Super Salad and Pot Pie

The Chef: Elizabeth

The Menu: A gigantic salad of romaine, grated carrot, bell pepper, cucumber, and black olives tossed with Annie's Goddess Dressing. In addition to this massive pile of vegetable bounty, I also enjoyed an Amy's Kitchen Non-Dairy Vegetable Pot Pie, filled with potatoes, carrots, tofu, and a delicious white sauce all wrapped in a soft pastry shell.

The Goods: After having every intention of not buying lunch today (in an effort to curb my raging Gracias Madre addiction), I discovered two things. One: it was really cold this morning. Two: the grocery store right around the corner from the office sells Amy's Pot Pies. You know what this editor can't resist on a cold day? That's right—it starts with "pot" and ends with "pie."

Tofu Salad, Garlic Breadsticks

The Chef: Colleen and Elizabeth

The Menu: A splendid, savory salad featuring romaine, mixed greens, shredded carrot, and baked tofu squares marinated in one of Colleen's signature vinaigrette dressings. This simple summer lunch was punctuated with fluffy garlic and herb breadsticks which Elizabeth whipped up with a batch of Trader Joe's pizza dough.

The Goods: It's day three of sunny, warm skies in San Francisco, and we're embracing the fresh weather with light, healthy lunches. Despite the recent spike in temperature, we know it won't be long before SF's classic cool weather returns, which is why several VN staffers are looking forward to coat shopping with Vaute Couture this weekend. Yes, the all-vegan fashion house is taking its cruelty-free threads on the road for a select few California pop-up shows, including two dates in SF. If you haven't made an appointment yet, we definitely recommend you do, because these coats are pretty much the cutest thing you'll ever own. But, no big deal.

Baked Ziti, Great Greens

The Chef: Elizabeth

The Menu: A healthy, hearty take on baked ziti using gluten-free pasta, tomato sauce, and a tasty tofu ricotta. Elizabeth chose an all-green theme for today's lovely leafy salad, including romaine, green olives, cucumber, avocado, and grated zucchini.

The Goods: Is it just us, or is this week rapidly whizzing by? We can't believe tomorrow is already Thursday, which marks a celebratory occasion: SF Vegan Drinks! With the weather finally turning sunny, we can't wait to trek over to Martuni's, San Francisco's most happening piano bar, and throw back a few $5 vegan Orange Creamsicle Martinis (this month's special!) at our favorite monthly meet-up. In addition to enjoying a few drinks, we're also pumped to nosh on veggie dogs and vegan popcorn—yeah, it's pretty much the perfect trifecta of summertime treats. If you're local, stop by to meet the VN staff, make new friends, and down a few stellar sippers.

Friday Ribs

The Chef: Lyndsay

The Menu: A perfectly delicious smorgasbord of lunchtime delights. First and foremost, Frankie's ribs and barbecue sauce made the scrumptious main course, to which Lyndsay added a rosemary-infused rice pilaf, mashed sweet potatoes, and a big green salad with kale, romaine, and avocado.

The Goods: This meal was the perfect way to end the week, even though we then experienced some technical difficulties that prevented us from posting about it until now. Here's hoping everyone enjoyed the weekend!

Raw Week: Rawkin' Tacos

The Chef: Aurelia

The Menu: Some decidedly delicious raw tacos and a big, beautiful kale salad! Aurelia blended red bell pepper and cashews for the filling of our romaine-wrapped tacos, and garnished them with sliced green onions. The lovely and satisfying salad consisted of chopped kale, sliced trumpet mushrooms, and slivered red onion, all of which was tossed with a perfectly tangy homemade dressing.

The Goods: It's midway through Raw Week! So far, so good, though there was some brief discussion of mashed potatoes today at lunch. And mac 'n' cheese. And brownies. OK, so maybe we aren't all raw at heart, but our plates haven't seen a lick of cooked food, and everything we've eaten has been totally yummy.

