"Hello, Dolly!" on Broadway: Bette Midler is a Ham & You'll Eat It Upby Randi / November 23, 2017
My recent trip home to Philly and NYC was jam-packed with new and delicious vegan food options, from the carrot lox at Orchard Grocer to Philly’s amazing new joints Wiz Kid and Goldie. Add in all the incredible new finds at Trader Joe’s and I was almost overwhelmed with vegan options, especially considering my dearth of options this past summer in Central Asia! With vegan treats coming at me from all sides, you’d think it would be hard to choose a favorite, but that was the easy part. The new (at least in my book, come on I’ve been gone forever) outpost of Juice Merchant, an all-vegan 100% organic cafe, on Montgomery Avenue in Narberth wins that honor. (There’s also one in Manayunk.) The food, while not Landau-levels of otherworldly perfection, is solidly good, sometimes great; the menu is the exact perfect size for offering tons of options but not being overwhelming (us vegans aren’t used to having such choice!); the drinks menu is flawless; the staff is insanely nice; and the desserts – guys – the desserts are from Vegan Treats. Finally a place on the Main Line with a constant supply of that peanut butter mousse!
If you’re a devoted reader, you know that if I don’t have salad access, I’m pretty cranky. I love salad, what can I say, I’m a total boring stereotype. I’m also a big fan of Joey so I love sandwiches, especially those that can pass as somewhat healthy. This in large part explains why I loved Juice Merchant so much – their menu is composed primarily of interesting salads and fun but still healthy sandwiches, so it’s like it’s tailor-made for my tastes. It reaches that hard-to-find balance between fun-but-greasy-tummy-ache food on one side of the spectrum and so-raw-and-health-conscious-that-it-tastes-like-feet on the other. Everything I tried – and hoo boy, did we try a lot – was good, and some was great. And next time I’m in town, I know some easy tweaks (“t-w-e-a-k-ing tweaking”) for when I order that, given how nice and accommodating the staff was, I’m sure they wouldn’t mind making. And I’ll share my thoughts on those tweaks herein so you can use them if/when you go. And if you’re in the area, you should.
THE FOOD
For dinner one evening between my party, we tried the three sandwiches and one flatbread. I know you’re thinking, ‘dude you JUST said how much you love salads and I see a prettayyyy prettayyy big salad section on the picture of the menu above so are you a liar or what?’ And I know, I was going to order at least one salad but guess what, ALL the sandwiches come with side salads! So it’s like winning extra prizes and getting to try two things when you get a sandwich! I mean OBVIOUSLY if I had my druthers I would have gotten a full salad too but I was with sandwich-preferers and honestly you can’t lose with this menu. Damn I LOVE side salad inclusions! My first choice was the Vegan Cubano, because I love jackfruit and I love the cubanos I’ve had in the past (like at Blackbird in Philly, man alive, but definitely a place that veers towards the too-fun-for-me side of the spectrum). Juice Merchant’s cubano was made with dehydrated jackfruit, vegan cheese, dijon mustard, and pickles. Dehydrating the jackfruit is a really interesting move. I’m not sure how necessary it is, since it makes the sandwich a little drier than it would be otherwise, but it gives the sandwich a kicking smokiness which is the payoff. I think my edition needed a bit more on the pickle-side to cut all that dark smokiness, and maybe a piece of lettuce would help as well. It also didn’t have that much cheese, which is usually a good thing for me but maybe the teensiest bit more would have been good. But my two non-vegan dining companions thought it was amazing and I’m very particular, so it’s all good. It came on a cute little English-muffin-almost-looking bun that gave it the right bread-to-filling ratio. I’m all about ratios. ALSO, the side salad it came with had chickpeas and a great balsamic-based dressing so yay!! This entire big platter was only $9.50, which, living in London and coming from NYC in the days before, seemed just about free to me.
