Saturday, May 26, 2007

Restaurant Review: Vegan Factory (Tarzana, CA)

This is a new restaurant in the San Fernando Valley that has only been open 7 months. While I had this in my little book of places to check out, we pretty much were in the area and starving and this was a great surprise. It's tucked in a strip mall and looks like any other of a hundred Thai restaurants on Ventura Blvd -- only this one is 100% vegan.
'Cucumber Salad' $4.95 Sliced cucumbers, red onions, carrots in special sweet sauce.



'Fresh Spring Rolls' $7.95 Romaine lettuces, soy chicken, mint leaves, bean sprouts and rice noodles wrapped in rice paper. Served with house vegan sauce.

These looked better than they tasted, and were improved when the big leaves of mint were extracted. We left one behind. The sauce was outstanding though, and we kept that for the rest of the meal.



'Sweet and Sour Soy Chicken' $7.95 Sauteed with cucumbers, tomatoes, pineapples, bell peppers and onions. This was good, and we gobbled it up, but it was second best to the other entree we shared below.









Isn't it cute how they shaped our side of brown rice into a heart? The sauce from the appetizer rolls was great on this.










'
Kung Pao' $7.95 Soy chicken stir fried with bell peppers, onions, peanuts, dry red pepper in hot & spicy sauce. This was our favorite dish. Art drank a Thai ice tea with soy milk, and I had a fusion tea with lychee. No room for dessert, and my drink satisfied my sweet tooth anyway.
Vegan Factory
19014 Ventura Blvd.
Tarzana, CA 91356
(818) 342-3286

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Welcome back. I'm loving the restaurant reviews. It's always fun to see what other people eat when they go out.

Jenni (aka Vegyogini) said...

It's so funny that you reviewed this restaurant yesterday because that was exactly when I was trying to remember its name! I hope you're staying in Tarzana long enough to also try Madeleine's, our amazing gourmet vegan restaurant. :) Have a wonderful, safe trip and thank you for spreading the word about our local vegan restaurants!!

aTxVegn said...

Great looking food and at great prices. Too bad the spring rolls weren't more impressive because they are huge. The rice presentation is so clever!

Vicki's Vegan Vice said...

hi vegyogini - How cool, hope I helped you remember. I think we went to Madeleine's back in the day - but we definately need to go back, thanks for the reminder for next time, & for your visit.

scottishvegan said...

I am so behind on my blog reading that I missed this post. I love this place! It's only a few miles from where I live! I think it's probably my favourite restaurant around. Unfortunately I think Wee G has been a bit sickened of it as we went quite a lot at first and his work also order lunch from there often, so it can be hard to persuade him to go! I love the little heart shaped rice too! And the staff are so sweet!

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