Restaurant Reviews: 2 in one day! (mofo 2009)
I'm not doing so well with keeping up on Mofo this week... work has been completely insane lately. I'm going to have some catching up to do...
Anyway, on Friday I went to 2 restaurants here in Columbus that I hadn't been to before. The amazing thing about Columbus is that I am *still* discovering new places to get great vegan food, and I've lived here for 3 years already! And there's still more new vegan options to be had. So wonderful.
For lunch, I went to On The Fly, the little street-food cafe attached to the crazy-expensive but delicious Dragonfly Neo-V restaurant. I had the chili+cornbread, and my friend had the empanada. The chili was good (primarily lentils) and had a mysterious sour-creamlike creation on it; the only thing I wished was that it was a little bit more spicy. I also had an apple turnover thingy for dessert that was freaking delicious. In the future I might stop by just for a fancy dessert option. They had some amazing looking desserts for reasonable prices.
The chili:
The empanada:
The thing about On The Fly that I wasn't that crazy about was the fact that all the food came in these plastic bowls. I know that's a pretty nitpicky thing to complain about when the food was good but... can't an empanada and my apple turnover come on a plate? please? And is it really that much cheaper/more pratical to use washable plastic rather than glass? I guess I always just have this thing where I hate eating off of plastic of any kind, so maybe that's just another of my quirks. Food was good, and I'll definitely be going back for desserts if not for lunch (and maybe lunch too.)
For dinner, S. and I went to Starliner Diner. I know a lot of people who rave about this place, but I haven't been because it's basically across town from where I live. I'm still not entirely sure where it is relative to the rest of the world since I didn't drive and it was dark and rainy when we went. But anyway, it was a pretty cool place. The server was very knowledgeable about veganism-- I asked whether something had dairy in it and she was like, "Oh, are you vegan? Here's some things you can try" and then listed off ways to modify certain dishes and other dishes that were already vegan. The menu has a cheeseless pizza on it! Like, it's already cheeseless--no modifications needed. That made me happy. They also have some pasta options, a burrito, and I think at least one other item. We had plantains for an appetizer, and I had the pizza, which was very good (though it needed some hot sauce).
That's the other thing... this place had FOUR KINDS of hot sauce on the table to pick from. FOUR KINDS. Do you have any idea how happy that made me?
Anyway it was a really quirky little establishment... tables and chairs from like the 60s, an entire wall full of metal clocks, and this really wacky mural on one wall:
Thumbs up to both places. Yay Columbus.
Anyway, on Friday I went to 2 restaurants here in Columbus that I hadn't been to before. The amazing thing about Columbus is that I am *still* discovering new places to get great vegan food, and I've lived here for 3 years already! And there's still more new vegan options to be had. So wonderful.
For lunch, I went to On The Fly, the little street-food cafe attached to the crazy-expensive but delicious Dragonfly Neo-V restaurant. I had the chili+cornbread, and my friend had the empanada. The chili was good (primarily lentils) and had a mysterious sour-creamlike creation on it; the only thing I wished was that it was a little bit more spicy. I also had an apple turnover thingy for dessert that was freaking delicious. In the future I might stop by just for a fancy dessert option. They had some amazing looking desserts for reasonable prices.
The chili:
The empanada:
The thing about On The Fly that I wasn't that crazy about was the fact that all the food came in these plastic bowls. I know that's a pretty nitpicky thing to complain about when the food was good but... can't an empanada and my apple turnover come on a plate? please? And is it really that much cheaper/more pratical to use washable plastic rather than glass? I guess I always just have this thing where I hate eating off of plastic of any kind, so maybe that's just another of my quirks. Food was good, and I'll definitely be going back for desserts if not for lunch (and maybe lunch too.)
For dinner, S. and I went to Starliner Diner. I know a lot of people who rave about this place, but I haven't been because it's basically across town from where I live. I'm still not entirely sure where it is relative to the rest of the world since I didn't drive and it was dark and rainy when we went. But anyway, it was a pretty cool place. The server was very knowledgeable about veganism-- I asked whether something had dairy in it and she was like, "Oh, are you vegan? Here's some things you can try" and then listed off ways to modify certain dishes and other dishes that were already vegan. The menu has a cheeseless pizza on it! Like, it's already cheeseless--no modifications needed. That made me happy. They also have some pasta options, a burrito, and I think at least one other item. We had plantains for an appetizer, and I had the pizza, which was very good (though it needed some hot sauce).
That's the other thing... this place had FOUR KINDS of hot sauce on the table to pick from. FOUR KINDS. Do you have any idea how happy that made me?
Anyway it was a really quirky little establishment... tables and chairs from like the 60s, an entire wall full of metal clocks, and this really wacky mural on one wall:
Thumbs up to both places. Yay Columbus.