RESTAURANT REVIEW - Tarka Indian Kitchen / Daily Juice / Sweet Ritual

Tarka Indian Kitchen
Tarka South Austin
5207 Brodie Lane
Austin, TX 78745
(512) 892-2008
Tarka Round Rock
201 University Blvd
Round Rock, TX 78665
(512) 246-1922
Tarka North Austin
2525 W. Anderson Lane
Austin, TX 78757
(512) 323-0955
Sunday-Thursday: 11 am to 9 pm
Friday & Saturday: 11 am to 10 pm

Daily Juice
4500 Duval St
Austin, TX 78751
(512) 380-9046
Open seven days a week. (Hours change seasonally.)

Sweet Ritual
4500 Duval Street
Austin TX, 78751
Monday-Friday: Noon – 10 pm
Saturday & Sunday: 10am – 10pm


Yesterday, I spend a relaxing day out with a friend, walking around central Austin, eating yummy food, and seeing another friend's play. We started out by having lunch at Tarka Indian Kitchen in Round Rock.



Tarka marks all of their vegan items with a "V", but a lot of the dishes are served with yogurt chutney, so make sure to specify that you don't want it. I decided to get the vegetable coconut curry (mild) and some roti (the naan isn't vegan).



The curry was super creamy, smooth, and absolutely delicious. At some point in the future when my gall bladder is behaving better, I'm going to try this again with a medium spice level.

After leaving Tarka, we drove down to the park behind (in front of?) Spider House, and spent some time walking around, enjoying the gorgeous weather. I needed something from Wheatsville, so I got to give my friend the grand tour (he'd never been, and was very impressed!) We then drove over to Daily Juice / Sweet Ritual for some dinner and yummy desert.



We started with a raw enchilada from Daily Juice. My omnivorous friend and I both liked it, and he was impressed that raw kale could taste that good. We could have got one enchilada for each of us, but we decided to split one to keep room for...



...desert. After much deliberation, we decided on a turtle sundae with added Oreo pieces in a handmade waffle cone dipped in chocolate and crushed Chick-O-Stick. So far, I've absolutely loved everything I've ever eaten at Sweet Ritual, and this sundae was no exception. I can't wait until I get a chance to go back and try a sundae with cookie dough (and perhaps a brownie as well - I don't think I get to eat anything else that week.)

I'm actually kind of surprised that I haven't already done a review of Sweet Ritual, so I'm going to post the past pictures I've taken here. If you're on a diet, you might not want to look...









Here's three more from Tarka -

RESTAURANT REVIEW - The Vegan Nom/Rockin' Vegan Tacos, Austin, TX

The Vegan Nom/Rockin' Vegan Tacos
120 East North Loop-B
Austin, Texas 78751
Tue-Wed: 7:00 am - 3:30 pm
Thu-Sat: 7:00 am - 9:00 pm
Sun: 7:00 am - 3:30 pm

Having finally got done with my 12 hour drive from Missouri, and having had a decent night's sleep, I talked my boyfriend into checking out The Vegan Nom, since I'd heard so many great things about it.




From their Facebook page - "First of its kind in Austin TEXAS, we are vegans who serve up Rockin Vegan Tacos featuring tex-mex breakfast tacos ALL DAY and our signature tacos, bomb nachos, handmade vegan chili con queso and our signature sauces: creamy salsa verde (hot), roasted smoky chipotle (med), and our fresh salsa la roja (mild).

All tacos are fresh and cooked to order. Fresh tasty food takes time. We do not serve any animal products with our tacos. 100% animal free kitchen and staff. We cook all are tacos with grapeseed and safflower oil."




The Jalisco and the Bean Diablo.


The Migas and the Grilled Avocado Reale

The Jalisco was my stand out favorite, with its faux chicken and flavorful spicy sauce. My boyfriend loved the Reale, saying it had a richer, fuller mix of flavors and that he liked the "avocadoness" of it. I liked the Bean Diablo, but it was quite spicy (too much so for my boyfriend), and we both liked the Migas, though he said it was a bit too "tofu-y". We also got chips and queso, which was creamy and delicious with quite a kick, and the large bag of chips was a great way to pick up all the taco droppings.

We used the Scoutmob deal and got our 4 fancy tacos with chips and queso for only $14. This was a great deal, and gave us money left to buy drinks at the convenience store on the property to go with the food.

