Atlanta Vegan Eats

If you've seen my posts from the past two days, you know I spent the weekend in Atlanta for their first-ever VegFest. Yesterday, I showed you all my pics from the super-successful fest. But tonight, I have pictures from everything else I ate in Atlanta (aside from Friday night's dinner at Cafe Sunflower, which you can see here).

My mama and I stuffed ourselves with free samples at VegFest, but we were still pretty hungry for dessert come 6 p.m. when the fest was over. We met the dudes from Dough Bakery at VegFest, and they informed us that their store is located just a few blocks from the place where we had 8 p.m. dinner reservations. So we decided to have a little cake appetizer.

My mom immediately headed for the dessert case, which was packed with vegan desserts. Dough is a totally vegan bakery:

While I was busy doing something else (more on that in a sec), she was ordering us a big ole slice of Hummingbird Cake — a banana-pineapple cake with cream cheese frosting. She cut it into two pieces for us to share:

While mama was choosing our cake, I was preoccupied with the other side of Dough Bakery! On one side, they serve sweet treats. But the other side is a vegan deli called Gutenfleischer's. They sell homemade vegan deli slices by the pound! They're wrapped in white paper and sold in deli bags, just like at a meat deli.

Here's the "vegan butcher"!

I chose a half-pound of Roast Beef and a half-pound of "Fire" Turkey (turkey slices with habaneros!). The butcher sliced the meat:

And then he weighed the meat:

And then I stuffed it in a cooler to take home to Memphis. After cake and meat slicing, my mama and I killed some more time shopping in Little Five Points. Then, we headed to Sauced, a retro-themed restaurant and bar where the ATL Vegan Drinks chapter was holding a very special post-VegFest after-party.

The four-course menu was ultra-fancy:

I'm not used to eating such fancy meals. And although I prefer comfort food with simple names 99 percent of the time, it's occasionally fun to do the whole farm-to-table foodie thing. The first course included two appetizers — Bluebird Biscuits with Peppered Scuppernong Jam (I have no idea what "scuppernong" means, but it was damn tasty):

And Nori-Wrapped Seared Tofu Scallops with a Balsamic Reduction:

Next up was the second course of salad and soup. The salad was Smoked Portabella Mushroom Carpaccio, Field Arugula, Pomegranate, and Crisp Shallots. Now, I'm no fan of arugula, but it was actually okay here. The smoked mushroom and shallots were wonderful:

The soup was a delectable and soul-warming Roast African Squash Soup with Fuji Apple Compote. I could eat this all day:

For the third course, we had a vegan buffet! Yep, all you can eat. I filled my plate with Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Pickled Purple Frills Mustard Greens and Cider Beurre Blanc, Hen-of-the-Woods Mushroom Stew with Crowder Peas, and Celeriac Cornbread Dressing with Fresh Sage Gravy:

Wow! Everything was so delicious. I think the mushroom stew was my fave. It had some of the biggest crowders I've ever seen! Plus, there were wheat berries, and I LOVE wheat berries. The gnocchi was also something special.

After all that food, I barely had room for dessert. But I wasn't about to miss out on Bittersweet Chocolate Peanut Butter Crisps, Warm Sorghum Pie, and Lavender and White Grapefruit Consume. Although not-so-pretty in this pic, the pie was my absolute fave!

We left Sauced thinking we'd never eat again. We were so full! But the next morning, I woke up with a growling tummy, just like I always do. We met Andrew and Liz from the Book Publishing Company at Soul Vegetarian 2 for a down-home brunch before hitting the road home. Here's me and mama:

The brunch special at Soul Vegetarian includes Tofu Scramble, Vegan Sausage, Sprouts, and Pancakes:

Wow! This was one of my favorite brunches ever! The tofu was moist and perfectly seasoned. The sausage was apparently homemade (most places in Memphis just serve Gimme Lean), and the pancakes were the fluffiest vegan pancakes I've ever had. And with the maple syrup, they tasted like glazed donuts!

I didn't get to eat even a quarter of the vegan awesomeness available in Atlanta. So I'll be back! If you're planning a trip to Atlanta, check out the Crack the Plates guide to veggie restaurants!