Final Salad of the Year

The Chefs: Elizabeth and Herbivore

The Menu: A big, gorgeous  green salad.

The Goods: You guys. You GUYS. It's pretty danged near impossible to describe the incredible day that we're having here at the VNHQ. Our staff is what you might call extra-double-super excited about our upcoming holiday break (this is our last day in the office until Jan. 2, 2012!), and the presents have been coming fast and furious. It's intense. The day started with Assistant Editor Anna Peraino bringing in cookies within cookies for Associate Editor Jennifer Chen, then progressed to a couple dozen candy cane brownies from Sticky Fingers for the staff from our publishers. If ever there was a day to feast on salad, it's today. We've had holiday music blasting all day, and things just basically couldn't be more festive. Here's to an amazing holiday season for everyone! We'll be back next year!

Comforting Curry

The Chefs: Hilary and Udupi Palace

The Menu: Aloo matar (the vegan version!) with potatoes, peas, and curry spices, enjoyed with rice and fluffy poori (a flatbread)

The Goods: When a craving strikes for Indian food, nothing will suffice but the warm, spicy flavor of curry. Fortunately, vegetarian South Indian restaurant Udupi Palace and it's awesome aloo matar are only a block and a half away from the VNHQ. Between finishing our January+February issue cover earlier this week (!) and looking ahead to the holidays, there is a lot to be happy about this Thursday afternoon. Even better, VN contributor Jasmin Singer of Our Hen House dropped by the office today and brought us all smiles with her bright wit and infectious sense of humor. More reasons to grin: this week's giveaway of Sticky Fingers Cowvin cookies! Only a few days are left to enter, so tell us your favorite holiday cookie now for a chance to win, and indulge, in a dozen of these decadent treats. 

Marinated Kale Salad

The Chefs: Jennifer and Herbivore

The Menu: A marinated kale salad with grilled soy chicken, tomatoes, cucumbers, and avocado.

The Dish: I have eaten my weight in Sticky Fingers treats, which they sent us early this week. So Herbivore's marinated kale salad was exactly what I needed. One kale salad erases the pumpkin whoopie pies I ate, right? Great! Last night, I went to a book party for Bust's new book, The Bust DIY Guide to Life, at one of my favorite local craft shops, Serendipity. Surrounded by yarn, I realized it had been a long time since I picked up a pair of knitting needles. If you've been itching to learn how to knit (trust me, it's easy!), join VN correspondent Jasmin Singer who shows you how in our VegNews TV Vegan Knitting 101 video. And don't forget to enter our holiday giveaway! This week we're giving away one Tofurky feast, perfect for making leftover faux turkey, cranberry, and mashed potato sandwiches. 

Indian Curry

The Chef: Alexandra and Sticky Fingers Bakery

The Menu: Home-made Indian curry with tofu, garbanzo beans, potatoes, and spinach on rice, plus a ginger cupcake with blueberry frosting from Sticky Fingers for dessert.

The Goods: While this isn't the prettiest meal featured on Café VegNews, it's definitely not lacking in the flavor department. Curries have to be one of my favorite foods, mostly because they are packed with amazing spices. I also love it when they're thick with vegetables, and this one is no exception. And since the VNHQ gets delicious deliveries every day, it's not hard to add another special element to lunch. The cupcake from Sticky Fingers satisfied my sweet tooth (no meal is complete without some form of dessert), and has me dreaming of visiting DC. Luckily, the Bay Area is an equally great place to be. There's tons of veg-restaurants and events (like SF Vegan Drinks coming up!), vegan luminaries come here to meet and discuss future books (check out VN Publisher Joseph Connelly's Press Pass post on Jeffrey Masson's book in the making), and of course, VegNews is here. You can't beat that.

Friday at Gracias Madre

The Chef: Colleen, Elizabeth, & Gracias Madre

The Menu: A traditional Mexican sandwich, or torta, filled with beans, avocado, grilled onions, and greens in a toasted French sandwich roll, along with a a fragrant bowl of the house Posole soup, a spicy hominy stew in an ancho-chile broth.

