Vegan Food In Providence

[rax]

I think I may have spent more weekends in Providence than fully at home in 2010. This is awesome, as I love Providence, but as I don't have a kitchen there, I've been eating out a lot. The upside of this is that I've discovered a bunch of vegan food in Providence that I hadn't known about before, and I thought some of you might benefit from hearing about it --- they're all good restaurants for omnivores as well.

• I'd always known about the Garden Grille (warning, website contains Flash) on Hope St. in Pawtucket --- well not always of course, but for a while. They're an all-vegetarian but not all-vegan place that my mother discovered. I'd particularly recommend their amazing drinks and their seitan products; they manage to get the seitan both crispy and moist, which is actually pretty hard. (eredien  is good at it; I've been able to duplicate it, mostly, with a two-stage cooking process, but it's quite time-consuming.) One of these days I will make it to their brunch.
• Right next to the Garden Grille [0] is Rasoi, an Indian place with the same awesome hanging lamps as Namaskar (flash again) in Davis Square. I had passed it by in favor of the Garden Grille on a number of occasions, until a friend told me that they had a vegan and gluten-free brunch on Saturdays. The brunch was amazing, and recently I went back on a different day with eredien , postrodent , ab3nd , and my mother. Their menu has a lot of vegan and gluten-free options marked on it, and they even have a veganable thali. (Well, there's a little bowl of raita, but you can just give it to postrodent , it's cool. Or to whoever. It didn't touch the food.)
• Over on da Hill, there's Julian's Restaurant, which seems biker-hangoutish and has a great beer selection. There are always new things on tap, and I've been able to come in and say "Three weeks ago I was here and had something... smoky?" "Oh I bet it was *something unintelligible*, I bet you'd also like *something else unintelligible*." "Sure, I'll try that OH MY GOD IT TASTES LIKE LAPSANG I WANT IT IN MY FACE." They have great seitan, there's usually a vegan special, they make their own ketchup and it is actually good... oh and the bathroom is basically Steer Roast. [2] Last time I was there there was a Neubauten video playing in it on loop.
• And of course there's Thayer Street, which has a few places I knew I liked (Blue State Cafe, East Side Pockets, and what the hell happened to the original Spike's? Yes, their veggie dogs are vegan) but I only just discovered the delicious vegan pizza offerings of Nice Slice. They even have bike delivery if you're within a mile (and they don't cross the river). Not a sit-down place really, but a great place to go if you're short on time.

[0] And also right next to a barbecue place with a disturbing mural of a somewhat-anthro pig getting ready to eat.

[1] Being vegan usually means ending up lactose-intolerant. I thought I wouldn't have to care; I do. :/ Oh well.
[2] Linked to this and not a normal page because I was totally there when whoever wrote this article was, and I find that entertaining --- and yes, the Minibosses concert did rock that hard.

Comments

Are you an RI-based vegan?

[(Anonymous)]

Hi! I found your blog while I was looking for interview subject for an article I have due on March 1. I'm interested in doing a brief interview with a Rhode Island-based vegan on what it's like to be a vegan and why you choose to be vegan. The article is a vegan-friendly informational piece about being vegan, but I need to speak with someone who's living the lifestyle (I'm currently trying it on for size). Know anyone who might be interested? My email is moira.richardson AT gmail. www.literarytease.com. Happy to speak to you via telephone, email, or in person, your choice. (Sorry for random comment, since it looks from your info page that you are from mass, but I thought I might stumble upon an RI vegan by posting!)