Vegan Comfort Food + Exotic Soy Gelato = One Happy Vegan

Here I am, back from a wonderful weekend in Detroit. Luckily I got there just in time to make it to the cider mill which is a Michigan tradition. Apple orchards across the state crank out hot batches of their own homemade spiced ciders and I assure you there is no better beverage on the planet. Now I'm back in L.A where it is 92 degrees today. Lame! Oh well, it hasn't been that hot all summer so I guess one little heat wave in October won't kill me.

Right before I took off on my trip, I had a little Pure Luck/Scoops excursion. There has been some discussion lately about Pure Luck's decline, but I think they are as amazing as ever! (Excuse the crappy photos--my camera is broken so I have to resort to my friend's iPhones.)

We started the meal off right with an order of pickle chips. The only way to make a near perfect food like the pickle taste even better, is to fry it. These are self explanitorily delish.

Lately I haven't been able to make myself order anything besides "Kristen's Carnitas Wrap." Juicy jackfruit and Pure Luck's spot-on Caeser dressing knock off is a winning combo in my book. Add chewy sweet potato fries and magical tangy BBQ sauce to that equation and I am over the moon. (My order is the one at top).

My friend ordered rosemary fries, but alas, there was not a trace of rosemary to be found on the fries. They were good fries, it was just kind of a bummer that they didn't come as advertised. Luckily the rest of our food was so good we were willing to overlook this omission.

I find it physically impossible to leave Pure Luck without being sucked into Scoops like Ahab getting sucked into Moby Dick's giant whale mouth. This time around I ordered a scoop of Salty Chocolate and a scoop of Banana Oreo. T'was orgasmic as usual!

I HEART PL/SCOOPS!

La Vida Dolce

Tuesday was our last day of principle shooting! We had Chipotle for lunch, which everyone seemed to agree was bad. You can absolutely tell that the place is owned by McDonalds. Everyone's food was tiny, gross, or both. I ordered a fajita salad which was slimy black beans with a truckload of guacamole and two slices of bell pepper. It was totally unappetizing and I am totally dumbfounded that when this Culver City location of the franchise opened recently people waited in line for over an hour to get lunch there.

After our disappointing lunch, Canada and George went to walk down the street to get some cupcakes from Bluebird. They took forever though and when they returned I found out why--they had actually gone to Dolce Isola and brought back sorbet!!! Literally every time we went to lunch at Dolce Isola over the season, I would ask for a taste of their peach sorbet and come back and tell everyone how mind blowing it is. So those two tricksters brought back peach and coconut. The coconut turned out to be even better than the peach! It wasn't really sweetened which was awesome. You would never guess that either one didn't have dairy. See George and Canada digging in above. What a sweet way to end season five!


Dolce Isola
2869 S. Robertson Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA
310.776.7070

Tennis, Tofu, Two Scoops, and Tecate

I meant to spend my Saturday doing the bajillion errands I neglected to do during the week, such as fixing my tire which has been leaking air for over a month now. But of course that didn't even come close to happening. Instead I started the day with a match of doubles tennis. I chose The Food Monster as my teammate and that turned out to be an excellent decision because not only did I discover he is insanely good at tennis, but he also had a very snazzy outfit that made him look a bit like Andre Agassi but less bald. We totally dominated, no thanks to me.

After that intense game we were all starving so we headed to the new Silver Lake location of Home which turned out to be just as whimsical and delicious as the original in Los Feliz. We ordered the Avocado Mash which is just avocados mashed onto a piece of thin sourdough. T'was slightly lame for three dollars. I got the tofu scramble which is by far the best of its kind in all of L.A., with the yellow curry being the ingredient that pushes it over the edge into crazy-good territory. The most drool-inducing food at the table however was The Food Monster's Frozen Iced Peach which is a blend of peaches, ice, mango, and coconut milk. At five bucks it's a tad more expensive than your average smoothie but its huge and could practically be your whole meal. I plan on making my own at home as soon as I get to the store.

After brunch we all seemed to have the same thought on our dessert-crazy brains: Scoops, of course. I think we all felt embarrassed about suggesting it as we had just stuffed ourselves like August Gloop proteges, but one of us sort of whispered it and that was all it took--we were off to Hel-Mel for the best gelato in the land. Scoops is always amazing, but they were in rare form--I tasted practically all the vegan flavors of the day: Vanilla Jack Daniels and Avocado Alcohol were good but I ended up getting Chocolate Sunflower Seed and Almond Mocha. Annnnnd that is the beauty of Scoops--when you order a One Scoop Cup you actually get two scoops! Oh Scoops, way to do your party in the great American obesity epidemic.

We returned to the The Food Monster's casa where literally all of us proceeded to take three-hour food coma naps before our raucous poker game and subsequent Tecate-filled Wet Hot American Summer theme party that night (I dressed up as The Cure Girl). It wasn't the most productive day, unless you count excessive eating and drinking as productive. Actually that sounds pretty good to me!


Home
2500 Riverside Dr.
Los Angeles, CA 90039
323.665.0211

Scoops
712 N. Heliotrope Dr.
Los Angeles, CA 90029
323.906.2649