Vegan à Go-Go! Week: Day Four

The Chef: Colleen

The Menu: Aloo-Yoop Curry Potato Wraps! Between yesterday's burritos and today's awesome main dish, we are getting spoiled rotten with yummy wraps! Colleen busted out these inventive, flavorful goodies—straight from the pages of Vegan à Go-Go!, of course—using freshly warmed tortillas, sweet potatoes, white potatoes, garbanzo beans, peas, coconut milk, and curry spices. Savory and just a teeny bit sweet, we each could have eaten about six of these were it not for the fact that they were also totally filling. Colleen also made a blended balsamic vinaigrette which she poured over romaine, spinach, tomatoes, and grated zucchini for a perfect side salad.

The Goods: And so Vegan à Go-Go! week comes to a close. We've been having a great time making recipes from this little book, and if you're curious to know the whole scoop be sure to look for a full review in the pages of the January+February issue of VegNews! Speaking of things that are coming to an end, today is the last day to get your comments in on our Press Pass giveaway, so don't delay!

Rad Wraps

The Chef: Aurelia

The Menu: Big, warm, yummy tortillas filled to the brim with seasoned potatoes, roasted zucchini and bell peppers, romaine, avocado, tomato, and a delicious mixture of tofu, onions, and smoked paprika. With a light splash of homemade vinaigrette, these hand-holds were flavorful and filling.

The Goods: As of today, we have officially less than a month left before a certain event. In case you somehow haven't already heard, Sarah Kramer is making her triumphant return to the world of cookbook publishing, and we're throwing her a little party. Tickets are available now, so be sure to reserve yours before they sell out. Mini root-beer floats, retro snacks, and faux tattoos will be the order of the evening, so break out your kitten heels and skinny ties, and we'll have ourselves a bash!

Culture-Clash Chapatis

The Chef: Lisa

The Menu: A whip-quick mix of black beans blended with garlic, onions and shiitake mushrooms sautéed with some of the sauce from yesterday, and chopped romaine spread over spinach-flavored chapatis. We're not sure if this meal counts as Indian, Mexican, or miscellaneous, but we are sure that it was tasty.

The Goods: Since Aurelia—who would have been today's chef—is en route to AR 2008, Lisa stepped up to make another meal. As we've probably mentioned before, we're big fans of the happy-accident style of cooking that involves throwing together whatever is on-hand in the kitchen and calling it lunch. Add a couple artistically placed drops of hot sauce, and it's cuisine!

Messy Pesto

The Chef: Elizabeth

The Menu: A late-summer pesto with broccolini, sautéed red bell peppers, and big, lovely bites of avocado. This meal took a turn for the lighter side with the substitution of rice noodles for the traditional wheat pasta, and the standard side salad brightened the plate a little bit too.

The Goods: One of the tell-tale signs of an Elizabeth lunch is the heavy-handed avocado. But really, why stop at adding it to one dish when you can just as easily add it to both? If you haven't yet tried sprucing up your pasta dishes with avocado, go for it. We're pretty certain you'll be glad you did. If you's just not an avocado fan, well, we're sorry to say, you probably have no soul. Er, um, we mean, uh, it's okay to not like something as intrinsically awesome as avocado. Sure.

Chapati Party

The Chef: Colleen & Frankie

The Menu: Folks, feast your eyes upon our "all-you-can-squeeze- spread-and-stuff-into-a-chapati" event. Beginning with pan-fried black beans and rice, we piled Frankie's smokey homemade un-turkey, vegan mayonnaise, avocado, and a crisp cherry tomato and romaine salad onto the warmed flatbreads for a complementary explosion of distinct flavors—and a sticky, two-handed, delicious mess.

The Goods: Not only is today the sunniest Friday we've had in weeks, we're less than a week away from our issue launch party! We're so excited that we're plowing through our respective piles of work so we can join the masses on the beach—and attend to last-minute party details. When it comes time to wrap up the work-week, we want to know what ya'll look forward to the most about the weekend?