About: cct

Okay, so if you follow my twitter, among my randomness, you would have seen this tweet:

If you look at this image closely, you would have seen that Chef John Rivera Sedlar created this menu for the Los Angeles Magazine’s 50th anniversary party to which my lovely friend Katie invited me.

While on one hand I have to admit I feel a little ashamed; on the other hand, I have to say – “How could I not?”

They were appetizer samples and I tried:

• Cobb Salad (a blended gazpacho style shot glass or 2)

Taco Salad - Carl's Jr.

So while I’ve been having fun collecting L.A. places to eat vegetarian cuisine and cooking up random dishes, I’ve realized that changing my diet has been more than just deciding not to eat meat. It’s been a growing consciousness of what I am eating. The first lesson of this was fast food consciousness.

The closest restaurant near my church is a local Carl’s Jr. where I’ll often grab a quick bite to eat before my afternoon choir rehearsals. The first Sunday of this Going Veggie adventure I found myself walking into the restaurant and without much thought having a craving for a Taco Salad. So I decided to buy one but ask for there not to be any meat in it.  #30DaysofGood taken care of, right?  Well…not exactly.

Life and work took over, preventing me from updating my veggie adventure! But I am still on course! Last weekend, I went home to visit my parents. Having spent 7 years not eating red meat, a sister who was vegetarian for awhile, and coming from a Buddhist family that occasionally eats vegetarian, my parents (pictured below) just shrugged and said we’d go eat at a vegetarian restaurant.

This – as I suspected – ultimately became an adventure in fake meat. Fake meat does not just begin and end with tofurkey!

Location:
Vegetarian Wok Chinese Restaurant
529 E Valley Blvd. #128, San Gabriel, CA 91776

Let’s be honest.  I work a lot and can’t cook as much as I would like.  I work a lot and I live in a town called Los Angeles with perhaps one of the most diverse food selections in the world and is privy to a ton of awesome restaurants.  So, obviously, this town can be fairly vegetarian fare-friendly as I’ve kind of always known, but am really beginning to figure out with this adventure.

So I decided to take up the GOOD 30 Day Challenge – Go Vegetarian.  I had thought to do this before my 2-week school seminar, but since that seminar was going to be in Texas and I wouldn’t have the best control over my food options, I decided to hold off…and I wasn’t going to go as extreme as a whole month, but well, here we go…

A note, I found out about this in the afternoon, so I am not counting the Chicken Pesto Sandwich I had for lunch .