The Goods: It's Friday, it's World Vegetarian Day, and today marks the end of the first week in our gorgeous new office space. Life is good—so Elizabeth and I decided to venture over to the all-vegan Gracias Madre (two blocks away) for a delicious mid-day Mexican meal. And, as expected, lunch was incredible. The restaurant has a $10 lunch special, which today consisted of the torta along with a Caesar salad and marinated vegetables. It's an excellent value, especially since all the food at GM is made from scratch, organic, and GMO-free. In case you haven't noticed, we're doing HUGE giveaways over on Facebook and Twitter (one for each!) in celebration of World Vegetarian Day. Don't miss your chance to win a VeganTreats Peanut Butter Bomb Cake and a dozen creme-filled cookie sandwiches from Sticky Fingers Bakery. Good luck!

Above photo: The taco platter at Gracias Madre, courtesy of SF Weekly. The chef for today's Café VegNews post (Colleen) forgot the camera, so this is just a sampling of the delicious food!

Onion Soup, Mashed Potatoes

The Chef: Chas

The Menu: A rich, flavorful onion soup of kale, seasoned tofu squares, carrot, celery, kidney beans, garlic, thyme, and lots of savory, crisp onion paired with a complementary comfort food classic, mashed potatoes and gravy. Chas took a samosa-filling inspired take on this standard side by adding peas, almond milk, veggie broth, and seasoning, and literally took a page from American Vegan Kitchen for the gravy recipe. Despite our assertion that a carb-filled meal was exactly what we always want, Chas also busted our one of his signature salads tossed with avocado dressing.

The Goods: Oh yes, this meal was a big, heaping helping of awesome. If there's one thing that the VN staff can rally around it's vegan mashed potatoes and gravy. The only thing more exciting than indulging in this satisfying fare is finishing off our meal with dessert from Sticky Fingers. During a weekend trip to Washington, DC, VN Art Director Sutton Long visited the capital city bakery and was gifted a box of dairy-free desserts by Sticky Fingers' Manager Ben Adams. Lets just say we're not complaining about any of it.

Garlic Pasta and Greens

The Chef: Lyndsay

The Menu: A light, flavorful pasta dressed with garlic, rosemary, and olive oil, then tossed with diced tomato and garbanzo beans. Lyndsay also transformed Frankie's delicious homemade bread into the best garlic bread we've had, and finished the meal with a simple salad of mixed greens and avocado. Yes, it was pretty much perfect.

The Goods: After a weekend of heavy rain, we were lucky enough to enjoy our plates of pasta al fresco thanks to a gorgeous, sunny day here at the VNHQ. Oh, and maybe we had Cowvin Cookies from Sticky Fingers for dessert. We also might still be thrilled about the arrival of our March+April issue, which ships to subscribers this week. All in all, we're a pretty freaking happy office!

Bright Green Soup!

The Chef: Elizabeth

The Menu: A delectable, raw Spinach Thyme Soup that included loads of green veggies, herbs and spices, hemp oil, agave, meat-free chicken bouillon, and a subtle kick of garlic. Elizabeth paired this nutritious, bright green bowl of soup with a similarly hued side salad complete with mixed greens, mushrooms, tomatoes, kidney beans, garbanzo beans, and diced bell peppers. Were there also slices of sunflower seed bread to dip into our soup? Indeed there were.

The Goods: In case there were any doubts, this lunch acts as proof that we are still obsessed with making soup in five minutes in our new Vita-Mix. People, it's bright green soup! In five minutes! It will never get old. This light and fresh vegetable-filled lunch was exactly what we needed after a week of over-indulging in sweets. So, in true VN style, we followed our cleansing, healthful lunch with to-die-for desserts from Sticky Fingers Bakery. Yes, our publisher's did generously order us Valentine's Day treats from Sticky Fingers, and yes, we know that they are the best.

Pizza and Piccata

The Chef: Elizabeth

The Menu: A mish-mash of on-hand delicacies. Today's plate certainly doesn't have a theme (except maybe the letter "p"). We enjoyed, and then promptly mourned, our last Daiya pizza from Vegan Essentials, which was just as delicious as the others we've had recently. Elizabeth made a seitan piccata with mustard and capers, and finished off the plate with a big freaking salad.

