Four Events in Five Days

Who: VN Associate Publisher Colleen Holland
What: The Maggie Awards, a VegNews Vacation Reunion, a Restaurant Review, and a Film Screening
Where: Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Campbell, Calif.
When: April 29–May 3, 2011
Why: A week in the life of a magazine publisher!

The Scoop: Being the publisher of a vegan magazine definitely has its benefits. Although our pace never seems to slow down and the workload continues to grow (I thought this was supposed to get easier?), we have an opportunity to attend all kinds of events and constantly meet interesting and inspirational people. In the last week alone, I attended one of the largest magazine award shows in the country, lunched with one of our VegNews Vacations guests at LA's Veggie Grill,  hit up a brand-new veg restaurant in San Francisco, and attended a film screening of a documentary that has huge potential to change the way people think about food and their health.

Last Friday, VN publisher Joseph Connelly and I made our annual trek to Los Angeles for one of the big industry award shows, The Maggies. We dined with the creative directors of Mother Jones and Yoga Journal (both based in San Francisco), ate some pretty decent vegan food (it's the Westin, but the meal was quite good this year!), met lots of people in the magazine world, and took part in a very entertaining awards program. Thankfully, Mother Jones, Yoga Journal, and VegNews all took home Maggie awards (including one for Best Magazine eNewsletter), so the spirits were high at our table of 10. Congratulations to all of our fellow publishers and award winners.

Tim of Mother Jones, Charli of Yoga Journal, Joseph of VegNews, and me at the Maggie Awards

Last year, we launched VegNews Vacations and have now been to India twice with VegNews readers. The trips are nothing short of fantastic, and one of the benefits is that we have made a lot of new friends from around the country. We've had several reunions from both journeys, and we met up with the lovely Brenda from Redondo Beach (VegNews Great Adventure to India 2010) this past Saturday for lunch at the newest Veggie Grill location in Torrance. We reminisced about the trip, talked about her new Etsy store, and ate a delicious array of food: buffalo wings with barbecue sauce and ranch dressing, the Santa Fe Crispy Chick'n sandwich, Papa's Portobello burger, the (best-ever) All Hail Kale salad, the mac 'n' cheese, and sweet potato fries. Yes, it was a good lunch, and, yes, we were full for the next 24 hours.

VegNews Vacation reunion at Veggie Grill! Me, Brenda, and Joseph

When our appetites finally returned, we were back in San Francisco and ready to try out the city's newest vegetarian restaurant. The Source, owned by former New Yorkers (and brothers) Andrew and Mitchell Fox. The restaurant bills itself as a "multi-dimensional dining experience," and we were impressed. The space is modern, the food is innovative, and the menu has something for everyone. We loved the Mushroom Onion Swiss Burger (served with cashew cheese and wrapped in a house-made flat bread) and the Almond Joy smoothie (freshly made cashew milk whirled with raw chocolate, coconut, and almonds). All of the pizzas and breads are made in the restaurant's brick oven, and a variety of juices, elixirs, lattes, and shakes are on offer to wash it all down. We are excited to welcome The Source to the San Francisco veg dining scene.

Overstuffed mushroom onion burger with cashew cheese and French fries, I love you

And to cap off the four events in five days, I headed down to Campbell on Tuesday night with Joseph for the Northern California premier of the the new film, Forks Over Knives. Joseph was on the post-film discussion panel along with The Engine 2 Diet author Rip Esselstyn and San Francisco Vegetarian Society President Dixie Mahy, and we hadn't seen the documentary since its latest round of editing. Whole Foods sponsored the event, the 200+ seat theater was packed, and the audience was very moved by the film. In essence, the documentary examines the relationship between what America eats (excessive animal products) and how sick we are (diabetes, cancer, and heart disease), and has enormous potential for reaching the masses. In fact, I predict that it will be nominated for an Academy Award. Forks Over Knives opens in theaters this weekend in New York and Los Angeles, and rolls out across the country throughout the month. Tell everyone you know!

