They currently have 1 other location in the San Mateo Equinox fitness center.

Ultimate Guide info - be the first to review it!

I am happy to report that I am optimistic about this new vegetarian restaurant with a heavy emphasis on vegan food. It’s in San Francisco on Broadway St, just off Montgomery, and probably trekkable from Montgomery BART if you’ve got good leg muscles or are allured by vegan food. The Usual Suspects Cafe, opened by Bob Bosco, is making a splash with local veg folks already. It’s a diner, it’s familiar foods made vegan, it’s great desserts, it’s talented chefs cooking with passion & pride, and they’ve got a commitment to organic, too. (In passing, they mentioned a big percentage of their food is organic; I don’t remember the exact number.)

Just hours after eating there last nite, I wrote the official description review in the Ultimate Guide:

Styled like an American diner, this new face in the SF restaurant scene offers a variety of vegan favorites like pizzas, sandwiches, burger, falafel, lasagna .. and they make their own seitan and sauces/salad dressings/cashew cheese. And, yes, vegan desserts, too. In an interesting twist, there are a few pizzas made with dairy, then it says everything is vegan except items which are marked that can be made vegetarian. Room upstairs available for private parties.

Read the rest of this entry »

New vegetarian restaurant (with an emphasis on vegan foods) just opened in SF, The Usual Suspects. Currently only open Tuesday through Saturday but they anticipate offering a weekend brunch. Check ‘em out -

Ultimate Guide: The Usual Suspects

Thanks to Bob for sharing the news!