Make No Bones About It We're Vegan


Tuesday, September 4, 2012

A Vegan Vacation or Two Psychos Take a Hike

Psycho boy and I took a vacation last month. We currently take a break two times a year. Since Veganville usually gets slammed from September through mid January, a vacation was now or never, or then or never, since vacation is over.
We have a lot of changes coming down the pike, but we couldn't even think about changing anything up until we took some down time.

Psycho Boy and I are Woody Allen type New Yorkers, who have never camped or followed a trail or a mountain anywhere too rural. I take that back. Psycho Boy did quite well as a Boy Scout until the scoutmaster trusted him with some matches. Needless to say I was never a Girl Scout, but when I was in 6th grade I went away with scout friends to a dude ranch for a weekend. I never saw a horse because I spent the entire weekend in the rec room gambling.

Several friends suggested we go to the Russian River which is just an hour and half away from Oakland, Ca. They told us that the trails and Redwoods were beautiful. We decided to brave the great outdoors so I packed my allergy meds, Psycho Boy took 2 weeks of psych meds and some mosquito repellent. I threw out his matches. Life is to be embraced and besides we could always turn back unless of course Bigfoot ate us first. (cancel cancel)

We yelped Vegan restaurants and decided to stop and eat lunch at the Sunflower Center in Petaluma on the way. The Sunflower Center's menu is mostly raw, all vegan and the ambiance is cozy and comforting.
Crazy Boy (aka Psycho boy aka Larry) had the Mediterranean wrap. It was filled with eggplant, a spicy tomato sauce, and Larry said too few kalamata olives. The wrap itself was more like a Spinach Injera. I am surprised Larry liked it all given his immense dislike for the Ethiopian sponge bread.

PB also got some weird ass gluten free spinach muffin. I think it was called a "spuffin". Tasted like a door stopper to me. Not that I go around licking the floor or anything. It was paired with a very thin miso gravy, something you might eat at a Thanksgiving from hell.
That is a hemp chocolate shake behind the spuffin. It had the same consistency as the gravy, but Crazyboy liked it. I think he just liked the idea of hemp.




I have a love affair with kale and cashew cheezes and avocado. I think we broke up after this lunch though. Yes, it was beautifully plated. There was nothing inherently bad about the dish, just basically flavorless. I was a little disappointed but just so happy to be going somewhere, that I ate quite a bit.


That's me running for dear life because I heard a bird chirp.


That's Crazy Boy in front of the Twisty Tree, explaining to passersby that the Twisty Tree is what the synapses of his brain look like without meds. He then asked some German tourists for matches. Haben Sie einen matches.


Here I am pretending not to know the little matchboy.

We loved our cottage efficiency at Creekside Lodge and had a wonderful time there. The health food store in town was exorbitant but we were lucky enough to stumble upon a Farmer's Market one day where we picked some fruit and veggies to accompany one of the best breads we ever had. Raymond's Bakery is not exclusively a vegan bakery but they do have a garlic rosemary vegan round bread that wowed us. After a day at the River we picked up some hummus in a nearby grocery store and ate it with the fruits and veggies and bread.

Here we are so happy to have braved the unknown and to have outrun Sasquatch. All in all it was a great vacation where no one gambled and no one lit anything on fire.





19 comments:

  1. So you don't have birds in Oakland? Hmmm. Actually, I understand your urbanitis perfectly. I am the first generation in my family to brave camping and hiking. I once took my mother on a walk in a state park that happened to be across the road from our house (the year we tried living "in the country," and she was hyperventilating with the fear that an axe murderer would find us. An axe murderer from the city, mind you, not a Sasquatch, mountain lion, wolf or some other creature from the wilds of the park. I'm glad it all turned out well, and you survived such a daring vacation. Just don't get any ideas about mountain climbing or weird stuff like that.

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  2. Now that's my kind of vacation! We love the great outdoors. :)

    Too bad the restaurant was a disappointment, but it sounds like you had a great time otherwise.

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  3. Sounds like a great vacation, Gi. Glad nothing was lit on fire. :oP

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  4. an axe murderer, Andrea. Why do you feed my fears? See...that's a play on words. feed my fears... you know because this is a food blog.
    You are a very brave woman.
    I grew up in Brooklyn amongst pigeons of the great outdoors.

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  5. I know Molly. The restaurant was fun though. Vacation was awesome. Thank you.
    Boy you guys are outdoorsy ;)

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  6. Veganosaurus- Fantastic vacation, thank you. Although the fire extinguisher that I carried everywhere got a litlte heavy after a while.

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  7. The trip sounds like lots of fun! I'm glad you were able to make it out intact and without catching anything (or anyone) on fire! Sometimes the wild outdoors is just the place for rejuvenation, especially when living in the city. Plus, garlic rosemary bread? Count me in!

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  8. Awesome, it's great to have a little break from usually scheduled programming. I'm a city girl myself but I think it'd be great to get into the open.
    Weird restaurant, kind of. The "spuffin" sounds, um, interesting.

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  9. Me to too, I was inspired to make it out, adn I am now good friends with Smokey the Bear Robinson.
    You are in like flynn!

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  10. Thank you, FF. I was much needed.
    I know... interesting haha
    spuffins mean nuffin

    ReplyDelete
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