When I was in Japan, a steamed bun (called a man, rhymes with fun) with chocolate milk was my regular lunch when doing touristy things on my own. It was cheap and tasty. What more could I want? Oh yes, in retrospect, it would have been good if it had been vegan.

When I found out that there was a steamed bun shop in Melbourne with vegan options, I knew I had to try them, even if they make the mistake of calling them by the Chinese name of bao rather than the clearly superior Japanese term man.

Even though I wasn't actually that hungry, a quick look at the menu indicated that I had to order the veggie lunch pack - one of each of the three vegan options. How else was I to decide? These were the choi bao (shiitake mushrooms, tofu and veggies), the taro bao (taro, duh), and the fried silky tofu gua bao (with pickled mustard, coriander, sweet soy sauce and crushed peanuts). They also sell freshly made organic soy milk, hot or cold. Although I don't usually drink soy milk straight, I decided to be adventurous, and ordered a hot one.

I started with the fried silky tofu gua bao, the one that looks like a steamed bun taco. It was amazing, heaven for $4.20. I felt like I was back in Japan about to go and take photos of a temple, except that instead I was sitting looking out on a kinda cool old graffitied laneway, and the food was an order of magnitude better than any of nikuman (meat filled bun), kareman (curried meat filled bun) or pizzaman (meat and cheese filled bun) I ever bought from a Japanese kombini (convenience store). It beat the steamed buns I had from more authentic vendors too.

The choi bao was tasty enough but unremarkable, more in line with the quality I generally enjoyed in Japan, though I think I would have enjoyed it more if I'd eaten it first. The taro bao, a sweet bun that I fortunately managed to leave till last by accident, was not really my thing. I found the texture a bit unpleasant, probably because it reminded me of sweet red bean paste which I also don't like.

As for the soy milk, as I said before, I don't normally drink any non-dairy milks straight. I didn't used to enjoy dairy milk straight either. However, this stuff was fantastic, a very pleasant flavour in its own right, no chocolate powder required. I asked if they sell it to take home, but unfortunately, they only sell it by the cup in store. I think I might have to try making my own soy milk, because this was in an entirely different league to the stuff that comes in cartons at the supermarket.

Even though I wasn't thrilled with every item I tried, I'm going to rate Wonderbao 9/10, because for the gua bao and soymilk, the price to taste sensation ratio is phenomenal. Next time, I'll just order two gua baos and a soymilk. Mmmmmm.

River Kwai Thai and Burmese - a review

Our local Thai restaurant - River Kwai, is not a vegetarian restaurant as such, but they're pretty accommodating. They state their vegetarian dishes to be 100% vegetarian: no shrimp paste, fish sauce or oyster sauce hiding in your supposedly vegetarian tofu dish.

Hunter and I have eaten there a number of times over the past couple of years, both eat in and takeaway, and the food has been consistently very good. I've only eaten from the Burmese menu once, and I didn't like it as much as the Thai. It's not the best Thai I've ever eaten, but it is definitely among the better ones. Last time we went was to celebrate Hunter getting a pay rise, which is when I took these photos.

The first thing to be aware of is that if you eat in, you get a complementary starter. For ages it was some chilli fish thing, maybe Thai Fishcakes. Anyway, neither Hunter nor I would eat it, so I tried to remember to ask them not to bring it to us, which always seemed to cause confusion. This time I forgot, but the appetizer had changed to a satay dipping sauce, so I enquired as to whether it contained fish sauce. This caused some confusion, with the waitress repeatedly asking me whether I was allergic to fish, and me repeatedly stating that I can't eat fish, but avoiding giving an answer on the allergy front, as I didn't want to a) lie, or b) have my desire to avoid fish be ignored since I wasn't allergic. Eventually, she went and checked in the kitchen, and came back to tell me that the sauce was fine, but the bready things for dipping contained prawn. So while Hunter dipped, I just ate the sauce with a spoon. Hunter was not impressed with me, but I could live with that since it was tasty.

To save you having to ask, both the veggie spring rolls and veggie curry puffs contain egg.

As usual, we aimed to have leftovers, so we ordered a Tofu Pad Thai minus the egg, as well as a curry each. I had the sad realization while eating the Pad Thai that Isa's Everyday Pad Thai is actually better than this one (if less authentic). This is not to say that River Kwai's Pad Thai is bad, but rather that Isa is an absolute genius.

While Hunter had a Massaman Beef, not photographed because meat, I had a Green Curry. This was on the mild side for a green curry, but delicious, except that it had what I think were little spherical zucchinis in it, which weren't so great.

As I said earlier, we've eaten here a number of times, and never had a bad dish. I've tried all the Thai veggie curries, one of the veggie soups (can't remember which), and a few of the stir fries. Also, I should mention that the coconut rice has chunks of coconut meat in it, so please pay the extra dollar to upgrade to the coconut rice.

Overall rating is 7/10. Points deducted as it's a little on the expensive side for Thai, without the fish/oyster sauce and shrimp paste, some of their dishes are slightly lacking depth of flavour, which could be compensated for with a bit of creativity, and because while they advertise as vegetarian friendly, not all the staff understand that concept. Still great food though.

