The Raw Kitchen - new premises

I blogged about the Raw Kitchen before but felt a new post needed to be made since their recent reinvention. Not only have they relocated, but they have also gotten bigger.
They are now situated at 181A High Street Fremantle, in what looks like a warehouse. The interior is all high ceiling, open faced brick walls, chain link fences and shipping containers. The tables range from long wooden ones, to booth styles, with seats that look like they have been ripped out of old buses. Sad to say that the other seating seems to range from small wooden chairs to metal ones. Common denominator - all pretty uncomfortable. I was really hoping that with the new venue, they would have ditched those chairs that were obviously built to hold primary school aged kids.
Your cutlery and water gets served to you in glass jars and brown bottles, and the food on small wooden boards and little enamel dishes.

The whole look is a cross between rustic and recycled, which does not appeal to me at all. But then, that is just personal taste, I guess. Just so long everything looked and was clean, that's what matters the most to me - and this place certainly passed that requirement from what I noticed.

We were seated at one of the long wooden tables. Although this new location is much larger than their old one, the place was VERY busy and I understood that having such big communal tables saves on space. Having said that, I didn't really like sitting at a table, facing strangers while I ate. Oh well.

Apart from the food (which I will get to in a moment), the new Raw Kitchen also features the 'Sea Container Gallery' that displays pieces by local artists and craftsmen, which can be purchased.
Yoga and fitness classes, as well as raw food preparation classes are also on offer and I do believe there will be film nights planned.
The new venue also has a bigger shopping area where there are all sorts raw and non-raw  packaged food items - many of them vegan, plus books, gifts, toiletries, etc.

We found the service to be mostly good. Having only just reopened, a LOT of people are curious to see the new place, and so the place was already very busy when we arrived a little before noontime. Nevertheless, we were seated almost immediately and our orders were taken in a timely manner. The only gripe I have is that when ordering, we asked the server if there was any egg in the 'mayo' in two of the dishes we wanted. She kept saying 'There is no dairy' in any of our dishes. I had to point out to her that egg was not dairy, which gave her pause. To her credit, she did go and find out for us. The verdict - NO EGG is used in ANY of their dishes. This of course begs the question  - why do they not mark this on their menu? Their menu is marked as completely dairy free, and where honey is used, it is marked. Why not mark things as completely egg free or just use the 'vegan' tag, and be done with it? Surely, they realize that a big number of their clientele are vegans? 

For our entree, we opted for the Aromatic fennel seed roasted chats with lemon juice. 

I'm a big fan of potatoes and these were lovely. Cooked just right. Obviously, this wasn't a raw entree. Infact, there were quite a few new items on the menu and quite a few were not raw. This may bother some raw food purists and it didn't bother me one bit.

The other entree we had was the Tempeh snaps. These were strips of cooked tempeh, made from lupin and not soy, sitting on top of cooked cauliflower. The dish came with a tasty garlic and caper aioli. I am not big on garlic but found their aioli to be mild on that front, so I enjoyed it very much.

For drinks, I opted for the Blue Moon smoothie, which featured blueberries, banana, lavender, agave, and almond milk. It was delicious. You could certainly taste the lavender but it was not overwhelming.

My partner had the Dream Juice which was a mixture of pineapple, lime, young coconut and apple.

For the mains, we had a lot to choose from. I ordered the club sandwich. 

As you can see from the photo, it was jam packed! Between two layers of dehydrated flax bread, was an assortment of goodness - marinated mushrooms, mango salsa, raw cashew 'mayo', tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber, alfalfa sprouts and onion. (I forgot to ask them to leave the onion out, so just picked it out as best I could.)
The sandwich was delicious but be warned - eating was tricky business. a mixture of hands and cutlery had to be employed.


My partner had the Raw pesto pasta, which featured radish, fresh basil, avocado, capers, sundried tomatoes and baby spinach.

After all of that, we didn't have room for dessert. There was plenty on offer - tarts, cakes, slices, balls, etc. Maybe next time!

The Raw Kitchen is open Mon-Thurs 7.30am - 4pm. Fri-Sun 7.30am - 10pm

Zafferano Restaurant

I had never been to Zafferano Restaurant before, it being out of my price range, but a small group of friends and I won some vouchers to dine there, so we got together for lunch. We rang and booked a table in advance and made sure to mention that we were all vegans and asked if they were able to accommodate us. The answer was 'Yes', so when we arrived, we were presented with a menu that they had specially put together for us, which included entree and main options.

For the entree, I and a few of my party, opted for the sweetpea risotto, which featured fresh garden peas, bound in a saffron risotto and garnished with extra virgin olive oil. Oddly enough, this dish had a 'fishy' flavour to it - so much so, that we had to check with the chef that it was, indeed vegan. We were assured it was, and it was suggested that its 'fishy' flavour came from the stock, which took a week to prepare. whatever gave it that flavour, it wasn't a favourite with us.

Thankfully, my main was a delicious pasta dish, which included chilli, rocket and fresh herbs, in fresh lemon and extra virgin olive oil.

Others had the mushroom risotto which featured slow roasted field mushrooms, and I was told it was very tasty.

Also meeting approval was the pumpkin salad, which was made up of roasted pumpkin, cherry tomatoes and rocket, in an almond and poppy seed dressing. 

