My eating frenzy this weekend while in San Francisco began appropriately enough at Herbivore, a vegan restaurant with two locations… I visited the one in the Mission district on Valencia. I think it’s safe to say that this place is any vegetarians dream eatery, with an extensive and affordable selection of items ranging from American style burgers and sandwiches, to Asian noodle and curry dishes, through to Middle Eastern and Italian style fare. Seriously, they’ve got anything you could possibly want.

I ordered the shawarma wrap which is made with grilled seitan, seasoned onions (and I didn’t even hate them), tomatoes, hummus, hot sauce, pickles and tahini, and served with a green salad. For a bit extra they’ll also stuff it full of potatoes and eggplant. Who was I to say no to that?

It was so totally yummy! I can’t really say that it tasted anything like real shawarma, but that hardly seemed to matter considering just how delicious it was on it’s own merit. As you can see, it’s gigantic and could easily feed two or three people. And no, I didn’t share.

On my second visit to Herbivore I got their veggie shish kabob. This was basically grilled tofu and vegetables on skewers (corn, zucchini, peppers, tomatoes, onions, mushrooms) served over brown rice and with two different sauces (lemon-garlic & peanut orange-miso). Simple yet delicious.

And how could I pass up dessert? We’re talking a vegan carrot cake the size of a small island in the Pacific. Truly delicious, and so big that even with four of us digging into it, there was nearly a third of it left over when we were all stuffed. How is it that some people still think that vegan food is boring?

Last but certainly not least, I had breakfast at Herbivore on my last day there. I got the scrambled tofu with with spinach, mushrooms, tomatoes (and a lot of garlic) with house potatoes.

As you see it comes with yummy whole grain toast, but I passed that up in favor of a sideorder of the blueberry cornbread. Words really cannot convey how amazing this bread is…cornbread has always been one of my favorite foods on earth, and the addition of delicious blueberries along with vegan buttery spread just took it over the top. All this along with the double soy-latte that I ordered had me in a sufficent enough breakfast food coma just in time for my flight back home to L.A.

Ok, Party Sushi isn’t really in S.F., it’s in Berkeley. While it’s not exclusively a vegetarian restaurant, they’ve got an entire section of their menu dedicated to vegetarian and vegan sushi options. Cool!

I got the Vegetable Sushi Combo which consists of veggie rolls (mixed), spinach rolls, avocado and asaparagus “sashimi”, seaweed rolls, shitake mushroom rolls and inari. Each and everyone of these little delicacies were super tasty, and as you can see, it’s ton of food.

Along with the sushi platter I was also served a bowl of soba noodles with tofu. Bring it on.

Finally, the highlight meal of the weekend took place at Greens Restaurant, the holy grail of upscale vegetarian restaurants. I was so looking forward to visiting this place, and it didn’t disappoint one bit.

When we were there, they were serving from their prix fixe menu… a set price with a selection of appetizers, entrees and desserts featuring fresh, organic ingredients.

My appetizer was the wilted spinach salad with treviso, red orach, frisee, pink lady apples, roasted onions, pumpkin seeds, cider vinegar and hot olive oil. This would also come with chevre cheese which they leave off by request for vegans. After picking out the easy to spot onions, I happily gobbled this right up.

My entree was the ‘Tagine - Spring vegetables’ with tomatoes, chickpeas, saffron, ginger and cilantro. Served with cherry pistachio pearl couscous and grilled artichokes with lemon oil. Hot damn was this good! By the time I was done with it, the plate was spotless and without even one couscous pearl in sight.

And finally for dessert, the vegan chocolate cake with poached Michigan cherries. Rich and delicious.

Wow, not only was everything here fantastic, but it’s also in a beautiful location at Fort Mason, right on the water. Greens Restaurant would be excellent for any sort of fancy dining events such as birthdays, anniversaries, and I’d imagine especially a nice romantic date with someone special. The view is breathtaking.

I had a great time visiting with friends and eating my little heart out on all the fine vegetarian fare that the bay area has to offer. Now it’s time to get back to reality and hit the gym. I don’t even want to think about how many calories I consumed in a short three days… yikes! What can I say, sometimes you just gotta live it up and throw caution (and diets) to the wind in order to experience the bounty right in front of you…though I’ll probably be singing a totally different tune once I step back on the scale. Goodbye San Francisco, hello Stair Master.