Jackfruit cubano
My next top choice (I have a lot of tops and bests and favorites, as you know) was the BLTA, a twist on the classic with automatic avocado. Automatic avocado is a surefire way to win me over, especially outside of the UK where the avocado might actually be good. The B in this sandwich was made from portobello mushroom, flavored and cooked like bacon, and it was delicious. The ratio (I’m all about ratios) of the mushroom bacon to tomato to lettuce to avocado was right, and the regular sandwich bread it was on was grilled and it was all perfect. It had a good amount of red onion too, which normally I hate but it worked well here. This was my fave sandwich by far. Just so perfect and delicious. This whole big mess of food (minus the chickpeas in the cup; they were from another person’s plate and I wanted them, but the chickpeas on the salad were again included I love this place) was also $9.50 which like come onnnn it’s almost annoyingly well-priced. They could easily raise their prices, I think.
the BLTA
The last item from the sandwich board we tried this evening was the Avocado Toast, which is always great and didn’t disappoint here. They offer it with either tomato and sprouts or arugula and pine nuts; both options cost the same, $6. This is avocado toast that won’t be the reason you can’t buy a house, millennials! Look at the size of this plate for $6. I cannot even. One good avocado in London will cost that much, I mean if such a thing existed. It’s hard to find pine nuts in the wild that don’t cost you an extra $20 so we ordered that option. So good! I really can’t with this whole mess costing $6. And on the Main Line!
Avocado toast
You can order all the sandwiches as is, on wraps, on multigrain bread, on gluten-free buns or wraps, or in lettuce wraps. I love all the options.
Lastly, we ordered the mushroom flatbread. There are three flatbreads, including one Hawaiian style made with jackfruit that sounds amazing. This is a big ole pizza-like shebang for $10, with mushrooms, walnuts, onions, garlic, tomatoes, and topped with red onion, parsley, mint, and lemon juice on top of a whole lot of melted cheese. I think they use Daiya – I’m not sure, I should have asked, but it seemed like Daiya – so if you don’t absolutely adore Daiya or just a lot of cheese in general, ask for less cheese than usual. I don’t mind Daiya – I’d prefer if they switched to Violife, which is the best and would be amazing even in an overdose – so the one change I’d make is the lemon juice. I don’t think it’s necessary and I think that was the culprit that detracted from the goodness overall of all the rest of the ingredients. There was something just a tad off, sharp, and I think it was lemon juice. The mushrooms and cheesiness without it would be like creamy and warm and amazing. The mushroom and nut mix is a great idea to add more substance, and the bread was a little crispy and a little chewy. Overall it was pretty good.
I can’t wait to try the rest of the food menu. My mom raves about the grilled cheese sandwich – and it’s only $5 with tomato and a dollar extra for the portobello bacon, so like, damn. The salads looked amazing, and I think the salad menu would be even more stellar with maybe a protein add-in option for all the salads overall. One had seitan, one had crispy tofu, and while I’m positive that they would add them to your salad choice if you asked, it would be easier and very cool if it was just listed, like ‘add crispy tofu for $2’ or whatever like that. The only weird thing about the menu (not actually weird, just weird to me) is the curious lack of tempeh in sight! Usually vegan places are all about the tempeh (as am I). It’s not bad, just weird to see (or not see!). If they make some menu changes seasonally or something I’d love to see a tempeh reuben oh oh my god I’d fly in just to try it. Maybe instead of the more basic options like the grilled portobello sandwich, which has been our only option at restaurants for so long that I can’t see many vegs ordering it when so many amazing options exist here.
Anyway, that’s enough about food. Juice Merchant also has a killer drinks menu – juices, smoothies, and coffee! I didn’t take a pic of the coffee options because I’m not a coffee drinker but even so I was still impressed by the extensive list.
The smoothie options sound great, and given the existence of the hemp and soy protein powders in the Protein Power smoothie, I bet you could add that to the others if you asked (as I would because I’m a protein powder fiend). I don’t know what the Blue Majik in the Cool Blue smoothie is but I wish I noticed that when I was there and asked! Those combos sound great, as do the juice options. We tried the Beet It juice and it was good. It was premade in the display case which helps speed things up if you’re in a hurry. The carrot-cinnamon-apple-maca options sounds like the first good use of maca! I’ve never been able to figure out how to use it so as not to vom but this sounds worth a try for sure. Genius. I love the $7.95 price for all the drinks, damn, especially having come from NYC where a small juice was like $11. I still can’t get over the Banana Whips and how amazing they sound (I LOVE banana whips) and how I was too full to try one. Le sigh. Next time! I love that they add granola; I wonder if it’s house made. And an Acai Bowl! Next time I’m going for breakfast. Except I need to try a salad. Dammit there’s too much!
