Well, this is fun! Thirteen restaurant kitchens in one location. Place your order at the MacDonalds-style kiosk (one of the staff hovered over me, assuming that since I was old, I would not get it) from any or all of the kitchens, pay once, and have your food delivered to one place! I noticed Veganzza on Instagram, a new local place for vegan pizza and with help, figured out that Club Kitchen was the place! So off we went to the corner of Cambie and Expo Blvd.
I stepped up to the kiosk (the person helping me was really just trying to be helpful, so I shouldn't be flippant) and ordered everything vegan from the 13 menus. I realize that is a little sad, and I would have hoped for more. I think that Thai Away Home might have some dishes that are vegan, but they are not noted on their menu. We really came for Veganzza, so anything else is actually a bonus.
We ordered the Vada Bao from Indi Co. This was a tasty Indian spiced mashed potato ball inside a bao. A couple of good chutneys, some onions and grilled chillis which nearly blew my head off. Very tasty except it seemed a little expensive at $15.75. ! I have since noticed that Indi also offers a vegan protein option (Madras chickpeas) but it's a little hard to know where to fit them into a vegan dish (i.e. they offer Biryani or a rice bowl with a choice of proteins but is the rice bowl animal product free?).
Dragon Bowl is also represented among the kitchens, offering a Vegan Bowl with three sides. This was a relative bargain at $12.88 for the medium-sized bowl. You start with your choice of base (brown rice for us) and sauce. We ordered the black pepper sauce hoping it is vegan (no indication on the sauces or the sides and the combo offer comes with a braised egg and soup so there are limited guarantees). For sides, we chose shredded potato, lotus root and edamame, and bean curd. This was a decent offering for sure.
Personal sized Teriyaki Shan Tofu Pizza was our first choice from VeganZza Pizza.These are not cheese pizzas, but each has a unique sauce that makes you realize that you don't miss the cheese. This one had chickpea tofu and chickpea sauce and of course teriyaki, The crust was outstanding with the requisite "leoparding" (not an animal product) and we were impressed.
Next up was the Seoul Food Pizza. Again with a great crust but this time with sweet potato, red cabbage, green onions and some gochujang. The chickpea sauce was again present and made us not miss the cheese. Some places use soy or cashew based cheese but we really didn't mind this alternate type of sauce. At $13 for the personal-sized pizza, we found this to be a pretty good deal. There are 8 different pizzas on their menu!
There are a few tables inside and quite a bunch of tables outside. We saw quite a few people getting food to go or delivered and considering we are in a densely populated area, it is a perfect place for vegans and omnivores. We are sold on VeganZza but wish more of the kitchens would step up their vegan options game.
Food 3 1/2 out of 5
Vegan Options 2 1/2 out of 5
Comfort 3 1/2 out of 5
Service 4 out of 5
Value 4 out of 5
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