For May’s vegan adventure, Avocado, Jerky and I went to Eternal Abundance. Eternal Abundance is located on Commercial Drive. Luckily, we found free street parking in close proximity to the restaurant!
Walking in, Eternal Abundance seems more of a grocery store with a cafe on the side. It seems like this is common in this area, as we ended up checking out a vegetarian supermarket a block away, Sweet Cherube, which had the same thing.
Everything screams ‘HEALTHY!’ and ‘CLEAN EATING’ here. Everything is raw, which means no heat is used to make or cook the food. And of course, everything is vegan. It was probably the healthiest place I’ve ever eaten at in my life. To be honest, I didn’t like it that much because the 100% raw, vegan lifestyle is not for me – personally, it was toooooo healthy and clean. So keep in mind that this review is from someone who eats ‘ordinary’ food such as meat and cooked products. Hate me if you want 🙂
Marvelous mushroom burger: This was definitely not a burger that I was expecting or used to. The ‘bread’ was not your usual bread, it had the texture of those SunRype fruit-to-go stripes that reminded me of childhood. I’m sorry but I can not see this as bread. Bread does not have this texture or taste. The taste was kind of onion-y and salty, like vegemite. It was very odd. The vegan patty was more acceptable. It was made with mushrooms, and also had a dense texture.
Although Avocado and I were going to share this, I ended up just swapping some food with Jerky and he ate the rest of my portion cause I couldn’t eat it anymore ROFL.
Zugghetti: My first time trying zoodles, aka shredded zucchini. I must admit that vegan names sound delicious and intriguing… but I prefer real noodles instead. Y’all know noodles are probably my favourite type of food.
Anyways, the zugghetti was a lot better than the marvelous mushroom burger. We got it with pesto, and it was smothered in it so you couldn’t really tell you were eating zucchini or vegetables. I thought I would hate zoodles, but it wasn’t that bad… it wouldn’t be my first or second or third choice though LOLOL.
Kale caesar, large $11.25: Finally, something familiar haha! No complaints about this caesar salad. After finding out that caesar dressing is made from an anchovy (type of fish) base, I find it pretty impressive when vegan caesar salad tastes like a non-vegan one.
Spicy kimchi roll, $7: This was my favourite of the day… probably because it had seaweed and rice (albeit, brown rice which is okay as well). This is actually only ‘half raw’ because the rice is cooked. I’m not sure if it was because I wasn’t that full from the few bites of that ‘burger’ or because zoodles aren’t filling, but I really liked this. It came with kimchi, sesame sauce, avocado, cucumber (or as they say “cuke”), carrot, peppers and sprouts.
IF you’re a person who enjoys clean, raw, healthy eating and vegan… then I would definitely recommend this place to you. All the vegetables are very fresh and crunchy, and there is a big variety of vegan, raw foods to pick from.
But for me, I personally did not like it. I still shudder at the thought of that mushroom burger, it is definitely not a burger. All of the vegan places I’ve tried in Vancouver so far mimic non-vegan food… such as pizza, chicken wings, ramen, ice cream, etc. However, since this restaurant is ‘raw’, nothing is cooked so your options are quite limited when making food. And since when is cooking/using heat to make food considered a bad or dirty thing?! Anyways, if you like your meat, dairy, bread, carbs, or basically anything deemed as not “clean” eating, stay away from this place.
Vegan or raw food lovers are probably hating me for this review right now or that I’m “uneducated” despite doing research on this trend… but that’s okay, we all have our opinions, and this is mine. I’m glad that I tried it so that I can appreciate meat burgers even more. Sorry not sorry.
Nay.
What it says (taken from Sephora):
The ampoules are made out of a plastic material. I’ve put a few in my hand for scale, so you can get a better idea of the size of each. At $138.00 CAD, these little guys aren’t cheap! Luckily, one is more than enough for moisturizing my face.
Using it can be a bit messy, so you have to be gentle. Gently twist the smaller circle to open the capsule, and then the product will come out right away. I can’t find a way to gracefully apply this product without it getting all over my hands, and frantically trying to put it on quick enough before it all spills out.
We had plans to go to another nice restaurant but that didn’t go through, so it was a pretty spontaneous decision to come here (we decided to come here half a hour before). I was Yelping and this placed seemed like the perfect atmosphere that we were looking for.
I didn’t really want to sit on the patio because it seemed cold outside, but we were ensured that the patio was heated. We were seated next to a roaring fireplace which kept us warm and cozy the entire evening! Not all the seats have the fireplace, and the views are slightly better without the fireplace blocking.
Bread, free: Standard complimentary bread. The bread was nice and chewy instead, and served slightly warm with a side of butter.
Calamari, $13.50: We normally don’t get appetizers to save money and our appetite, but it was a special occasion. We were glad we ordered this because it was really good. It came with a very generous portion of calamari, with crisp and fresh batter. The calamari was seasoned with a variety of herbs which made it really good.
Alderwood grilled BC salmon, $29.50: The salmon was DELICIOUS. It flaked off nicely, and had a slightly grilled taste to it. So good. I just wanted to eat the whole thing.
New York Striploin, $42: My entree was the striploin, cooked medium rare! It was very juicy, tender, and flavourful. If I recall correctly, it usually comes with some sort of sauce or butter, but I asked for only salt and pepper with it. I’m a big believer in eating steak with good ol’ salt and pepper because I find it tastes so much better when made simply! Am I the only one who prefers steak this way?
Close up of my medium rare steak! WordPress needs to have an emoji keyboard so I can insert the drooling and heart eye ones here!
Mac and cheese, $7.00: Wow, I didn’t realize how much food we ordered until writing this post. For $7, this was a really good value and good size. The mac and cheese was baked with four types of cheese. The boyfriend said it was really comforting, with very stringy and delicious looking cheese.
I was in the mood for some authentic sushi, not the usual Chinese or Korean-run fast food sushi joints that we usually go to. I’m not hating on Chinese/Korean-run sushi joints because those are cheap, fast, and usually decent but I just wanted to go somewhere that was authentic that day.
Tuna tataki, 9 pieces, $14.95: The boyfriend loves tuna tataki, so we usually order it at every new place to see how it compares. It came with grated daikon on top which we haven’t seen at other places, but it was refreshing and cleaned our palette.
Tuna & salmon sashimi, $14.95: We really appreciated the fact that they had freshly grated wasabi here, as most places do not! I normally like to eat my sashimi plain, but I used wasabi this time because it was freshly grated.
Salmon nigiri, $2.95 / piece: Just like the salmon sashimi, the salmon nigiri was so good as well. The sushi rice was absolutely perfect too!
Negitoro maki, $4.75: Just like the tuna tataki, negitoro is a must for the boyfriend. This was soooo good. The tuna was so soft and mashed perfectly with the fresh green onion. At first, we were reluctant to order it because it was more expensive than we were used to, but so worth it.
Our bill came to around $65-70 with tip (forgot exactly how much), which was a lot more than we we usually pay! But it was nice to treat ourselves and have a relaxing, authentic Japanese dinner.