THE DESSERT
Speaking of too much:
Juice Merchant gets Vegan Treats treats delivered every Thursday, and the selection is off the chain. They have the giant cinnamon buns (they are GIANT) which are the best ever. They have the peanut butter mousse brownie-cake bars which are THE BEST EVER. (Everything from Vegan Treats is the best ever, if you didn’t know.) They have the whoopie pies (three flavors!), the donuts (oh my god), and – THE CANNOLIS! I am NEVER able to find the cannolis because they’re usually just at Grindcore in South Philly and when do I ever get to go to South Philly anymore. So this is exciting. I got everything. It keeps!! IT KEEPS.
HELLO LOVER |
DANISHES? |
Okay I’ll stop. It’s all the best. I’ve never seen those Avocado Truffles before and I’m not sure if they’re Vegan Treats or Juice Merchant-made but I loved them!
Aside from the VT, there’s MORE dessert that is indeed house-made, and it’s amazing. We tried the chia pudding and the avocado mousse that you can sort of see in the big display case picture below. Both were SO good. I think I preferred the avocado mousse more even though I’m a huge chia head (ch ch ch chia!) because they made that subtle cocoa flavor just spot on.
The best part (how many best parts did I already say there were?) aside from the great food and drinks and the amazing desserts was how nice the staff was. And that there’s a big clean bathroom. And that they give a discount for teachers which I LOVE. Hooray for being kind to teachers. I can’t get over how perfect this place is and how close it is to my USA home. I can’t wait to go back and I highly recommend that you go if you can. Next time I think the chocolate peanut butter banana whip will be my first order of business. Or the carrot-maca juice. Or the blue magik smoothie. Or the veggie burger; I must try theirs! Or the cabbage and seitan salad! Oh my god I want everything. Who am I kidding it will be the peanut butter mousse cakey-pie thing. Okay now I’m hungry and I have to cook for myself ughhhhh. Go and enjoy!
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Vegan Goodies at Smorgasburg, Brooklyn (Dumbo)
Under the bridge like a troll
Today, I had the pleasure of roaming around Dumbo, Brooklyn in the beautiful (and unseasonably strong) sunshine for Smorgasburg, the Brooklyn Flea Food Market. It’s a crazy varied array of food stalls in Williamsburg on Saturdays, hence the name, with a smaller version on Sundays in Dumbo. The Dumbo version has fewer vendors, I think, but also lesser crowds, which is great. Today, I found several vegan options while I got sunburnt and couldn’t find a toilet without a thirty minute line. Fun times! Let’s see what we found!
  I also spotted this Hummus stand! I imagine that the company isn’t really called Hummus, because that would be pretty dumb (“Oh what’s your name? Hummus? Ok, I’ll google that to find out more about you!” says a soon-to-be-very-frustrated individual). The hummus on offer looked pretty splendid, but I told myself it was bad form to buy something at this fair that I make pretty much every day.
Instead, my second food installment came from Bombay Sandwich Company. I’ve heard good things about their all-vegan Indian-inspired sandwiches, so I decided to try one. I ordered the Kale & Cumin, though The Bomb (a garam masala and potato one) is the most popular. And food with ‘bomb’ in the name tends to be pretty amazing. (See, e.g., Vegan Treats.) I waited for about 20 minutes, which seemed absurd in this environment. Finally, they called my name. This was…ok. It was mostly purple cabbage, and I didn’t notice any kale, which made me mad. My friend said she spotted some green shreds in her piece, but that’s not exactly enough to warrant putting kale in the title. It had a thin great northern bean puree, which was good, as were the chutneys topping the bread. However, the sandwiches are billed as being ‘sealed’, so when I saw that they were all just regular pieces of toast, sliding and letting the fillings out, it was a bit disappointing. I think I’ll spend my $8 elsewhere next time. |
 First up was Asia Dog, which can make most of its specialty creations with a vegan dog. My friend ordered the purple cabbage-topped Mel & Steve, left, and I ordered the Vinh (above), which comes with banh mi toppings. I said I was vegan and the woman said there was a veg pate substitute, and that it wouldn’t come with the aioli. However, I didn’t notice a pate of any kind, nor the mustard that was listed. Just the carrots and cilantro. Oh well, it was still pretty good, and for $4 each, not a bad deal.