As there were no desserts listed in our menu, the chef came out and spoke to us, offering a few suitable options. These were basically sorbets with either strawberries, peaches or bananas, preapred in various ways. We all tried a bit of all three of these and it was hard to pick a favourite!

All in all, we enjoyed our lunch. The staff were friendly and helpful and the chef was accommodating and happy to come to our table and discuss our options.

The view we had from our outdoor table, was lovely, as the restaurant is situated right on the Swan River.

The downside to the restaurant is that it is very expensive (on average, the entrees cost $12 to $27, the mains up to $40, the desserts around $15) and the portions on the small side.   

But if you can afford it, and want a 'finer'dining experience, then by all means give this restaurant a go - just make sure you give them sufficient notice that you will be requiring a full vegan menu.

Zafferano Restaurant is situated at 173 Mounts Bay Road (Old Swan Brewery) in Crawley. 

They are open Monday to Sunday Noon to late. Breakfast available on the weekends 8am .

Loving Hut- East Victoria Park, Perth

After having lunch at Loving Hut in Victoria Park, my partner, a friend, and I had to check out the sister restaurant in East Victoria Park.
Again, the decor was light and pleasing, and the staff were friendly.
We had a hard time to choose what we wanted for entree and mains, as there was so much choice.
Between us, we had the spring rolls, the steamed dumplings and samosas.

All were delicious and gone rather quickly between us. I don't tend to drink while I eat, but my partner ordered a drink which I tasted and enjoyed. it was the 'Golden Sunlight' which is mixture of pineapple juice and coconut cream, with a scoop of vegan vanilla icecream on the top. It was heavenly!

For the main meal, I opted for the Special Fried Clear Noodles which consisted of cabbage, shitake mushrooms, carrot, tofu and noodles. They were tasty and presented beautifully. My partner ordered the Spaghetti Carbonara which I eyed off enviously, given its creamy sauce and mushrooms. This dish also came with a salad on the side. Our friend chose the Satay Tofu which had capsicum, cauliflower, broccoli, and carrot in a peanut sauce, with steamed rice on the side. She said it was enjoyable.

Having polished off our mains, we found that we were too full to fit in dessert but the cakes at the front counter just looked soooo good! It was lucky for us that they did takeaway, so we asked for a slice of the vegan tiramisu, to take home. That cake was a slice of heaven! It was big enough for my partner and I to share and enjoyed it to the last crumb! Sadly, I was so intent on trying it, that I forgot to take a photo of it! But here are some photos of the mains we had...

Loving Hut, East Victoria Park are situated on 64A Etwell Street and are open Wednesdays through to Sundays, 5-9pm. 

Again, my only gripe about this place is that it is too far from my home but I have to admit, they are worth the trip.

Two Fat Indians Restaurant

A friend recently had a birthday dinner at an Indian restaurant called 2 Fat Indians, and my partner and I were invited. The entire meal was to be vegan, as she, her partner and at least half of her guests were vegan.

I had never been to this restaurant before though had heard of it. It is situated on Beaufort Street in Mt Lawley, though I hear there is another one in Cottesloe. The decore inside is lovely and being a Saturday night, it was very busy.

Before the food arrived, I asked my friend about how she arranged this dinner, as the restaurant is not exclusively vegan or even vegetarian. She explained to me that she rang ahead and told management that she wanted a vegan banquet for her guests. They then told her to call back a week before the date and they would tell her what they would be serving. I guess the advance warning gave them time to come up with a menu for the event, to accommodate us. Ideally, vegans should be able to walk into such places and order off the menu or have something prepared for our needs. Sadly, this more often that not, is not the case. So ring ahead it is! And the way I look at it - at least they were prepared and able to accommodate us. Some will not even try.

The good thing about Indian cuisine, is that it does lend itself to vegetarian and vegan needs. I guess the main ingredients to look out for are ghee and paneer if you are a vegan.

Our dinner began with some appetizers, including poppadoms. There were three different items, one of which were onion bhajhi which are slices of onion coated in chickpea batter and deep fried. Sadly, due to my aversion to onions, I had to forgo that one. There were also samosas and a kind of patty that I am guessing was lentil based. Apologies for my vagueness, but I am no expert when it comes to Indian food!

Next came the mains along with the naan bread and bowls of saffron rice and plain rice.
I managed to take a photo of the various different curries and dhals we were served.

The dhal was probably the mildest of them all. There was a chickpea curry, and a cauliflower one as well. And it is around this point that my lack of knowledge in Indian cuisine really fails! All I can tell you was that they were all delicious. Some were much hotter than others. Infact, at one point, my mouth was burning! I thought I spotted a green bean but as soon as I bit into it, it turned out to be a slice of green chilli! Oops! 

I cannot comment on dessert at 2 Fat Indians, as we were treated to a raw vegan chocolate cheesecake from The Raw Kitchen, which the staff at 2 Fat Indians were happy to bring out for us.  If you have not tried  out this cake, you simply MUST! It is so creamy, smooth, rich and delicious!

So, all in all, a lovely time was had. Good food and good company. You just have to plan ahead! Visit 2 Fat Indian's website for opening hours, addresses and contact details.