(Pre-Post) Concierge Service = 2 Spoiled Adults

The Arusha Savannah

I guess, to start, I should mention that we are staying at the Animal Kingdom Lodge and Resort with Concierge Service to boot. This resort should come at no surprise considering my husband and I both love exploring different cultures, enjoying nature and practicing living green in order to preserve our environment. 

To paint a picture: as we sit on our deck, in the warm, humid sun, rain begins to pour down. It’s raining, but the scene is amazing. Everywhere we look, we are blessed with the opportunity to observe the wildlife that exists on the safari located outside the resort. From giraffes to hogs to pelicans, we observe these beautiful creatures being conserved in the environment they know best - the African safari. It is breathtaking and peaceful. It reminds me of why I am a vegan; why I need to do my part to take care and be the voice for these amazing, intelligent creatures. And trust me, you never get sick of seeing the same scenery; because it never is the same. You always discover something new and interesting.

Concierge Service

Complimentary South African Wine and Beer

As I mentioned, we went ahead and paid the extra, only $50-a-day extra, for Concierge Service and can I tell you it is so totally worth it! Not only is wine and beer complimentary throughout the day, but they have six, yes I said, 6, scheduled food and drink offerings each day:

• MACHEO (Sunrise Offerings): Enjoy tea, coffee and juice for the early risers. 

• MIAMKO (Adventurous Awakenings): Start your adventure with an assortment of fresh fruits, juices, pastries and cereals.

•  VITAFUNIO (Safari Snacks): Take a mid-day break and enjoy a selection of African snacks and beverages. 

• CHAI (Afternoon Tea): Sit back and relax with imported teas, assorted freshly baked scones, cookies and biscuits! A daily MUST in Africa!

• KISIKUSIKU (Twilight Offerings): After an exciting safari, take pleasure in an array of wines, hors d’oevres, and savor African specialty appetizer from our resort restaurants, Jiko and Boma

• REHEMA (Evening Indulgences): Revisit your days activities or plan for tomorrow while treating yourself to a sampling of fine desserts and a variety of premium cordials.

Since I’ll be enjoying these perks throughout my stay, I plan on holding out and writing a full throttle post on all the offerings we discovered. So heads up…it’s worth the wait…

So here is what a vegan can expect to find as a member of the concierge level.

Concierge Level Personal Area with Food, TV, and Internet.

At MACHEO: An assortment of teas with honey or sugar as a sweetener, coffee, and Jungle Juice which is the best tropical fruit blend you have ever tasted! And guess what!? Need organic soy milk!? They have it!!

At MIAMKO: Oatmeal or Quinoa Cereal which can be topped with always available fresh fruit, brown sugar or a blend of brown sugar and crunchy quinoa! They also had peanut butter and jelly available as wel

At VITAFUNIO:  Jungle Juice, Cinnamon Kettle Chips and Spiced Mix Nuts! Which were DELISH! Sweet, Salty and spicy! Nom nom!

At CHAI:Similar to MACHEO with cookies and biscuits. Unfortunately, nothing vegan here. Oh they did have some coffee syrups though...

At KISIKUSIKU: The Hors d'oeuvre were the best! The variety of gourmet bites always changed making this one of our very favorite times to go to the concierge level! I know we're such foodies! Assorted flatbreads and pita with a Trio of Hummus, pickled veggies and olives, crispy corn flour coated tofu with boma mustard, tabouleh, and chilled mango ginger soup to name a few! I'm sure I would have found more if we went everyday!The tofu was our absolute FAVORITE dish!

 At REHEMA: Desserts and Premium Cordials...need we say more :) No vegan desserts but hey who needs dessert when you have Cordials!

Overall, conierge service was the absolute best!!! It was so worth every penny. The people were accomodating and always so helpful. As a vegan, I definitely didn;t feel left out. They had EVERYTHING...well except for lemons...they had to go get some from a restaurant...but heck is that's ALL I'm complaining about then you know this is a must do hands down!

Just to compare, here are the perks of the concierge level at the Hard Rock Hotel at Universal Studios.

  

Breakfast: They had some teas, coffee, fruit and plain oatmeal with brown sugar and raisins. Thankfully I had some Justin's with me cause that went straight on top of my oatmeal!

During the day they had snacks available like bagged chips, pretzels and bottled water (no, no and NO!) and a Happy Hour time which was the only time you could get beer or wine (although we had an awesome employee who hooked us up ;)) and snacks. I found pita and hummus as well as pickled veggies.

