City Eats: Metro Granola

Way back when Flax Club started, we didn't know how our love of Metropolitan Bakery granola would fit in. For one thing, it doesn't. EVEN. have. flax. in. IT.

Ethics.

Then Metro went ahead and added two new flavors: Coffee Chocolate Chip and Pomegranate Cinnamon.

Squeezed, wondering what everyone would think of us, we bought the Coffee Chocolate Chip. (We don't do pomegranate).

There's coffee in it. I look at you. Coffee. It's a laidback kind of sweet. Bits of chocolate. Maple-wrapped almonds. Captivating oats and seductive grains. Wholesome enough to be a flaxologist's truce.

Swallow it with soy milk. Yogurt. A hard day.

Above Par

Shortly after discovering that diet Cane Cola was severely vegetarian, the inquisitive party came upon eleven o'clock on a Sunday. A perilous hour on the block of Poplar at 2nd is managed in a bevy of ways.

1) Blood orange and watermelon mimosas
2) Coffee washed with tequila
3) Oh, right, we should "eat".
4) Egg + potato + tempeh scramble
5) Brunch burrito
6) French toast with the top-secret cinnamon bread that Cantina Dos Segundos bakes daily.
4) Vegetarian refried black beans

Not stopping, never slowing, and always wondering, the lush band relocated to Franklin Square for a sweltering round of highly competitive mini golf. 2/3 even rode the carousel.

Cantina Dos Segundos, 931 N. 2nd Street
Franklin Square, 6th and Race Streets

Great Veggie Affirmations

Why does it say "veggie burger" on Boylan's Bottling Company's Diet Cane Cola? Veggie on one side, burger on the other.

Veg Out: Rick's Steaks at the Bellevue

The vegan cheesesteak at Rick's new location at the Bellevue? It's not vegan.

Unless you order it without cheese, that is.

Even though the menu clearly reads that a vegan chicken or regular cheesesteak comes with "vegan cheese", the response I got today was not promising.

"Hey! Veggie steak! We don't have vegan cheese. What do you want instead?"

YEAHHHHH, this line cook just called me out as "Veggie Steak". It's the things like this that make my day. If I was vegan, I would have pulled out a package of soy cheese singles that I carried at all times. As such, I am not, and was caught unprepared.

I sheepishly asked for provolone, daring anyone else in queue to question my inconsistency.

A few minutes later, one odd-looking sandwich that had been prepared on a separate grill was placed in front of me. I instantly regretted adding lettuce and tomato. How was I going to fold this thing? All three tomato slices were banished to the side.

I could barely detect the provolone at first, as the pale seitan product that passes for "chicken" in many of our local establishments is almost the color of provolone. There's a hue for it, starting now: Off-provolone.

While not my favorite incarnation of seitan, the low-key, sometimes rubbery protein often needs cheese to up its flavor. It, however, was not the problem with this sandwich. My ketchup application was thwarted by those tomatoes, for sure, but even our lycopene friend could not cover the major wrong here: the chili powder that had been sprinkled over the "chicken".

What was going on here?

Why did they put chili powder on my chicken cheesesteak? And if you're going to put anything on my sandwich that I don't ask for, at least do it right. I wouldn't have minded a nice hit of spice or some marinated seitan, but this was a clear last-minute shake that was only on the top part of the sandwich. I was able to eat around it for a few bites until my mouth was set a-flame.

Rick's Steaks at the Bellevue, 200 South Broad Street

A Valid Case of $7.50 Challah Bread

I didn't realize that Challahman Michael Dolich's goods cost so much.

Fortunately, there was some whole wheat challah and regular egg challah in the discount bin at the Fair Food Farmstand. Even the discounted bread clocked in at $5.25. Kaplan's, Whole Foods, and DiBruno Bros are all selling challah loaves for a much lower price. I wanted to complain. Then I untwisted the bag.


I severed the gnarled end hunk. Spread on a thin coat of Earth Balance. I ate.

When a man makes bread this good a few miles away, he may as well have my extra dollars. Dolich, from what I've learned, is not some crazed bread czar out to make a buck. He is not churning out product at the rate of a large company or with a workforce. He is not Kaplan's, which sells many other items from which they can count on a profit.

Finally, even his days-old discount bin challah is better than all that other play.

Delivery to Fair Food Farmstand is Fridays at 3pm, get it then. Four Worlds ordering instructions are here.

Veggie Burger Off: PoPE vs Noble

Pub on Passyunk East

Name: PoPE Veggie Burger
Weight: Heavy. This is a substantial burger that belongs on a much thinner bun to do it justice. The crusty roll it was served on required lots of knife work.
Sides: You can and should order fries with this burger. They might come out cold, but at least they'd be better than the mistake of a side salad. Since this is a bar's bar, we know choosing salad over fries is a self-hating move.
Ketchup: Better with.
Accoutrements: Fried onion & tomato, mayo, cheese all taken seriously on this sandwich. Without its toppings, it could be less worthy.
Bun: Lose it.
Patty: Sink your teeth into it. Hearty kasha grains ground into utter pureness of heart. Falls apart.
Found at: PoPE, 1501 E Passyunk Ave.

