The next find is This ice cream shop on Firefly Lane. They don’t have any sort of vegan ice cream but they do have sorbets. Sorbet connoisseurs have been long limited to flavors like lemon, lime, or some other summery fruit. Here there are these familiar flavors, lemon, nectarine (it’s pretty good), blueberry, but in addition there are more unusual ones like ‘Chili Papaya’, ‘cucumber lime’, and my favorite ‘banana curry’. This is a good place if you like to pair up flavors. The two I put together were ‘cucumber lime’ and ‘banana curry’; the effect was like eating an Indian curry dish. I particularly liked the ‘banana curry’ because it had an almost umami flavor to it along with the salt and sweet. Since they change their flavors every once and awhile, I will be returning. Perhaps they will have the blueberry and basil flavor.

My first attempt was at an establishment called ‘Lompoc’. What I got ended up as some unbreaded fried tofu with a grainy nut-sweet pepper paste on top; below a small amount of roasted/fried potatoes and warmed dill pickles to hide the greasy vinegar pool gathering from the combined runoff of the food above. I liked the fried tofu but the rest I could have lived without. My second attempt was at ‘Tamarind’, a deli of sorts. I didn’t even get the ‘vegan’ food here ’cause the cheese on the sandwiches and pizza isn’t even vegan. When I asked the woman behind the counter about the brand they used, she pointed to a block of ‘Soy-Kass’ in the cooler. The stuff is basically as close as you can get to real cheese while still calling it ‘soy cheese’. Not vegan what-so-ever. When I told her that it isn’t vegan she feebly replied “I know, the owner won’t change it”. Wow, way to deceive people! The next eatery I attended is called ‘Maggie’s’. The soup, a tomato gazpacho, was amazing. The sweet and acid balanced really well and the textures were well matched. The main dish of stuffed squash fell short though. The sauce it was sitting in was this curry-coconut blend with corn kernels in it; it wasn’t bad at all. I would have actually liked more of it; it could have livened up the dish. The center piece was a bland, steamed zucchini-esque squash filled with unseasoned (salt and pepper anyone?) quinoa and I think chunks of vegan boca patties. It was like eating a pile-roast of below-average steamed veggies, no, wait, that’s what it was. It was ok, but for the price ($19) I wouldn’t eat it again. I can’t even find a nice salad… To sum up the vegan restaurnt experience so far: meh.

Driving last night was almost this bad…

8 hours later update: I am still not really a fan of Chicago but I can see why some people like it.

So much better than ‘braska

Writing tires me

I’m not really in the mood for copious amounts of writing about the trip tonight, hence my poor man’s haiku (we had Japanese tonight). I’m really excited because Iowa City has a vegan bakery that serves breakfast and lunch. I’m really aiming for the breakfast because they have French toast and waffles (vegan of course) in exciting flavors like “dill potato”, “virgin bananas foster”, and my personal favorite “Monte Cristo”. The city is also home to its own brand of vegan cheese only sold at the local cooperative. Tomorrow will be a good day!

P.S. Nebraska isn’t too bad if you hang out in Lincoln; it is actually a cool town (and, unlike Denver, it has drugstores). I’d like to go back to peruse the record stores.

After five hours sleep and some photo uploading I was off again this time through and over the Rockies to Denver, my next destination (cue the theme from “The Magnificent Seven”). The trip was uneventful until we hit the mountains themselves. This section of I-70 is basically hairpin curves, tunnels, and 6% grades up and down. It is an amazing piece of engineering but at some points (Ooof, those grades…) the driving became very difficult. I think at one point I had to have the heater on full blast and drop the car into low gear (that means I was going at most 45 mph on an interstate). Finally we slid into our hotel in a cloud of hot biodiesel exhaust and the fumes of burnt brakes. I’m glad I have a nice soft bed tonight…

The calm before the storm.

This comedy sketch has been reappearing as an indoor-outdoor joke (Not quite an inside joke) throughout the trip so I thought I’d post it!

The Moab that I know so far reminds me of this song.