So yes that was it! It was a bit disappointing, but the employees were so awesome and personable that we kind of didn't care. It did suck that alcohol wasn't available all day and the food options overall were minimal. It was overall, okay. Would we do it again!? Probably not.

So there ya go! So what do you think!? Which one would you choose?

Where *Vegan* Dreams Come True!

I’m a huge a Disney fan. Actually, I’m in love with Disney. Every time I hear a Disney song or see something Disney related, this overwhelming, euphoric feeling of love and excitement takes over my entire body. My immediate reaction is a smile from ear to ear and a flood of tears that fill my eyes. I can’t help it! My parents raised me in a Disney loving home. To me, it literally is the happiest place on earth and I will never, ever get sick of it. Reading that, it's probably no surprise then that my husband decided to plan a trip too Disney World and Universal Studios for our official honeymoon trip; 9 months from our LAST trip to Disney World in December of 2011. Yeah. We are obsessed! I was thrilled because, one, we were going by ourselves and two, I wanted to take the opportunity to experience as many vegan food options as my tummy could handle. So, to stop before I go into too many details, I'd like to welcome you on my journey to the land where dreams become reality...*Vegan* dreams that is. :)

- Beth 

Vegan Dinner Event at Whole Foods

I recently relocated to the Northern Virginia area a few months ago and one of my favorite events in my new area is the vegan dinner and movie night at the Whole Foods in Reston, VA.  Once a month on a Friday night Whole Foods at this location hosts a dinner with an exclusive vegan menu, and a documentary on plant based living.   For $15 each event participants is served a delicious and healthy vegan meal with several courses, all while meeting with other vegans in the area.  The best part about the event is that all of the profits go directly toward the local Humane Society in Fairfax County.  This monthly vegan and film night has now become my favorite way to spend a low key Friday night with my Split Plate counterpart. 

Two months ago we attended this event for the first time (unfortunately we had to both miss last month's event).  We watched the film “Vegucated” and had a great dinner that included quinoa stuffed roasted peppers, sweet potato salad with blueberry dressing, wheat berry salad with pineapple mint dressing, mushroom burgers with Dijon mustard, and watermelon and lime salad with thyme.  The highlight of the meal was definitely the mushroom burgers with Dijon mustard. 

  I am very different from most vegans in that I am not a mushroom fan and I almost never eat them.  I was very impressed with the burger and ate all of it!  My favorite part of the entire event was watching the film “Vegucated" for the first time.  Vegucated is a documentary that follows three omnivores who agree to eat vegan for 6 weeks.  The film depicts the health benefits of eating a plant based diet, as well as the evolution and change among each person as they learn more about animal agriculture and the benefits of becoming a vegan.  Anyone interested in learning more about the vegan lifestyle would benefit from watching this film.    

For the most recent vegan event at the Reston Whole Foods I was highly impressed once again with the dinner, but not so much the movie.  The film "Grow" wasn't terrible, it was just not very captivating.    “Grow” is a documentary about the growing movement of educated young people who are leaving the cities to take up an agrarian life in order to pursue their dreams of running an organic and sustainable farm.  While I fully support organic and local farmers I unfortunately had a hard time paying attention to the entire documentary.  Maybe I was too distracted by the several courses of amazing food that the Whole Food chefs kept placing in front of me!

The dinner was definitely the highlight of the evening at this event.  The Whole Food Chefs put together a menu that included:  green salad, Italian florentine soup, penne with kale, tomatoes, and olives, kale pie, and sweet potato pudding. The meal was not also delicious but was very healthy and left me feeling full but in a good way!  We were allowed to select from 3 different dressings to go with our green salad with my favorite being the Fig Dressing from one of Dr. Furman’s recipes. 

I actually enjoyed this dressing so much that I did a Google search for Dr Furman's recipes on my phone right away.  I definitely plan on creating this homemade dressing in the near future.  The Italian Florentine Soup was spicy as others around us were complaining that it was a little too much for their tastes.  I really enjoyed the soup…. The more spice the better!  The penne with kale was a great entrée as I love kale and the kale pie on the side was a great addition.  My favorite part of the meal was the sweet potato pudding.  I am really excited that we received recipes for everything that we ate as both Beth and I have decided that the sweet potato pudding is going to be on our holiday menu list this year for desert.

Overall I was very satisfied once again with my vegan dinner at Whole Foods.  I plan to attend these every month if I am able to, as I feel that it is important to both support vegan events in my area as well as nonprofit/animal welfare organizations.  If you live in the DMV area and you are a vegetarian, vegan, or just interested in this diet I highly recommend attending one these dinners!

