Another feature in Appetite Magazine + pretty good vegan alfredo and edamame pate

More vegan love in the local food magazine scene. I contributed some vegan baking tips to this month's Appetite Magazine. I also handed in an original oatmeal cookie recipe, fairly similar in taste to the old butter-and-egg laden version I used to make in my pre-vegetarian days.

Pick up a copy of the June 2009 issue of Appetite Magazine!

PS If you recall, my vegan baking business Kitchen Revolution was given a positive review in this magazine's pages last February 2009.

Zoom in to check it out!















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Finally a restaurant in the metro is showing some vegan love. Healthy Kitchen in Serendra, Bonifacio High Street offers some nice vegan options that don't rely on fake meat and Indian spices. Sorry, no offense to India -- I mean I love Indian food, I eat Indian probably once a week. In the past if I wanted some good vegan food, I'd have to go to an Indian restaurant; Indian food can get tiring though if you eat it all the time. So if you have the option to eat good vegan food in a non-Indian restaurant, you take it.

Like Healthy Kitchen. I'll admit, at first I did not appreciate this restaurant's name. While health is certainly important, the word "healthy" tends to scare people away. Not sure if this is a manifestation of the scary H word, but the past 3 times I've been in the restaurant, majority if not all of the customers were female... I got 6 brothers and I know they aren't a fan of the H word.

Anyway, I like that this restaurant actually displays the V word prominently. And I'm not even talking about vegetarian, but vegan. Such a big relief that a food establishment recognizes veganism!

Here's one of HK's dishes -- wholewheat spaghetti with vegan alfredo sauce and tofu. I honestly did not have any expectations because I've never tried to make a vegan cream sauce (okay once I made the pine nut sauce from Veganomicon (link to amazon), which frankly sucked. I think I added too much lemon juice). I was pleasantly surprised. It tastes nothing like traditional alfredo sauce, but it's got a nice savory taste which I think comes from mushroom broth and onions. The cubed tofu was seared and tasted great with the sauce.

The next time I was in HK was for a merienda thing and I ordered the edamame pate with tortilla chips. The chips were supposed to be a combination of blue and red but the restaurant only had blue, which I didn't mind at all. The pate was very hummus-esque, with only its green tinge separating it from it's tan cousin. Good merienda, however I think it would've been tastier if it was served with salsa.

Healthy Kitchen also serves tofu adobo, vegetarian burrito wraps and Boca burgers.

I caution you not to take any of the green tea frappes, even if you can have them made with soymilk -- the green tea mixes HK uses has milk.

What the restaurant seriously lacks is vegan dessert. I miss being able to buy dessert...


HEALTHY KITCHEN
141C Serendra Place, Bonifacio High St,
Global City, Taguig
900.6514

Check out their menu here.