  Please excuse these photos. It was sunny as ALL GET OUT today, and I could barely see let alone take proper pics |
 This may be the best picture I’ve ever taken. No, actually I had to pee so badly I wasn’t even trying. |
Given the heat, the best part of the day was seeing the Kelvin Slush stand. Started from the Kelvin Natural Slush Truck, this company sells the most amazing, natural slushies, like 7-11 Slurpees but so much better in every way (except not as cheap). You pick your slushy base, like Green & Black Tea, Citrus, or Spicy Ginger (the best best one), and then you choose your add-in flavor, like raspberry or white peach. Today, with no Ginger base on offer, I got the Arnold Palmer (citrus and tea mixed, so good) with a guava (!) add-in. It was great! So refreshing, and they really perfected the level of iciness. Although I’ll probably order the Ginger when I can, I loved the Arnold Palmer base, and the guava made the day seem even more summery. Such a perfect treat!
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Unfortunately, I didn’t see Electric Blue Baking Co., The Regal Vegan with their rumored vegan banh mi, the homemade tempeh guy, or the vegan tacos. Next time, Williamsburg! It was still a pretty fun time though! Have you been? What did you get?
Dinner at the new fully vegan Alter London
This week, we had dinner – out – in a restaurant – for the first time since, well, you know. All this shiz. It was our wedding anniversary, so a fairly decent reason to risk our lives for a great meal, I guess. Last week or so I wrote about our return to the theatre, and how thank god it was a great show because if we’d risked our health and well-being for a piece of shit we’d be really mad. Well, same for this wonderful dinner. Alter, the latest hottest all-vegan restaurant in London’s ever-increasing vegan scene, delivered the goods, and I cannot wait to go back and try the rest of the menu.
Alter is the brainchild of chef Andy Hogben, who has cooked at several trendy place and has done a number of popular pop-ups in recent years and finally has a restaurant just a few blocks from my flat (the most important detail). Fun fact, a few years ago, he did a special dinner at The Frog Hoxton that we had tickets to, and then I got sick (pre-Covid), so husbo went with a friend and sent me pictures and it was torture. I was all (Sherie Rene Scott impression coming) “thissss shoulda been myyy tiiiime” but finally MY TIME HAS COME.
Alter’s whole concept reflects Andy’s sort of veganism (which is I think fairly recent? I could be wrong, it’s happened before, also what is time) – less focused on meat substitutes and the kind of “fun” food we find in abundance as a result of London’s obsession with vegan junk food bars. The menu focuses instead on fascinating flavor combinations from various cultures, especially those that are Not British. It’s very Thai-Malaysian-Chinese-other South Asian fusiony made hipster but in a great way. As my tastes go more towards vegetables than burgers, this is my kind of place for sure. Also, husbo and I debate a lot over the very stupid topic of ‘if you had only one cuisine to eat for the rest of your life what would it be’ and we usually narrow it down to Chinese and a few South Asian contenders, so this combo of all the bests really speaks to us.
Okay enough rambling. You know how much we love overordering, and if there were maybe 2 fewer items on the menu we prob would have just been like ‘BRING US ONE OF EVERYTHING’ which was my family’s favorite pastime at V Street in Philly (RIP). (Good thing we didn’t; we still brought leftovers home.) Instead, we finally decided on 3 from Column A (the small bites), 3 from Column B (the starter sizes), and 1 from Column C (the mains). Most of the dishes are shareable, or everything is if you’re with someone you don’t have to stand on ceremony with. I think we ordered a good amount, but there are a few changes I’d make for next time.
