Well folks, the vegan picks for restaurant week in Downtown Norfolk and Ghent are few and far between, but at least we have some options! Click each restaurant below for their restaurant week menu. Before you head out to any of these restaurants, you may want to call and confirm if certain dishes are in fact vegan or can be made vegan. I haven’t made any calls myself, but I’ve included those places offering dishes that seem like they should be vegan. And unfortunately vegans will not be able to enjoy all three courses on restaurant week since the desserts seem to all be non-vegan, but maybe you can talk them into a substitution for you.
California Pizza Kitchen - Hummus appetizer and veggie pizza without cheese.
Freemason Abbey - House salad and balsamic grilled eggplant, though be warned that Freemason Abbey uses meat stock in their rice which comes with the vegetarian dish. Make sure you ask for a different side.
Monastery - House salad and pasta florentine dish. Surprising that there are options at this decidedly un-vegan, Hungarian restaurant. I’m not sure about any of the other, more traditional dishes, but my suspicion is that none of them is vegan or vegetarian. If you find out something different, let us know!
Pasha - Hummus or kale salad appetizer and vegetarian plate entree (a few items on this platter are not vegan, so you’ll need to ask for a substitution).
Rajput Indian Cuisine - Vegetable samosa appetizer, vegetable jalfrezi or chana masala entree, and gajjar halwa (carrot pudding) for dessert. This is the only fully-vegan, three course meal you can get on restaurant week and it’s only $20! Rajput is great.
Boot - Many of the Boot’s dishes are vegetarian and some can be made vegan upon request, so just let your server know and they’ll give you your options at the table. I ate dinner recently at the Boot and had some great vegan dishes. **update** The sorbet on the Boot’s restaurant week menu is vegan! Thanks to Kristen for letting us know. And she said it was pretty tasty.
Remember, you can follow us on Twitter for up-to-the-minute Hampton Roads vegan dining news and conversation @veganHR. For local vegan food porn, check out our flickr stream.
The sorbet at The Boot is vegan. I ate there on Friday and when the server showed us the dessert menu I asked if any of it was vegan. She said no and came back a little later and asked me if I would like sorbet instead. It was pretty good.
My girlfriend works at a California Pizza Kitchen and wanted you to know that the hummus appetizer is not vegan unless you get it on their Neapolitan dough. The same goes for the pizzas.
Thanks, Joe!
So the hummus itself is vegan, right? It’s just the bread/dough that isn’t?