The Goods: Pizza and piccata might not be the new surf 'n' turf, but with some serious time limitations it totally filled us up today. Speaking of things that might fill you up, did you know that there are Sticky Fingers goodies being given away on our Facebook page?

Chili and Sandwiches

The Chef: Abby

The Menu: A very yummy homemade chili, complete with kidney and black beans, sweet potatoes, red quinoa, tomatoes, and spices. By spices, we pretty much mean garlic, which is just how we like things here at the VNHQ. On the side Abby served finger sandwiches with sautéed mushrooms and some melted Ste. Martaen cheese. And, of course, no meal here would be complete without a lovely green salad. Today's had sliced bell peppers and mushrooms for extra veggies!

The Goods: Ok, we have some big news. You know about our sister site VegWeb.com, right? And how it has thousands of awesome vegan recipes, yes? Great. But! Do you know which of those are the absolute best? We need your help to determine which recipes from VegWeb will be featured in the May+June issue of VegNews! We are thrilled to announce our first-ever VegWeb Recipe Showdown! Voting will last until next Wednesday, and by voting you'll be entered to win some amazing goodies from Sticky Fingers Bakery! Lots of exclamation points!!

World Vegetarian Day Chili!

The Chef: Sara

The Menu: A triple-chili treat! Ms. Sara prepared three varieties of Eden Organic Chili (the black bean and quinoa, Great Northern bean and barley, and kidney bean and kamut, in case you were wondering), which we topped with hearty handfuls of Daiya. She also made a delicious cornbread from scratch, and a fresh guacamole. Are we spoiled? Yes.

The Goods: Happy World Vegetarian Day, everyone! To give lunch an international feel, we had the pleasure of dining with Helen, a long-time friend of VN who's in town for World Vegetarian Festival from Switzerland. There are a couple reasons to love Helen, one of which being that she's amazing, and the other that she brings Swiss chocolate with her! Again, spoiled. We like pretty much any excuse to celebrate, and this one just happens to be near and dear to us! To make an awesome day even more fun, we're giving away an enormous shipment of Sticky Fingers goodies. Yes, you definitely want these. But! It's a one-day giveaway, the winner will be picked at 11:59 pm tonight, so make sure to comment quickly!

Breakout Bean Salad!

The Chef: Kailey

The Menu: A delightful trio of dishes prepared by the VNHQ's newest chef, Ms. Kailey! For her debut effort, Kailey prepared a delicious, Italian-herb-seasoned bean salad with black beans, garbanzos, celery, and corn. She also roasted sweet potato fries, and busted out a big, beautiful green salad with slices of fresh carrots. Of course, we already knew we were getting a world-class chef in Kailey, but it was a joy to get to experience her cooking first hand. Here's to many more lunches!

The Goods: It's Friday. Some of us have been singing and some of us have been scurrying to get everything done before the weekend, but all of us are thrilled because our magazine came today! That's right, we've got our hot little hands on the July+August issue, and couldn't be happier about it. Yes, if you need us, we'll be covered in cinnamon reading the magazine this weekend.

Scramble and Sticky Fingers!

The Chef: Elizabeth

The Menu: Something sort of like brunch, and sort of like whatever was in the kitchen that could be easily thrown together. The result? A Mexican-food-inspired tofu scramble with corn, black beans, and pinto beans; a big, fresh salad with avocado and chopped cherry tomatoes; and finally home fries that were doused in Parma!

The Goods: Just in case anyone is wondering, if you only have half an hour to prepare lunch, it's probably best to go ahead and skip the roasted potatoes. While these little nuggets were the perfect vehicle for some fancy ketchups, they delayed the beginning of lunch a bit, which is never a popular move here at the VNHQ. Thankfully, the day was saved by the arrival of a surprise treat from Sticky Fingers! We'll be very happily under our desks in hyperglycemic comas if anyone needs us.

