My good friend Sara and I met a few years ago at a yoga class. We instantly hit it off, and started doing everything together...grocery shopping, dining, working out. She even moved into my building.
But over the past couple of months, we've both been on crazy schedules. No more hanging out. Not even a quick phone call.
So imagine my surprise when Sara called to tell me she got engaged to some guy named JJ! What?!? How did this happen? I've never even met the guy!
Well, after weeks of juggling our schedules, Sara and I finally arranged a day for JJ and me to meet. So when that time came, I called Sara to get the deets.
The plan: meet at her place and take JJ to lunch...alone. She'd made other plans.
"Ok...how do I get out of this?" I thought.
But I decided to play nice and agreed to take JJ to one of my favorite vegan-friendly restaurants--Asian Mint in North Dallas.
Asian Mint has a sister location in Highland Park called The Mint, but
the North Dallas location offers a larger variety of entrées for
vegans...and they have sushi, too (JJ's a big fan).
Sadly, we got there
too early for Sushi Hour, but JJ and I still had a great time getting
to know each other over Asian Mint's regular menu offerings. Vegan
appetizers include edamame, seaweed salad, fried veggie egg rolls (they
don't contain egg), and fresh summer rolls. The summer rolls'
accompanying peanut sauce is not vegan (contains milk), but you can
request sweet and sour sauce instead.
Several noodle dishes can be
ordered vegan by omitting egg, and tofu is listed as a protein option.
Pad kee mow is made with rice noodles, bells, and tomatoes wok-tossed
in a spicy Thai chili sauce. The pad kee mow woon sen is a similar
dish, but served with clear noodles. Kua kai is a traditional Thai rice
noodle dish served over a bed of lettuce and topped with green onions.
Pad see lew is a mild, wok-tossed noodle dish with broccoli, and bok
choy in a black soy sauce. Rad nah is essentially the same dish, but
prepared with a heartier sauce.
A special house sauce is the base of
the pad woon sen: clear noodles, snow peas, onions, tomatoes,
mushrooms, baby corn, and bean sprouts. Vegan stir-fries include Asian vegetables with tofu, spicy kung pao tofu, and all fried rice dishes can be made vegan upon request.
My selected entrée
was the egg-less pad kee mow woon sen with tofu. The tofu was perfectly
seared--crisp on the outside, but still tender in the middle. That's
important to us vegans because, let me tell ya, there's some pretty
jankety tofu out there. I ordered my dish at medium-high heat. It was
great, but I might go with medium heat next time (they're serious about
spice here). JJ ordered the Thai red curry. The curries are not vegan,
but he didn't mind...considering he ordered his with chicken.
JJ turned
out to be a really cool guy. I'm happy to hand Sara over to him. And I
can't wait to see how his eating habits will change once they're
married. Sara's a vegetarian who doesn't allow meat in her house...and
she's a feisty one.