The line formed early for the Forks Over Knives screening in Campbell

Natural Products Expo West 2011

Who: VN Editorial Assistant Anna Peraino and the entire VN team

What: Natural Products Expo West 2011

Where: Anaheim, Calif.

When: March 11-13, 2011

Why: To find out about this year's best new vegan products, of course!

The Scoop: I had heard what I thought were tall tales of the food, beverage, and natural product Mecca that is Expo West, but to be quite honest, I didn't believe it. Boy, was I wrong. Imagine a grocery store multiplied by 50, filled with hundreds of thousands of people, and throw in millions of skillets, slow cookers, and toothpicks, and you have Expo West. The booths were massive (So Delicious' booth was not only two stories tall but also had a Nintendio Wii), the food and drinks were never-ending (think vegan quesadillas, pizza, 10 kinds of peanut butter, and Gardein galore in just one section of one of the 50 football field-long aisles), and the people were everywhere (The Spork Girls! Jillian Michaels! Fabio!).

So Delicious' two-story booth: one of many behemoths

Most of the VegNews team flew down on Thursday afternoon, and the weekend only got crazier from there. The days were filled with taste testing new products (chocolate walnut brownie ice cream, pizza, and orange sugar-covered marshmallow Dandies were three of the thousands), picking our 2011 Best of Show winners (want to know who we picked? Make sure to check out our May+June issue!), and catching up with friends. The craziness didn't stop there: with dinners at Native Foods Café (my burger consisted of a heap of seitan, Daiya cheddar cheese, tempeh bacon, BBQ sauce, ranch dressing, and fried pickle chips) and The Veggie Grill, it seemed like we never stopped eating. Well, to be fair, we didn't.

Native Food Café's Oklahoma Bacon Cheeseburger. Be jealous.

I'd like to sign off saying it was all fun and tasting spoons, but I'd be lying. A blackout at our hotel (waking up to a room full of lights at 4am? Jarring) and a two and a half-hour delay on our way home were definitely both unexpected (and quite unwelcome), but all in all, it was an awesome and completely exhausting weekend. Want more Expo West dish? Check out our Facebook album for pics, stories, and finds!

Seed, Spork Sisters, and the 59th Annual Maggie Awards

Who: VN Publisher Joseph Connelly and VN Associate Publisher Colleen Holland
What: One fine day in LA
Where: Venice, West Hollywood, and Los Angeles, Calif.
When: May 7, 2010
Why: The trophies were waiting

The Scoop: Colleen and I have been on the road pretty much non-stop since early February—publishing duties keep us busy, y'know. Why not jam as much into this 48-hour SoCal trip as possible?

Thursday night was Forks Over Knives; today began with chopsticks at Venice's stylish Seed Restaurant. The baby of Love, Eric author Eric Lechasseur and his wife Sanae Suzuki, this quaint and cozy restaurant not far from Muscle Beach serves such a dazzling selection of fresh macrobiotic fare that one visit won't do it justice. We'll be back. Thanks, Eric!

Seed's Saisai Donburi Macro Bowl

Just around the corner from Seed is Eko Zone, a spacious, well-lit vegan shop run by the lovely threesome of Dana Riley, Bill, and the one who does the real work, the photogenic Kosmo. If you ever need to pick up a copy of VegNews, they sell it here!

Eko Zone's Dana, Bill, and the white-and-fluffy Kosmo

Since I had just seen Chef Tanya Petrovna at the Farm Sanctuary Hoe Down six days ago, we stopped at the Westwood location of her Native Foods to see if she was around. She wasn't, so we settled for a non-macro Boogie Bar.