Stellar Stir-Fry

The Chef: Aurelia

The Menu: An absolutely stellar stir-fry served atop perfectly fluffy basmati rice. Aurelia made the most of the veggies in the fridge, including bok choy, red bell pepper, ginger, garlic, green onions, and walnuts in her savory main dish. We also got a taste of veggie shrimp, procured from our local Asian grocery, which added an, um, unexpected element to the meal that some of us really enjoyed, others not so much. Aurelia also made a delicious spinach salad with cucumber and grated carrot, which we doused with organic French dressing from Organicville. Yum!

The Goods: Fittingly, we followed up this fab feast by brainstorming our upcoming September+October Food Issue, about which we're all pretty stinking excited. Since pretty much everything on the plate today was of a savory persuation, we'd like to remind everyone to satisfy your sweet tooth!

Hot Dog!(s)

The Chef: Colleen

The Menu: Fan-freakin'-tastic Friday frankfurters. Colleen warmed some delicious whole-wheat buns, and we piled these pups high with a smorgasbord of sauces. Ketchup, spicy Dijon mustard, relish, barbecue sauce, Artichoke Hummus, Vegenaise, Roasted Green Salsa, and Roasted Mole were just a few of the ample options. Alongside these barely contained buns we enjoyed crispy fries and a vibrant salad with dried cranberries and Swiss chard.

The Goods: Ever wonder just exactly what a group of educated, professional, dedicated vegans talk about during lunch? Saving the animals? Bettering the movement? Opening new, exciting restaurants/boutiques/animal sanctuaries? Not today, friends. Today we discussed such enlightening topics as the work histories of Sandra Oh and Margaret Cho, who had/had not seen Saved by the Bell during their youth, and which of the incredible, delicious treats from Sticky Fingers that arrived yesterday were our favorites. Yes, it's Friday. Yes, that's good news all around.

Five-Star Soup

The Chef: Colleen

The Menu: An incredible three-squash soup! Colleen blended acorn, butternut, and delicata squashes together with an Indian-food-inspired blend of spices for this thick, filling main course. Alongside our bowls were slices of perfectly crunchy rosemary crostini, and a mixed green salad with our favorite new add-in: craisins. All together this was one satisfying meal, utterly worthy of the five-star rating.

The Goods: Get ready, we've got gobs of goods today! First, we got to share this amazing lunch with Mr. Billy Hulting, who just happens to be a rockstar. No, literally, that's what he does for a living. Billy plays percussion for Zappa Plays Zappa, and we just learned that the band is nominated for a Grammy! Woo hoo! In his limited free time, Billy also helps to organize WorldFest, a totally-vegan eco-friendly festival in Los Angeles, where you're sure to find a VegNews booth. Accompanying Billy was his delightful mother, Pat, who lives here in San Francisco and whom we hope to see again soon! As if all this wasn't enough, we were also treated to some insanely good candy cane brownies from Sticky Fingers. Yes, you read that right: candy cane brownies. If anyone needs us this afternoon, we'll be under our desks in hyperglycemic comas.

Booya Burgers

The Chef: Lyndsay

The Menu: Totally bad-ass burgers, which Ms. Lyndsay whipped up from scratch. Yes, we're pretty sure that means she loves us. Yes, we freakin' love her too, especially since she paired her totally tasty main course with perfectly seasoned sweet potato fries. Swoon. The burgers were served on fluffy buns and topped with nice big slices of cheddar-flavor Teese. Seriously, burgers and fries never had it so good. Of course, no meal here at the VNHQ would be complete without a big side salad, and today we dressed ours with a sweet mustard-flax blend.

The Goods: You want goods aside from the awesome eats? Well, fine. We're gearing up for the Green Festival this weekend here in SF, and we still have a couple pairs of tickets up for grabs from today's special giveaway at VegNews.com, but they're going fast! Not local to SF? Not to worry, we've also got today's regularly scheduled giveaway, which happens to be a dozen Little Devils from Sticky Fingers Bakery! Oh yes, that would be the same Sticky Fingers Bakery that was recently named Best Vegan Dessert on VegDC.com.