I can't wait to go back and try some of the other offerings! Yay, vegan tacos!

Mud Pie Vegan Bakery & Coffee House - Kansas City, MO

Mud Pie Vegan Bakery
Facebook Page
1615 W. 39th Street
Kansas City, Missouri 64111
(816) 931-4539
Mon - Fri: 6 am - 9 pm
Sat: 7 am - 9 pm
Sun: 8 am - 7 pm


Yesterday, before my 12 hour drive from Missouri to Texas, I decided to stop at Mud Pie Vegan Bakery, Kansas City's only 100% vegan bakery and coffee house. A warning to all of you who might have problems making decisions - everything in there looks absolutely delicious (and it's all vegan, so that doesn't help narrow anything down!)




Check out all the milk options! Also, soy is standard and free- take *that*, Starbucks!

I ended up getting a vegan cheddar scone, a slice of coffee cake, and an almond milk chai latte. Upon further reflection, this is a bit out of character for me - no chocolate at all?




I liked what I got, but I'm thinking next time I'll pick something chocolate, because it's bound to blow me away. (I'm still dreaming of those mini chocolate bundt cakes...)

Mud Pie Vegan Bakery, Prelimenary

I am currently sitting in Mud Pie Vegan Bakery and Coffee Shop in Kansas City, MO, enjoying a vegan cheddar scone, a slice of coffee cake, and an almond milk chai. I have my iPhone, but the computer is packed up in the van. I have uploaded all my pictures to Flickr with the app, but can't get the code to embed them in a blog post. So, I'm just going to tease all of you with thoughts of vegan baked goods, and I'll make a proper post in 12 hours when I get back to Austin. Yay, driving. (I'm excited. Can't you tell?)

Ruby Red Stir-Fry

Sorry for the ultra-late post today; I was going to go check out Cafe Gratitude and Mud Pie Bakery today and blog about those, but instead, I've been sewing a couple of Tudor-era shirts for my friend Aaron (who has been so nice as to let me stay with him and his wife pretty much the whole time I've been up here in Kansasouri). The good news is that the shirts are almost done! The bad news is that it's 11:45 pm, I'm not packed at all, and I'm supposed to be leaving to go back to Austin tomorrow morning. The original plan was to leave at 7 am, but I'm pretty sure that I have as much chance of making that happen as I do discovering a TARDIS in the front yard with a certain handsome Time Lord waiting to take me on adventures.

*sigh*

In the meantime, here's some pictures of this really delicious stir-fry I made about 10 weeks ago. I think it fits nicely with my previous beet post.



I started by dicing a tomato, a red bell pepper, and a beet, and sautéed them in a bit of Earth Balance.



When those were nice and soft, I added brown rice and black beans, and made a sauce of peanut butter, mango chutney, Bragg liquid aminos, and salsa. I cooked it for another 5-10 minutes until everything was heated and the flavors had combined. It was super tasty (and so pretty!)

Baba Ganoush

While I've been up here in Kansasouri, I've had the opportunity to hang out (and share the stage!) with my friend Sarah. While over at her house a couple of weeks ago, I happened to mention that I love eggplant.



"Eggplant? Say, my grandmother has a ton of eggplants in her garden that she's trying to get rid of. Want some?"



Free eggplants? Sure, twist my arm. I ended up getting three gorgeous purple eggplants, just about the right size for juggling (which I can't do, though I joked that I was going to try). I spent a week or so trying to figure out what I would make with them. I finally decided that I was in a snacky mood, and that baba ganoush would be just the thing.



I went with this recipe. This was seriously some of the best baba ganoush I've ever eaten. I wonder if Sarah's grandmother has any more unwanted eggplants...?

Chocolate Beet Cupcakes

Even though I missed the Vegan Iron Chef Beet Challenge, I got in on the action unofficially (and a bit late) by making these yummy chocolate beet cupcakes.



The original recipe called for a bundt pan, but since I didn't have one, I decided to make cupcakes instead. Since the batter ended up being enough for about 13 instead of 12, my cupcakes are shaped more like muffins, but don't let that fool you. These are moist, cakey, and downright delicious. I made a few changes - I used homemade applesauce instead of oil, whole wheat flour instead of AP, I didn't dust the tops with sugar (I don't think they needed it), and instead of boiling the beets, I roasted them (using this method).