Las Vegan Cafe - a review

While picking up my exciting new 100% vegan shoes, I stopped in to have lunch at the nearby Las Vegan Cafe. There are actually two shops that share the premises, the cafe at the front, and Vegan Style, a (mostly) shoe shop at the back. This was dangerous. I visited Vegan Style while I was waiting for my food, and ended up falling in love with a pair of teal Mary Janes. I couldn't justify buying (and carrying) two pairs of shoes in one day, but I think I will have to go back for them... I've gone so long without buying shoes, I can buy these too, right?

Anyway, back to the food. Overwhelmed by the choices on the menu (i.e. overwhelmed by having choices), I asked for recommendations, and ended up getting crispy rice balls with satay sauce. At $12, it was one of the most expensive items on the menu.

It tasty enough, but nothing to get excited about. I'm going to give it a rating of 5/10. I'm not sure if that's too harsh, but I feel that it was around the minimum I would expect from a meal out, and as I'm new to this reviewing business, I don't want to start too high. The staff were friendly enough, and the cafe space was pleasant enough, though not particularly inviting.

I was also excited to order a hot chocolate, something that I very rarely buy any more since I'm not keen on grilling shop people about whether or not there is milk in the chocolate powder. It was, however, quite disappointing. I think it was made on almond milk, at any rate, it tasted very watery.

On the way out, I allowed myself to be tempted by a muffin - strawberry and lime. Despite the exciting sounding flavour combination, the muffin was less so. It was rather dry, and although I was excited to be eating an actual bought vegan muffin, I have made better (though admittedly not of that flavour). Actually, that seems like a good challenge, strawberry and lime muffins are now on the radar, as soon as I unpack my muffin tins, as soon as we actually move...

Overall, the food was unexciting but acceptable. I'll probably still give them another try next time I'm in the vicinity.

Lord of the Fries - a review (of sorts)

I remember when I was really small begging to go to MacDonald's. We could sometimes persuade Mum, but Dad was resolute that it wasn't even food there. He was convinced it would give him food poisoning.

By the time I'd reached high school, I was enough of a food snob that eating at Macca's held no appeal, except for the cheap softserves, and by the time I'd left school, the only thing I could be tempted to buy were some of the McCafe products. The last time I bought food there would have been about 4 years ago, and that was because I was on taekwondo camp, and we were expected to have eaten before arriving. I hadn't known. The person who was nice enough to take me to get food took me to MacDonald's, and though I wasn't impressed, but I wasn't in a position to argue.

The point of me rambling on about Macca's is this. Every now and then, I think it's a good idea to buy something from Lord of the Fries, and I have no idea why I think it's a good idea. In case you're not familiar with them, they're a Melbourne based vegetarian fast food chain with vegan options. They're also Kosher and Halal, which I imagine is fairly easy to do if you're all vegetarian. They have stores all over Melbourne, and from their website, it looks like there's now one in Sydney too.

Before I went vegan, even before I went vegetarian, you couldn't drag me into Macca's or Hungry Jack's. Yet every now and then I buy food from Lord of the Fries. It's like I get so excited that as a vegan I can eat this sort of food that I forget that I don't even like it.

A few days ago was one of those days. I was out shopping, and needed to buy lunch. I could have had vegan options in any number of chains, Zambrero is excellent, I'm sure I would have found something tasty and vegan at Sumo Salad. I could have gone to Wagamamas if I was feeling a bit more upmarket, or if I really wanted a burger, I could have gone to Grill'd. Instead, I wandered past a Lord of the Fries that I hadn't previously even known was there, and immediately walked in and started trying to decide what to order. Even as I was doing this, I knew I would regret it, but well, I hadn't had Lord of the Fries since going vegan, and they offer cheese.

I bought the Parma Burger. Because I listened at least a little bit to the voice in my head telling me it was a bad idea, I ordered the mini rather than the full size. There must have been a remnant of sense left in me. When they handed me my mini burger and chips, I couldn't believe my eyes, mini really did mean mini. I wish I'd thought to take a scale photo.

The chips and sauce were ok, though nowhere near as good as they're hyped up to be. Grill'd chips are way better. As for the burger... As soon as I unwrapped it, all I could smell was the cheese. It reeked. Just in case that isn't clear, it didn't reek in a good way, like for example (dairy) parmesan smells bad, yet still tastes good. It was a genuine reek, that was accompanied by an unpleasant flavour. Cheese aside, the burger itself was predictably mediocre. I imagine that if you like Macca's burgers, Lord of the Fries is probably on a par. I mean, the texture of their mock meat, though not exactly like meat, is pretty good. A little bit can even be pleasant. But taken as a whole, the burger just wasn't good. Edible, definitely, but not much more than that. I regret it, I really do. I hope next time, I can remember what I've written here, and keep walking. There wasn't even the token lettuce and pickle to pretend at being healthy.

What do you eat knowing you'll regret it?