- Kerry

Veg-Friendly Food Truck Event!!

Geeze! This is what happens when you start a blog the same week you start back at being a full-time college student…your sleeping hours get cut into half, you wish God would have considered 36 hour days, you wish that you could work from home…and then you get angry realizing you work for 8 hours a day but devote 12 hours to work including getting dressed and traveling. Who’s with me!? That’s why they say do what you love and love what you :)

So I have bit of an obsession with Food Trucks; a bit less than before, now that I no longer travel to DC once a week for work, but all the same an obsession. Why? Well, besides the fact I’m a foodie and love to seek out new vegan eats, supporting the food trucks supports small businesses which are extremely important to the local economy. Not only that, food from a Food Truck is unique, fresh and amazingly delish! There has yet to be a Food Truck that disappoints me. It’s seriously gourmet food on wheels. 

Now our Food Trucks have a slight advantage over all the rest. Between the newly renovated Half Street Fairgrounds, event coordinators, Wonky Promotions, and Food Truck trackers, foodtruckfiesta.com, our DC Food Trucks get a lot of advertising and selling opportunities. Monthly Truckeroos, special Food Truck events, showdowns, and each one of them I crave to attend. Unfortunately, that’s not always possible, but when I do go, I want to make sure I’m going when there are tons of vegan options available. It’s my chance to have a feast J. Then I came up with a crazy idea: why not have an all veg truck event!? Of course in my mind was the offspring of Truckeroo and Vegfest (I can’t help it I think big!) but none the less it was an idea and I was determined to act on it!

I made my rounds of contacts to find the right person to help me with this: Jeff Kelly with Wonky Promotions. I sent him my idea, we chatted and his offer – a four truck deep pre-Nats game tailgating event. Reminder! Have to start SMALL! Of course, I agreed! He gave me the date, the trucks involved and now it was in my hands to advertise!

But then life happened…I was on travel for a week with limited access to the internet; my partner in crime, Ms. K couldn’t make it; my husband had soccer, my parents were busy…and if anyone knows me, I’m a loner, except for my family and Kerry, and worse, I hate traveling alone because my sense of direction and street sense both SUCK! So of course, I worried…for two weeks. I did all the advertising I could do, and while I did get “Goings”, very little communication was made. Did I make Jeff do all this work for nothing? I hope not! And then some very exciting moments happened! VegDC.com, the Veracious Vegan, and Loudon Veg advertised the event on their FaceBook page, and DC Vegan Drinks sent out a newsletter about it! Now to you all that may not sound like anything to be excited about, but to me, it was something! It was thrilling and it provided me some hope…until the day arrived. 

August 17^th arrived and all I could worry about was one, if people would arrive and two, trecking it into DC by myself with my five-year-old. I could have backed down and not attend, but this was important to me and that was NOT an option. I picked my daughter up early, who was thrilled to ride the metro and off we went. We arrived safe and surprisingly, earlier than I had expected. I walked into the Fairgrounds, weather, overcast, but perfect – not too hot, not too chilly - and the place was packed…with Nats pre-gamers doing one thing..DRINKING! No line at the Food Trucks! Perfect! So I walked up to the first truck Surfside and ordered vegan tacos with guacamole. Yumm! Next, I walked up to DC Empanadas and asked for vegan empanadas. “No vegan ones today. Just the vegetarian.” I was told. Hmm okay I thought. Veg is veg. So I walked over to DC Slices and asked if they had vegan pizza available. “No, we don’t have vegan pizza today. Sorry.” Now all I could do was scream in my head, “WHAT THE FUDGE!?”. I ordered my daughter a pizza, grabbed drinks, fast walked my way to a table and immediately freaked out. I was starving so as I tried to make posts on Facebook, e-mail Jeff and call my mom to see if she can post notes on Facebook (since we all know FB mobile lacks needed capabilities!) – aka freaking out – I scarfed my tacos down, not realizing that I forgot to take a picture! AAAAH! I breathed, told my mom not to worry about it and waited for a response. Jeff responded. He came down, fixed the situation (apparently they forgot…I’ll forgive them for that. They are, after all, busy people who just had to go through lunch rush a few hours before) and I got to meet the man behind the scenes. That was cool! I finally relaxed, made my updates, and waited as the trucks prepped their vegan creations. After all, I came here to support them and I also came for a feast. I was going to wait! And then my five-year-old got winey and antsy wanting ice cream….great!

