A Bit of Southern Comfort

Who: VegNews Office Manager Lyndsay Orwig, the rest of the VN Crew, plus a special guest

What: The annual Southern Comfort dinner

Where: Millennium Restaurant, San Francisco, Calif.

When: Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Why: We just can't get enough fried, comforting food.

The Scoop: For those who are familiar with Millennium, their annual Southern Comfort night is something to look forward to all year long. It's also the one time in the year when the restaurant may be a little more casual than usual—plaid and mullets are in abundance, as is the beer. So we at the VNHQ were very excited when VegNews Publishers Joseph Connelly and Colleen Holland invited all of us to this special dinner. We were also extremely thrilled to have a special guest join us—former VegNews Editorial Assistant and VN Contributor Melissa Feineman, who is now living in the SF Bay Area once again!  Delicious food and friends—what more could you ask for?

 Lyndsay and Elizabeth having a good time

Shortly after our arrival, we were served a big bucket of a variety of beer, including such classics as Pabst Blue Ribbon (my personal favorite), Schlitz, Olympia, and Miller High Life. Then came the bread—homemade biscuits, oat-molasses bread, and jalapeño-scallion cornbread to be exact—served with an amazing smoky pecan spread. And that was just the beginning of the appetizers! We were then served Becca's Chili Fries with papadzul, Danielle's Deep Fried Kosher Dill Pickles, and Black-eyed Pea Chow Chow. This was our idea of heaven, but then we were given the third part of the appetizers, which blew our minds—a shredded cabbage and watercress salad with strawberries, spiced almonds, tempeh bacon, and poppy-seed dressing.

 The amazing appetizer—chili cheese fries,  fried pickles, and black-eyed peas

Did I mention that those were just the appetizers? The choice of entrées was up next, and boy was it a hard decision to make! Here were our choices (see if you can decide): a Steamed Beer and Kraut Brat with your choice of toppings, including but not limited to cheese sauce, chili, and pickled mushrooms; Tammy Fae Gomez's Midwest Tamale Pie; Jersey Diner-Style Ketchup-Glazed Meatloaf, served with mushroom-bourbon gravy, and sour-cream-and-chive smashed potatoes; Alice's Buttermilk Fried Chicken Sandwich, with cilanto-red cabbage slaw, mayonnaise, Yucatan Diablo Sauce, and a French bread roll. It was a very tough decision, to say the least, but the chicken sandwich was the big winner, and the meatloaf was a close second.

Two entrées in one—the meatloaf and the popular buttermilk fried chicken

Straight from the ice cream sandwich bar—delicious!

We were completely stuffed, but you can't attend Southern Comfort night without fitting in the dessert. And this was no ordinary dessert, but Anne's Ice Cream Sandwich Bar! First, we had a choice of Oatmeal Raisin or Chocolate cookies, but most of us picked one of each. Then we had to choose two fillings to be mixed with the vanilla ice cream, including chocolate-covered pretzels, sprinkles, chocolate chips, brownies, Newman O's, chocolate-peanut butter rice crispy treats, pralines, and rice mellow. Finally, we were able to go crazy with the toppings, which included maraschino cherries, fudge sauce, caramel sauce, strawberry-chipotle sauce, and vanilla bean cream. The decadence nearly killed us, and it took us a little while, but we were finally able to stand up and say our goodbyes. Our satisfaction had hit 100 percent—that is until this morning when the waiting began once again for this amazing dinner! To check out more photos, just go to our Facebook photo gallery.

Vegan Drinks: Hello, 2010!

Who: VN Editorial Assistant Liz Miller and the VN crew!

What: SF Vegan Drinks

Where: Martuni's, San Francisco, Calif.

When: Thursday, January 28, 2010

Why: Cocktail time is always more fun with like-minded people!

The Scoop: When happy hour rolls around, hardworking vegans are just like everybody else—we too enjoy indulging in afterwork libations. Thankfully for thirsty Bay Area vegans, VegNews and Vegansaurus host SF Vegan Drinks once every month at Martuni's. While the drink specials are great—no, seriously, we have our own monthly special—the company is certainly why we love and greatly anticipate the event. The best part of the night was definitely seeing the room slowly grow from a handful of people to an overwhelming, tightly packed crowd of the finest vegans in SF. Familiar faces included vegan bodybuilder and former VN cover model Kenneth Williams, VN contributor Mat Thomas, VegWebmistress and Vegansaurus founder Laura Beck, vegetarian chef Philip Gelb, Brian Grupe of Vegan Outreach, Dr. Mark Berman, Suicide Girls co-founder and Vegansaurus contributor Steve Simitzis, and many more! Yep, we vegans are a pretty awesome crowd—and very looking good, of course.

Elizabeth and Abby show off how "cute" is done.

It wasn't all just fun though—there were also games. While sipping on cocktails, guests had the opportunity to enter VN's raffle for a chance to win a dozen cinnamon rolls from Cinnaholic! As if that alone wasn't a good enough reason to sign-up, all proceeds from the raffle benefited LBGT Compassion. Florian and Shannon Michelle Radke of Cinnaholic were even on-hand to see who the lucky winner would be. After much anticipation, officer manager Lyndsay Orwig drew the winning raffle ticket: VN columnist and vegan chef extraordinaire Jesse Miner! In total, the raffle raised more than $60 for LBGT Compassion.