Native Food's cookbook and Boogie Bar

A last-minute invite by the dynamic duo that is the Goldberg sisters, had us "rushing" from Venice to West Hollywood through legendary LA traffic. Heather and Jenny, the insanely adorable owners of Spork Foods have opened a fashionable loft studio where they teach cooking classes, film their VegNews TV segments, and actually spin vinyl! I was in heaven. Heather and Jenny are raising veganism to a new level, which is a good thing, don't you think?

The chic, hip Spork Foods loft

Heather and Jenny Goldberg

Next up was a pit stop at "Sunset Grill," aka the West Hollywood Veggie Grill on Sunset Boulevard (Colleen's first visit). We bumped into a young man cautiously eyeing the menu; sensing apprehension, VegNews offered to buy him his very first veggie burger (the Santa Fe Crispy Chickin', for those who appreciate detail). Wouldn't you know that our new friend, Tamon George, is actually a professional football player (defensive back) for the Canadian Football League's Saskatchewan Roughriders and was the number nine overall pick in the 2009 CFL draft? Later, his lovely Persia White-look-alike girlfriend Sarah Fontenot joined us. Of course, she's beautiful and a budding silver screen actress. If this story isn't sappy enough, the handsome couple met when they were five years old! Another order of Sweetheart Fries, please.

All the way from Saskatchewan: Tamon George and Sarah Fontenot

A quick change into evening wear and we were off to the big show: The 59th annual Maggie Awards, the "Oscars of the Magazine Industry." VegNews picked up two (including Best Lifestyle Magazine for the third year in a row), and had the pleasure of sitting with Madeleine Buckingham, publisher of fellow San Francisco magazine Mother Jones. Madeleine and MJ were the evening's big winners, taking home four Maggies, which translates into bragging rights for our table, as seen here:

Mother Jones' Claudia Smukler and Madeleine Buckingham with VegNews' Joe and Colleen

If you enjoy Press Pass, check back often, and sign up to get notified about new postings via Google Friend Connect!

Weekend Warriors

Who: VN Associate Editor Abigail Young, Office Manager Lyndsay Orwig, and Editorial Assistants Kailey Harless and Charlotte Gordon
What: Animal Rights National Conference, Part I
Where: Los Angeles, Calif.
When: June 16–20, 2009
Why: To represent VegNews at the annual AR conference

The Scoop: This year’s Animal Rights National Conference brought activists from across the world to Los Angeles for four days of thought-provoking lectures, stimulating conversations, and fast friendships. A lucky group of VN staffers, myself included, made the oh-so-excruciating one-hour flight to the world’s oldest meet-up of its kind.

Joining an array of exhibitors, the team set up shop to meet attendees and spread the VegNews word. Conveniently, our table was sandwiched between the two sole food vendors, Samosa House and SunPower Natural Café. Did we complain about vegan samosas in plain sight, or the generous raw chocolate-cookie samples sent our way? Certainly not.

Friday welcomed an excited crowd, eager to peruse the exhibition room between lectures. I had the pleasure of meeting many of our readers, as well as making friends with some new subscribers. Robert Cheeke of Vegan Bodybuilding fame stopped by and was kind enough to dole out free fitness advice to Kailey and me (upon our request).

After a long day at the conference, it was time for our anticipated outing to the much-hyped vegan fast-food haven, The Veggie Grill. In case you haven’t been, believe the hype.

Veggie Grill's All Hail Kale salad with crispy "chicken"

I inhaled my All Hail Kale salad, and snuck a few stellar sweet-potato fries from the table’s appetizer.

Sweet-potato fries with chipotle ranch dipping sauce

If the food and sunshine weren't enough, I had the pleasure of keeping excellent dinner company: author and blogger Erik Marcus, Mercy for Animals' Nathan Runkle, and the conference’s two Grassroots Activist awardees, Lauren Ornelas and Dave Bernel.

Their awards, among others, were presented at Saturday’s banquet. Attendees in their swankiest weekend wear honored the year’s top activists and organizations, dined on Match Meats entrées, and enjoyed an entertaining celebrity-hosted charity auction. Remember French Stewart? No? What about now? He garnered quite a few laughs from our table, which I wouldn't entirely attribute to the merlot.

