Vegan in an Omni World: Michael's Oriental

Saturday was Mum's 60th birthday, so to celebrate Dad took us and all her brothers and sisters out to dinner at Michael's Oriental in Eight Mile Plains. Chinese restaurants can either be fantastic for vegans, or a nightmare. Chicken stock and oyster sauce seem to sneak their way in to the most innocent of looking dishes in some places. So I rang in advance to make sure I would be able to eat there. I have to say the staff were very helpful. They already knew what a vegan actually was, which is always a bonus! When we got to the restaurant, I spoke to the woman behind the desk and she made sure the wait staff and the chefs knew all about how my food was to be prepared. The fact that she could list to me all the things they didn't use if there was a vegan dining there was very reassuring.

The parentals and the aunts and uncles all partook of the 'Ultimate Feast', which quite frankly was just a parade of different sorts of dead critters, so I will not even bother to recap any of it here. Even their vegetables had some crab sauce thing on it. For myself and my brother, who is a fledgling vegetarian, we had out own little veggie feast.



For out entree we shared the vegetarian spring rolls. They were OK, as far as vegetarian spring rolls go, though certainly not the best ever. That honour for me still belongs to Jasmine Rice in Wollongong. Although I have had a few close seconds recently. But there weren't those. They were perfectly pleasant, but a little bit gluggy.

For our mains, we shared two dishes. Which was fun because normally I just end up having one dish to myself. So it is nice to have someone to share with for a bit more variety!



This is stir fried vegetables in a chilli plum sauce. The vegetables were cooked so that they were still a bit crunchy, which I love. The sauce was nice, but there was no chilli in it that I could really taste. I guess we should have asked for them to make it a bit hotter!



And this is Fried Tofu, Bok Choy and Mushrooms, which is in a thick soy sauce. This was great. The fried tofu was particularly excellent! And this was all served with rice in the cutest little bamboo buckets. I wish I had a photo of them!

So overall, not a bad vegan dining experience. Pretty darn expensive for some vegetables though, so I really doubt I'd be going there again on a regular basis with so many other yummy cheap options around the area. But nice for special occasions for the meat eaters, and good to know that the vegans and vegetarians are looked after so well.

In other news, there was a wedding reception there as well and they played 'The Glory Of Love' not once, but twice. Frakking awesome! It's my favourite cheesy love song!

VeganMoFo: Huo Fo Vegetarian Court

Only two days of VeganMoFo left!

I was super tired this morning and hadn't planned anything for dinner. I also was going to spend two hours at the gym in the morning and then go horse riding in the afternoon, so I knew my sleepiness would be on the increase. Sounds like the perfect excuse to eat out! Most of the time I go to my old trusty, The Magic Wok. Tonight I thought I would try something a bit different.

Several months ago a friend and I went to try Huo Fo Vegetarian Court, which is across the road from The Magic Wok. I was a bit unimpressed. The staff member I spoke to didn't really understand what I was saying about being a vegan and not wanting to have any eggs, and the food seemed to take quite a while to come. While the burdock salad was delicious (who doesn't love a good pickled burdock!), I left thinking I wouldn't go back.

Well, tonight I did. I had heard from some other Brisbane vegans that it is one of their favourite places, and everyone can have a bad night. So off I went with my mother. And it was great! The chef was out chatting to people and taking orders, and she absolutely knew what being a vegan was and how it related to their menu. Foodwise, almost everything is vegan. There are a few egg dishes, but they all clearly state this. There is also a honey dish or two. They have an extensive bubble tea and drinks menu, and while it seems the milk teas may be all dairy (but I need to confirm, last time they were), they have lots of fun other options to try.

For starters we had soup. I had the Hot And Sour Soup, which was divine. Just what a girl wants! I must remember this for next time I am feeling sickly, as sadly The Magic Wok's spicy and sour soup just doesn't work for me (all spice, no sour). My mum had the Seafood Soup, which was pronounced excellent. We also had a starter of salty fried chicken with plum sauce. It was a big serving! Not bad, but not as salty as expected. The Fried Taiwanese Chicken at Kuan Yin is better. For mains we had Sizzling Black Pepper Mushroom (divine) and Veggie Meat Balls (served with bok choy), which were really nice though a bit sweeter than expected. I think I like the Meat Balls at The Magic Wok better. We also got a takeaway of Chicken Fried Rice for my Dad. For drinks, we tried out some iced brown sugar green tea, which was really nice though a bit sweet to have too often!

So the food was great this time! And I felt secure that my vegan needs were being met and that I wasn't accidentally consuming something naughty. Hurrah! The only downside was that everything was served pretty much at once, so things cooled down quickly. The Sizzle dish had stopped sizzling by the time I got there.

But overall, it was great. The restaurant is located in Sunny Park shopping center, on the corner of Mains and Padstow Roads. It has a small indoor area, and a larger outdoor covered area - which was lovely to sit in on this balmy spring night. Though I might stick with take away during the colder months. There is an extensive menu, with lots and lots to choose from. It is going to take me a good long while to come close to making a dent in it. Price wise, it is fairly reasonable, though some dishes are relatively expensive considering the prices at places like The Magic Wok and Kuan Yin. But there are also a lot of cheap dishes as well. They only accept cash, so if you go make sure you have plenty of mulah!

I'm really glad I gave this place a second chance. Though I shall always love The Magic Wok (indeed, I felt strangely guilty eating just across the road from it tonight), it is always good to get out and about and I am definitely going to go back for more this time!

I'm going to try and get together a big vegan Brisbane guide (I know it's been done a thousand times before, but if it means I get to vegan eat my way arount the city, I am all for it - tee hee!), so be on the look out for more posts about exciting vegan finds!

And now, bearing in mind that I started this post talking about how tired I was, I must sleep!