Florian and Shannon Michelle from Cinnaholic!

If you haven't tried Cinnaholic's crazy delicious cinnamon roll creations, we can't emphasize enough how, well, crazy fantastic they are. Between delicious drinks we chatted with old friends, mingled with new ones, and photographed everything in between. We were thrilled with the teeming turn out, and can't wait for next month's celebration—hope to see you there! Cheers!

Saturday Sound-off

Who: VN Associate Editor Abigail Young, VN Publisher Joseph Connelly, VN Associate Publisher Colleen Holland, and VN Editorial Assistant Kailey Harless

What: PCRM’s School Lunch Sound-off

Where: a.Muse Gallery, San Francisco, Calif.

When: August 22, 2009

Why: I was told there’d be vegan tamales.

The Scoop: This was an extra-special Saturday, seeing as I’m generally of the sleep-until-noon variety. I happily put my weekend tradition on hold for an event not to be missed—the School Lunch Sound-Off, presented by the Physicians’ Committee for Responsible Medicine. I managed a pre-lunchtime wake-up call with (relative) ease, and made my way to a.Muse Gallery with the rest of the VN crew for what promised to be a fantastic start to my Saturday.

The event, spearheaded by everyone’s favorite Ms. Laura Beck, brought students, parents, and citizens together to discuss PCRM’s Healthy School Lunches campaign, aimed at bringing vegetarian and vegan options to public schools nationwide. To fuel attendees brains, an all-star vegan feast created by local SF talent awaited guests. I’m not ashamed to admit, I was one of the first to hit the serving table.

The front of the serving line—the happiest place on earth

You can’t blame my eagerness—this wasn’t ordinary “free food.” A triple culinary threat brought the party, formed by the Brassica Supperclub gourmands, the elusive SF Vegan Tamales crew, and the always tasty Sugar Beat Sweets. The results? We’re talking two kinds of vegan tamales, fresh fruit salad, savory white and black bean dips, heirloom-tomato bruschetta, and bite-sized cupcakes, including my personal favorite flavor combo, chocolate mint. Maybe I got seconds. You would’ve, too.

A full plate of vegan offerings, including the infamous tamales

The food served as a welcomed bonus, but not the main attraction. Millennium chef Stephanie Roston started off the afternoon’s lecture with a brief history of her experience with kids and healthy eating (conclusion: kids love healthy food!), followed by a talk on nutrition by Susan LaVelle, a family nurse practitioner. The facts and figures about childhood obesity and its resulting health risks, not to mention first-hand accounts of her professional practice, were unsettling. Considering 30.5 million school lunches are served everyday, the cafeteria seems like a great place to initiate healthy change.

The third speaker was former Taxi-star, nutritionista, and best-selling author Marilu Henner. During her passionate speech, Marilu shared her personal vegan history, reaching back more than 30 years, and her motivation as a mother and educated activist for supporting PCRM’s initiative. The word “firecracker” could be heard throughout the room as the perfect descriptive of Marilu. An inspiring force to be reckoned with, she’s spreading a message of health across the country.

The rest of the afternoon passed with mingling, including a run-in with our friend Michelle (who also works with PCRM) from Vegan Break, and other fun activities: planting take-home flower pots, writing letters in support of PCRM, coloring, and making awesome animal-shaped PB&J sandwiches. Okay, so maybe some of these activities were originally planned for the younger crowd. Still, they were enjoyed by all, as was the entire afternoon.

Living the VegNews Dream

Who: The whole VN team + la vegan-entrepreneur crème de la soy crème
What: Birthdays and bubbly by the pool
When: March 15, 2008
Where: Candy Cane Inn, Anaheim, Calif.
Why: Because we’ll take any excuse to celebrate two of our favorite VN ladies!

The Scoop: It’s a tough life we have, we VegNews peons: traveling extreme distances only to be taken to a poolside suite; then, after a night of being force-fed at Native Foods, getting dragged out of bed to sample hundreds of vegan treats and personal products—at one point, we were even commanded to bring some samples home with us. Talk about a hostile work environment!

Okay, so maybe it was a little more like the ultimate vegan fantasy, and a little less like arduous labor, but, after nine hours of boothing and sleuthing, our feet were seriously sore. And, because it was Jenny and Katie’s birthdays, we were not ready to call it a night. Enter our hero, VN Publisher Joseph Connelly, who brought us delicious Vietnamese take-out from the nearby and newly opened Thuyen Vien, a specially made, giant Native Foods chocolate birthday cake with vanilla frosting, and several pints of Maggie Mudd Tarmac and Memphis Mudd Pie vegan ice-cream. Joining in the festivities were longtime friends of VegNews, and standout entrepreneurs, Vegan Essentials husband and wife team Courtney Ernster and Ryan Wilson, as well as the always entertaining Chicago Soy Dairy gents—producers of the first "ice-cream" made in an all-vegan facility. Later on, after heartfelt card-giving and candle-blowing, we dipped our tired, happy bodies into the glowing hot tub, and popped some Champagne. It’s tough work, but hey, somebody’s gotta do it.