COLUMN A
Our superb waitress (thankfully wearing a mask, although the too loud music made it hard to hear her despite how hard she was trying to yell; please lower the music so your staff doesn’t go hoarse! (also we couldn’t really hear each other either and we are NOT OLD I SWEAR)) recommended the Kung Pao crackers, so we got those as well as the rice-fermented mustard green miang laos and the salted watermelon and coconut miang khams. Now I don’t know what miang means and it seems important, so I’m going to look it up: Oh just as I predicted it means FORKING DELICIOUS LITTLE PIECE OF HEAVEN.
Let’s start with the salted watermelon miangs, because they were my favorite. Well, everything is my favorite here. But I really loved these because, if you have ever eaten with me, you know my favorite kind of food is food that I can put in a raw leaf of some kind. You might think that limits things but I have put literally every food on lettuce, no joke. Anyway, this little parcel of goodness was I think a betel leaf? or like that? because it reminded me sooo much of all the best things we ate in Burma all those years ago. Luckily, unlike the great things I ate in Burma, this little leaf jawn did not make me sick for 3 days in a hotel room on stilts on a lake. Anyway, they were AMAZING.
Next up to bat, the Kung Pao crackers were also incredible. I was picturing those little soy-sauce-flavored rice crackers that taste like salt but also cardboard, so I clearly had no idea what was coming. This lovely light rice cracker was filled with shredded green stuff and white stuff and flavor wondrousness, honestly I have no idea but it was SO GOOD. Along with this, they sent out extra treats of rice patties topped with spicy goodness, again, no idea what it is, just put it in your gd mouth.
The little miang laos balls were also like my favorite thing of putting food on a green leaf but instead of an open taco, it was all wrapped up neatly. Thanks friend! This was cold, which I didn’t expect, and a nice contrast from the other bites. I think this was super spicy too? and delicious, I know that much. Guys, I’m sorry, I did not take notes, I forgot that that helps, it’s been so long, also I was too busy trying not to freak out about the celebrity behind me (see below).
COLUMN B
(You know with these headings I’m singing Aladdin, right? good. Next time I will take the Genie’s advice and try all of Column B.)
After our plates of bites, allllll the rest of our dishes came at once, which was a struggle for our tiny little table, a struggle we know quite well due to our aforementioned sublime ordering skills, but a struggle that could be avoided if things were staggered a little. Maybe the naem het could have been served alone since it was like the true starter-y feel and the rest were super mains-y? Anyway, that dish – the crispy naem het with jaew (what did you call me) dressing and ‘erbs (their styling not mine) was a standout, and husbo’s fave of the night. IT WAS SO GOOD.
The crispy naem het was a birds nest mess of fried strands of things (mushrooms? stems?) that we couldn’t really discern from the waiter because of the music but whatever, it was delicious. You know I’m not the world’s biggest fan of fried food but this was ace. You take one of the raw green leaves (yesss), put some fried strands in it, add some of the fresh herbs, roll it up, and dip it in the sauce pot (and you got cheesy blasters, and then meatcat goes off in his um spaceship). At least we thought those were the instructions we were given – later, our waitress said something that made it seem like we had no idea what we were doing. Doesn’t matter, whether we did it right or wrong it was forking amazing. So much flavor, so many different flavors mixing together in a surprising and wonderful way. A must get!
Another absolute must-get is the charred jordan cabbage, with kolae coconut curry. This dish is only £9 and what a value – on a normal night eating at home, this dish alone would be enough for the two of us, maybe with some rice. I’m serious, that picture doesn’t show how big that hunk of cabbage is. Without a knife (only chopsticks and spoons on the table), I was worried that I would have to pick up an entire head of cabbage and bite into it head first while wearing a dress, but of course that wasn’t the case. The cabbage was so tender and the leaves separated at the touch of the chopsticks. This is the dish I am going to try to recreate at home, and fail miserably I’m sure.
