Sunday, October 6, 2019

Vegan in Dublin!

A quick warning about restaurants in Ireland.  They will try to charge you Dollars instead of Euros. Unless you have a ridiculously high transaction fee, do NOT do this.  They are price gouging you and making extra money.  They are supposed to ask you, but they often don't/.

The Bakehouse

I had breakfast here after the red eye from Newark.  It was good. I went all Basic and got the avocado toast. It is easy to get to downtown and within walking distance of most bus stops.  They had other breakfast options as well when we went there.

Apertivo
This was a walking down the street find. We were hungry after walking for so long after the tour.  I got a Vegan VLT and my friend got a vegan pizza.  We both thought they were delish! Mine was totally messy to eat, but so worth it. It was tasty and toasty and just what I expected.  It was a great snack/lunch item.  Not too much food, but good.

Noble House Chinese
This wasn't on the food tour, but it was next to my hotel in Dublin. I had the tofu and veggie sweet and sour here. There were WAY too many peppers and onions and not enough other mixed vegetables for my taste, but the sweet and sour sauce was right up my alley. My friend said they had the best pad thai he has ever had, it was so good, he went back three or four times to the same place while we were there.

The Rolling Doughnut
These were yummy, if you like doughnuts! They have vegan and non-vegan options.  I got the little three box that all the Irish liked to carry around. Two stuffed doughnuts (blueberry and raspberry) and vanilla glaze.

Food Tour
On one Saturday, I took a Vegan In Ireland Food Tour, and man did they show me to some great places! We visited 6 stops, but 2 were clothing related.

Cornicopia
We started here and had curry and goulash as a main bowl and potato salad and a cucumber/brocolini/pumpkin seed salad. I still dream about the potato salad.  I'm actually going to buy their cookbook Cornicopia at Home because their food was so good.  After the food tour, I went back twice more (insert blushing emoji here). That's how good it is, and also a take on how often they are open compared to others, especially on the weekends.

Blazing Salads
We stopped here for an egg roll and man I wish I had time to go back.  The food is not all vegan, but it is mostly vegetarian. A great place to grab a quick lunch or food to go.






Difontaine
This place had the best pizza I have ever had outside of the U.S. Seriously. It tasted just like a U.S. based pizza- fresh from NYC. It was super salty, but super tasty! I actually went back another time.


Thunder Road Cafe
According to their website, they actually have tons of vegan options here!  We went to try the English version of Beyond Burger. If you like Beyond, then you will like this.  These types of burgers will taste like meat if you are someone who doesn't like the taste of meat.






Brother Hubbard
All the Irish people loved this stop. But I just wouldn't go back. They were a weird fusion place. When I want falafels, I want them to taste like falafels, and these didn't. They had a smoky eggplant that tasted like pure smoke.




Vegan In Ireland

In August 2019, I got the chance to go to Ireland.  And surprisingly, it is extremely easy to be vegan in Ireland. Except for breakfast. All allergens (at least the 14 most common) have to be legally available in a list, if not on the menu exactly. So that means that eggs and milk have to be listed as an ingredient.  

Breakfast is difficult- the full Irish breakfast is meat meat more meat and eggs.  They will also have mushrooms and tomatoes.  Hotels will probably have oatmeal (there was a really yummy golden syrup oatmeal at my hotel).  Below is an overview of the delicious vegan meals I had outside of Dublin. Dublin meals in a different post.  

I do not subscribe to the vegan alcohol aspect, so I do not know if all of the delicious cider I drank was vegan or not, but it was so fresh and tasty. 

Howth




We went to the Abby Tavern. It has a good mixture of vegan, vegetarian, meat eater, and all sorts of allergy menus. I had the Stovetop Flatbread (Cherry Tomato Passata, Roast Cauliflower, Chickpea Croutons, and Sweet Potato Fries).  And the best part is that it was edible. I personally didn't like it, but it just wasn't to my taste. The chickpea croutons were just dried chickpeas. I also had the  Frozen Berries (Warm Vegan White Chocolate Sauce, Raspberry Sorbet, Pecan Vegan Praline).  Now the sorbet was delicious! The frozen berries were just that- frozen berries. Odd, but still good. I still recommend this as an option because a place with decent menu options for all is hard to come by. 

Malahide
Now this restaurant, was so tasty.  It was also 30 euros for my meal. We ate at Siam Thai restaurant.  I had the Yellow Curry (without the fish sauce): A mild and creamy yellow curry with coconut milk, onion, potatoes, pineapple and topped with fried onion, it’s very easy to eat, and is the mildest of the curries.  I have never had tomatoes and pineapple in my yellow curry. But dang...it was so yummy! Afterwards, we walked to The Fish Shack and got ice cream and sorbet.  So yummy!  If you like Thai food or sorbet, these are a great place to go!



Athalone
We stopped at the Michelin recommended restaurant called Thyme.  They don't upload their most recent menus, but the website and reviews said that they had a vegan option.  So when we got there and they handed me the menu. I asked for their vegan options/allergen menu.  The server looked at me that I was CRAZY. She said they don't have a vegan menu, but they might be able to make something for me, so she would as the chef. The chef said they could, so I had whatever he wanted to serve! I also finally took pictures of the food. 


The three course menu was as follows:

Appetizer: salad with house pickled vegetables. Actually pretty yummy, even though I:m not a big pickle fan. 

Main: Some sort of gnocchi and vegetable dish.  The surprise- it was cold! The little beet red things around the side were so tasty!

Dessert: 3 types of sorbet- peach, rhubarb, and raspberry?






Shannon Airport
Two words for you here: good luck!  You need to investigate the food closely. There was a pasta salad that had ham hidden in it. There was a spicy salad option. 

Dublin Airport
Go to Marquette in Terminal 1.  They have a hot vegan main option every day and numerous salads that are vegan as well.  In Terminal 2, there is a breakfast option that has avocado toast (that you can get without the egg). 

Dublin Hilton Airport Hotel
This is where I stayed (they were great while I was there, but they never sent me a receipt).  Their breakfast did have the Full Irish Breakfast.  They did have oatmeal as an option.  They had a dinner with a superfood salad that was so utterly bland that I can't recommend you getting it unless you just need food that is somewhat healthy and don't care about taste.