Noble Cookery

Name: Noble Veggie Burger
Weight: Not quite as hefty as the Big PoPpa. Still enough to split with a largeman.
Sides: Three cornichons. Slightly crisp fries sprinkled with herbs. These frites are addictive.
Ketchup: It has to be freshly made. Zippy. Primary color red.
Accoutrements: Beet slice, special sauce, Mount Lettuce, cheddar. Is the beet the new tomato? I'm convinced.
Bun: Nice-sized. Patty-friendly.
Patty: Bean-based, but oddly meat-like. Falls apart, too. Not as tasty as the PoPE Mac.
Found at: Noble Cookery, bar menu, 2025 Sansom St.

Final Thoughts

You bet your ass I would order either burger again in a second's consideration. I was raised on the concept of "the burger". These days, I view food in a completely different way, but "the veggie burger" is something I crave a couple of times a month. I appreciate Noble's take as it binds the comfort of a classic burger with a cleaner feel and more thoughtful composition. I find the PoPE version a sloppy, extraordinary monster that was made for Friday nights and cheap tricks.

Vegan Treats Redesign

Look who redesigned their website, making it even easier to order a birthday cake from.

It looks better than all of your non-vegan bakery sites. There is some rule that states only vegan bakeries have a visible web presence. Thoughts?

Remember when I was early-22 and used to eat Vegan Treats brownies for breakfast? That was the life.

LoTV: AM Protein-Loading

And the Award for the Veggiest Pizza Goes to...

Home Slice.

You could likely secure more nutrients from the vegan pizzas at this Liberties Walk pizzeria than any pie pusher city-wide. If you're into that sort of thing. No, there's nothing wrong with your red and mostly off-white slice. I ain't say that.

In a pizza rut, a whole-wheat pie with vegan almond cheese, basil, spinach, and veggie sausage is a hot girl calling you back.

Almond cheese. Ring again. Our pie came loaded generously with the crumbly homemade cheese that resembled ricotta in texture and recalled parmesan in flavor. One lactose-intolerant homeboy went nuts for it. If you're crazy about dairy cheese, I wouldn't recommend this. It doesn't match the melted goodness of regular cheese, but it's better for you than those overprocessed substitutes.

We were surprised again that the pie was covered in basil and spinach, when most pizzerias skimp on these. The sausage was plentiful, too, and paired really well with the basil.

The whole wheat crust turned a little soggy within a few hours. Maybe it was the cheese, or the fact that it was sitting out while I was out reporting? It crisped right back up after hitting the fridge. It was delicious the day after.

Home Slice, Liberties Walk

Yogurt Memo

Sampled the watermelon frozen yogurt at Sweet Endings yesterday, but went for $2 of the chocolate. Solid, but not knee-buckling.

It was mental in there. It was like people didn't know about frozen yogurt and wanted to take their tops off for it.

Sweet Endings, 18th & Chestnut

Vegan Brunching

I picked up a copy of Vegan Brunch (after a five-minute hunt and assistance from an employee, who finally located the book in an unlikely place).

I took it home and promised that I would make vegan bagels.

That was two weeks ago. That was 14 days of perhaps one acceptable bagel in a coffee shop, some pretty decent coffee cake from Metro, and an extreme haze of work, life gathering, and shooting tedious looks at others.

Then, finally, at 10:30 last night, when real LIFE stuff was nowhere close to being done, we decided it was bagel time. The vegan bagel recipe from Vegan Brunch is very similar to the bagels we've made before, but we made a few key changes. First, we used filtered water. No, we did not have it shipped from New York like we should have. Even if this doesn't matter, it feels important. Second, we added millet to our batch. Why? Cuz we've got a boatload of millet in the cupboard, and yes, it feels right, too. We also used half whole wheat flour, half white. Is this getting too healthy for you yet?


After boiling, each bagel was given a sea salt or poppyseed dip, or honey glaze treatment before baking. No bagels were consumed before bed as part of some great test of will. This morning, the dense holes were slathered with cream cheese or vegan turkey salad (do not fight how good this is). Given that the norm bagel is gigantic, these were the perfect size. They were special, like birthday cake special. Yeah.

Next, as if to say hey, we are really using this Vegan Brunch cookbook, we turned out the Puttanesca Scramble for dinner. My diet is very low salt, I'm just not crazy about the mineral unless there's chocolate or gelato involved. I have historically low blood pressure. Considering that this dish had capers, olives, and salt, I thought it would taste like ocean. It was considerably saline, but not threatening. There were 6-8 cloves of garlic called for that didn't come across at all. Tofu scramble can either be humbling and dry or it can be spectacular. I've found ways to ensure the latter, and this recipe was not one of them.

I'll keep cooking. I am sure there are some definite keepers in this book, along with the bagels.