Charlotte, Kailey, and I pose at the banquet

The night ended with a mixer at the hotel’s high-dollar bar, combining a local LA Vegan Drinks event with the conference’s nightly reception. Despite the attire and the cocktails’ price tags, the tone was casual, celebratory, and a perfect end to the evening.

Viva Veggie Grill!

Who: VN Publisher/Editor in Chief Joseph Connelly, VN Associate Publisher Colleen Holland, VN Editorial Director Aurelia d'Andrea, VN Senior Editor Elizabeth Castoria, and VN West Coast Advertising Representative Lara Bradley

What: A flat-out feast

Where: The Veggie Grill, El Segundo, Calif.

Why: Powering up before a fancy-pants gala

When: September 6, 2008

The Scoop: In case it wasn't already abundantly clear, we like food. A lot. All the time. So when we had the chance to stop by The Veggie Grill's second location before heading out to Acton for Animal Acres' Gala, we jumped on a plane and drove directly there, without so much as stopping to check in to our hotel. Our enthusiasm was matched by that of Kevin Boylan and John Anderson—TVG's co-founder and operations manager, respectively—who were kind enough to not only join us for lunch, but insisted on helping us out with deciding what to order. And by "helping," we mean that they had the kitchen send out enough amazing food to feed a famished army. The VN team is made up of some serious eaters, and we bravely rose to the challenge of tasting each and every delicious thing that came our way.

First off, let's just say that if every meal began with Sweetheart Fries, like this one did, the world would be a better place. Thinly sliced sweet potatoes get flash fried, then baked, to hot, crispy, yummy perfection. Along the same lines, the Chill Out Wings are basically the best faux-chicken any of us ever had. With a thick, crunchy batter and two dipping sauces—barbecue and chiptole ranch (swoon!)—these wings had us flying high. Yes, those were just the appetizers. Yes, we should have all worn maternity pants.

A slew of sandwiches and salads followed, including the Santa Fe Crispy Chickin', Papa's Portobello, Carne Asada, Bali Bliss, Grillin' Chickin', The V-Burger, the Baja Fiesta salad, and a little something that isn't quite on the menu yet called the All Hail Kale salad with blackened chickin'. Holy crap. Yes everything was amazing, and yes, somehow we managed to eat it all! Since all the sandwiches came on fresh, whole-wheat bread and smothered in avocado and other top-shelf toppings, it's hard to imagine a more appetizing spread. The All Hail Kale stood out from the already outstanding crowd for a couple reasons. One: the kale is perfectly marinated, so it retains all the fresh flavor of raw kale without being too dense. Two: the blackened chickin'. If you were ever any kind of fan of barbecued chicken in the pre-vegan days of yore, get you some blackened chickin'. Without overstating the case, it's perfect.

Just in case there was any nanometer of room left in our bellies, out came dessert. Usually, we'd send up a white flag and declare surrender at the thought of eating one more morsel after a meal like this. This time, however, let's just say that Kevin convinced us—aka told us not to "wimp out." And somehow we ended up tasting the very densely chocolaty brownie, the slightly pumpkiny cheesecake, and the faux-cream-cheese-frosted carrot cake. Then we died.

Aside from the outrageously good food—which in this case is a big aside!—what we noticed most about TVG were the people. On a sleepy Saturday afternoon, the place was continuously busy, and the customers represented all age groups and ethnicities. Kevin told us that roughly 75 percent of his customers are meat eaters, many of whom have no idea that their lunches are cruelty-free, but know for certain that the food is damn tasty. It was difficult to leave The Veggie Grill, but with our bellies bulging we bid a very fond adieu to Kevin and John, and headed back our to hotel to digest. Here's the VN crew with Kevin, who is not standing on a platform, fyi: