The Unvegan

Featured Reviews

Merging Cultures at Chino Bandido
Back to Asia with Taiwan Food Express
A Big Ass Burger at Roaring Fork
Damn Near Perfection at Tokyo Fried Chicken

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A Bit of Pinches Tacos

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Taco or poorly wrapped burrito?

Just recently, West Hollywood’s Pinches Tacos branched out to Culver City and my buddy, Waldo, decided we had to try it out. I didn’t really know anything about the original place, but I figured it had to be good enough to build a second location. Since he was picking up, I checked out the menu online and found two tasty-looking tacos. The first was Pollo Mole and the second was Carne Asada. The menu was pretty vague about what came in each, so asked Waldo to order them without vegetables. He is a firm supporter of the unvegan way, so he was happy to get them ordered correctly.

Too Much Green at the Green Truck

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The “Money Truck” doesn’t sound as good.

While trying to be environmentally conscious, my office invited environmentally-friendly Green Truck over for some lunch. At first I was frightened by this, since the term “green” has taken on a pretty anti-meat connotation. It’s a damn shame, too, since green is the second-best color in the world. The best, of course, being orange. But I digress, back to some truckery. Despite the frightening name, the Green Truck did have some unvegan choices, including hot dogs and hamburgers. Even before heading out to the truck, I checked out the menu and decided I wanted one of their hot dogs. What’s more environmentally friendly than hot dogs? Well I guess since they are Niman Beef, they are quite advantageous for the environment.

Serendipity at Daddy’s Burritos

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A strong start.

On a pretty little Sunday afternoon in Culver City, my friends and I decided to try out a little place in Culver’s sketchville called J and J’s. After hearing tons of great meaty stories about this place, I knew it had to become an unvegan conquest. Alas, when we pulled up to the nondescript corner of West Adams and Spaulding, we found that the place didn’t do business on Sundays. A damn shame, but fortune wasn’t frowning upon us too much on that day. As we made our exit, we spotted an even more nondescript hole in the wall called Daddy’s Burritos. After a few moments of contemplation, we decided to try it out.

More Than Ice Cream at Al Gelato

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Leaf!

With a name like Al Gelato, you kind of expect to be walking into a gelato shop. This is not the case with Al Gelato in Beverly Hills. Sure, the place has gelato, but it is also a full-on Italian restaurant. Aside from realizing that it wasn’t just a gelato place, I also found that Al Gelato didn’t carry a lot of the pretension that Italian restaurants seem to have. There was no mood lighting, no fancy table cloths and no people with strange accents that weren’t quite Italian. Despite this, I found that the prices still fell into what you would expect in Beverly Hills, with very little under 10 bucks and pasta prices jumping up to 15 if you wanted any meat.

Clogging Arteries at Vicious Dogs

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Breakfast?!

So apparently my blog was listed as an attacker page on Google because some sneaky bastard figured out a way to hack me and install malware. That was no good, but luckily it has all been cleared up. The only thing my blog is intended to attack is arteries, and few places attack arteries quite like Vicious Dogs, a wonderful little hot dog joint in North Hollywood. Some places you can tell are going to be good just by taking a look at their facade. This facade was pretty amazing, sporting a 10 foot plastic hot dog, and although this hot dog was loaded with veggies, it was a very good sign. I walked on in and was surprised to find that Vicious Dogs also doubled as a cupcake shop. It was a strange mix of foods, but I had no time to deal with cupcakery, I was here to eat something vicious and dog-like.

Following the Rules at Kuma’s Corner

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That burger sounds loud.

The following guest blog is courtesy of Ryan Glasspiegel. Check him out on Twitter: @RGSpiegel

After living the unvegan lifestyle in Chicago for the better part of a year, I am extremely ashamed to admit that I had never eaten at Kuma’s Corner until just recently. Located off the beaten path on Belmont Avenue near the corner of Belmont, California, and Elston, Kuma’s Corner is not easily accessible to me by either walking or public transportation. Further, there is a perpetual wait time of over two hours so in addition to knowing someone who has a car, you have to be willing to stake out the significant portion of a day in order to indulge in their renowned hamburgers.

A Little Italy at Maggiano’s

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Oh look, there’s a little bit of Italy.

To grab some dinner, and take advantage of one of our seemingly endless restaurant gift cards, the girlfriend and I headed to Maggiano’s Little Italy next to The Grove. When we arrived, there was a pretty long line, but their bar had a first come, first served policy that had the full menu and we quickly found ourselves a nice table there.

Although Maggiano’s is a national chain, I’d never been and dove right in to the menu head first. I found a few things that looked great and had a hard time narrowing down to an appetizer and main course. Fortunately, I found that one of the main courses I was staring down also repeated as an appetizer. Such genius. This was the four cheese ravioli, mmm four cheeses. These were in some pesto-alfredo sauce with mozzarella. After a little browning in the oven, this ravioli looked great and tasted just as good as it looked. The pesto sauce was nice and creamy and although the marinara sauce was unnecessary, it was nice to feel thought-of.

Not a Usual Bar at Souplantation (CLOSED)

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An array of cold pasta.

EDIT: This Souplantation is no more, but if you’re into salad bars there are plenty others carrying on its name.

As a man who loves all-you-can-eat, I was very excited at the prospect of heading to Souplantation (also known as Sweet Tomatoes in some places). I knew that they had an 80-foot salad bar, which sounded terrible, but I had also been told they had some REAL food. When I walked in, I hadn’t totally comprehended what an 80-foot salad bar would look like, and it bothered me deeply. Tucked in the recesses of this foul bar, I found some pastas that seemed pretty decent. I decided to start with these and took them back to my table for some tasting.

A Big Slice at Big Mama’s & Papa’s

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Notice the paperclip to demonstrate the size.

Big Mama’s & Papa’s Pizzeria sells pizza by the slice. But it’s not just any pizza by the slice. It’s Big Mama’s Slice and it is massive. Signs outside the place say that their slices are the size of three regular pizza slices. Unfortunately, the picture of the slice on the sign didn’t give give any scale and only showed the price, at $3.99. So for all I knew, as I ordered the slice, it could have been the size of three tiny pizza slices.

Steak Night at Outback

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Steak heaven.

Since there appears to be no Outback Steakhouse in LA (seriously LA?!), the last time I was in Palm Desert I managed to convince my grandparents to take me to Outback. Of course, I have had Outback in the past, but not since I’ve been writing my glorious meat blog. I’ve never had a bad experience at Outback and I hoped this one would be no different.

The place was set up just like any other Outback and although there was a short wait, we were seated soon and ready to order some beef. Of the delicious-sounding steaks, the Outback Special looked especially tasty. This special cut of steak, that I think is a sirloin, comes in 7 or 9 ounce cuts. It also comes with a choice of two sides. I went with the larger of the cuts and then decided to load up on carbs for my sides. I chose both the garlic mashed potatoes and the dressed baked potato. I’m sure this meal was an accurate reflection of the typical Australian diet.

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