Unfortunately, pleasant pops wasn’t able to make it; the only sweet treats that I was aware of that would be available. Then, as we were walking around, hidden within a white and blue container, in the far back was Sweet Freeze, or ice cream made with liquid nitrogen, by Faithfully Sweets. All I could do was say “Thank You God!”. We walked in and we were immediately intrigued. They asked if we would like to sample some ice cream, and of course, I, by instinct, or maybe its habit, declined claiming that I was vegan, but offered my daughter up as a tester. Then the girl looked at me and said, “Well, we do have sorbet too”. My face lit up. She just made my stressful day better. While asking about the process, the girl behind the counter kindly offered to show us how it was done so I could take a few super cool pics. AmFam sampled all three: Cookies and Cream, Vanilla and Strawberry Mint Lemonade Sorbet. Of course I was all over the delicious sorbet, and well so was AmFam! Two scoops for $5 or three scoops for $7? Umm three scoops! It was way more than I expected but not a single bite was left after we were done. The sorbet was very well balance. Each bite was both sweet and tart and the mint gave a hint of savoriness that was both cooling and refreshing. After we downed our sorbet, we walked around a bit more, hoping to get some feedback from people who were planning on attending. Nothing.

The sugar rush made us hungry again, so we went up to DC Slices and asked for a vegan pizza. Jeff had suggested this amazing concoction of a tomato pie with tater tots and a choice of BBQ Sauce or Hot Sauce. As much as I wanted the hot sauce, I was sharing with AmFam, so BBQ it was! One slice was $5 (or maybe it was $4?)…it was a dollar less than a normal slice; a price I was willing to pay for their efforts. As I walked around, people were gawking over my pizza and asking me what that was. I explained it was a special vegan make for the day and people drooled over the idea. All I could think was Jeff’s a genius! I think he just gave DC Slices a brand new creation to try for vegans and non-vegans alike! I had been craving pizza for weeks and while it did lack the vegan cheese I was looking for, it still hit the spot perfectly! The crust was thin yet crispy. Perfect for that New York fold hold! The tater tots and BBQ sauce brought pizza to a whole new level! The crunchy, creamy texture of the tater tots along with the sweet and tangy BBQ sauce made this a serious winner! I couldn’t believe how amazing it tasted. I wanted it to be loaded with tots and wish I had bought one more, but I needed room for empanadas! 

Now DCEmpanadas had to bring their empanadas down from the shop, which meant we had to wait for them to arrive. It was getting close to 7:30, the possible closing time depending on demand, and AmFam was getting tired. It was also getting dark outside and I wanted to get through the metro before nightfall. As we were walking toward the exit, their, just recently displayed was the sign for Vegan Tofu Empanadas! And I thought I was going to miss out… at $3.50 a piece and with an already full belly, I was going to get one just to share with AmFam, but she insisted on getting two! I unwrapped my package to find a piping hot, golden brown large empanada, giving off that freshly fried aroma that so many love and desire. I took one bite, almost burning my mouth in the process, and fell in love. The dough was beautifully fried, crispy, crunchy and buttery and loaded with a mixture of silken tofu and veggies that were lightly seasoned with sweet, asian sauce. At this point the people around me, half drunk, had seen me get up and sit back down and eat something new at least three times. I can only imagine what they were thinking…but I didn’t care; I had just reached veg-food coma. AmFam decided to take her empanada home since it was too hot to eat. We headed me, me still worried about the outcome. My daughter, however, had me laughing the whole ride home, that I eventually forgot all about it. When we arrived home AmFam wanted to finally eat her empanada. Apparently, she had fallen in love too. She rambled on about how I should have told the man to put two in her bag and I should have gotten my own. The next morning, she was asking to go back. Best mother and daughter date night ever.

The following week I looked for feedback and got nothing. I worried what went wrong. I contacted Jeff and heard that DC Empanadas sold out of vegan empanadas and that the other two trucks had decent sales as well. So vegans arrived! Either that or non-vegans just really wanted the Asian empanadas and tots pizza – not something to complain about!! 

While it may not have been as hyped up of an event as I wanted it to be, the evening was not wasted. Not only did I spend an afternoon in my most favorite city, I also had an opportunity  to enjoy an evening alone spending one on one with my daughter. In addition, I had a vegan feast and the idea of a veg-friendly food truck event has not gone unnoticed. Could there be another veg-friendly food truck event in the near future? Possibly. Hopefully. We’ll see…