The coconut curry that surrounded the cabbage was one of the best curries I’ve had. It was perfect in every way, salty but not too salty, coconutty in that great way but without any visible overpronunciation of coconut milk, just a surprisingly treaty, complex dish for something that seems so simple. I would truly pick this up every week and eat at home with rice.
We also really enjoyed the Chengdu street tofu, not that it was like any tofu we had on the streets in Chengdu (you couldn’t eat this and walk at the same time! also it didn’t burn our faces off!). It was a soupy dish that was best eaten with a spoon out of the bowl rather than putting on your own plate. The flavors were on the mellower side so the dish was almost comforting, like a soupy sales should be.
COLUMN C
The only disappointer was the Xi’an-style knife-cut noodles. It’s not that they were bad at all, they just were not impressive like everything else was. (Also the fact that they are ‘knife-cut’ isn’t really much of a selling point; I mean, you cut the dough with a knife instead of what, scissors? teeth?) The flavors didn’t really hit; the dish was sort of bland, a little plain. Maybe we are just spoiled because we actually had noodles in Xi’an (omg the Xi’an night market noodles…and the spicy tofu…and the fresh jackfruit…omg and that coconut milk…dammit now I’m remembering all this glory). But this dish, unlike all the others, was missing a punch. It was the only thing that wasn’t a ‘wow’. Of course it could be your fave dish, no harm no fowell (to quote Estelle), I guess we prefer noodles that burn our faces off (we really like things that burn our faces off). I’ve heard really great things about the laksa, so next time we will definitely be trying that instead.
Even though we were stuffed to the brim, we had to try the dessert. Alter has just one dessert, but it’s a good one – mango sticky rice.
This was a really lovely iteration of a classic, kind of saltier than normal but in a way that really really worked. And I am a sucker for edible flowers. So pretty! You can’t go wrong with mango sticky rice and this was delicious and the perfect size for sharing. Mango sticky rice is just the best, right? In Thailand, at the annual Vegetarian Festival, I had it from a cart that stored their cut-up mango next to their cut-up durian, so the scent of the durian, that overpowering devil’s anus scent, had infiltrated the taste of the mango. And it was still DELICIOUS.
So, overall, dinner at Alter was a huge win. I cannot wait to go back. It’s the kind of small plates fine vegan dining that London needed, one that focuses on flavors and vegetables rather than burgers and fries. It reminded me of a Michelin-starred restaurant we ate at in Cambodia that I can’t remember the name of. My god I am dropping a lot of travel brags in this post; I sound like a full-on Gwyneth, sorry I just miss traveling.
Alter is located inside the Leman Locke hotel, just south of Aldgate East tube station. There’s a cafe on the ground floor (with great sounding smoothies, which I live on even more than food wrapped in lettuce), and a spiral staircase (and elevators) up to the second floor (I’m sorry, “first floor”) where Alter is located. We actually had dinner in this space a few years ago but it was a different, less-entirely-vegan restaurant, so I hope Alter stays much longer – like forever. Because I’m gonna be a regular. (Well, within reason; I still am into hermit life.)
ALTER, ALDGATE EAST, LONDON, ENGLAND, UK, CRUMBLING WORLD
Water speed: They do the stupid thing nearly everyone does where their water glasses are freaking thimbles, but they give you the carafes and the waitress was EXCELLENT at refreshing our carafe. She had to do it at least 12 times because I drink so much, but I didn’t once need to dip into my liter in my purse, which is rare in restaurants so really speaks highly of her attention.
Service: Our waitress was great! Top marks.
Bathrooms: There are two single-serves through a hallway behind the bar. They are really spacious and modern and clean and they smelled so good that I took a picture of the fragrance stick jawn. It is SUPER confusing when you come out because there are doors on each side of the area but one is locked, so you will eventually find your way back to the restaurant space.
Food: Soooo good, a great new addition to London’s incredible scene, whether you’re vegan or in denial.
Bonus: Alfred Enoch was sitting behind us. If it’s good enough for celebrities it’s good enough for you! Everyone there was sooo hip and cool and it made us feel simultaneously not cool but also like we were getting cool by osmosis, which is interesting.
