To Live and Eat in L.A. – A Vegan Food Photo Blog

Earlier this year I introduced you to the outstanding Homegirl Cafe, the restaurant downtown that’s run by reformed L.A. gang members. At that time they were only open for breakfast and lunch, but they’ve recently expanded their hours and their menu, and now we get to enjoy their unique take on authentic Mexican & Latin American food for dinner! Care to join me?

While Homegirl is not exclusively a vegetarian restaurant, they are very vegan friendly and have created specialty items for their menu which are clearly marked as vegan… and they’re wonderful.

The few times I’ve been there they’ve always brought over an appetizer as soon as seating me. Last time it was freshly made tortilla chips & salsa, on my recent dinner visit it was these scrumptious spicy roasted chickpeas with lime. Crunchy and warm, they totally do the trick of getting your appetite rip, roaring & ready to go.
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From what I can tell, Mama’s Hot Tamales Cafe in Macarthur Park has been around since at least 2003. So why is it that I’ve never heard of it before now? How is it possible that a place so delightful, delicious and vegan-friendly has gone under the radar of not just me but everyone else I know? Have you all just been keeping this discovery to yourselves, squirreling it away like a well-guarded secret? Well it’s not a secret anymore because I’m blowing the lid off this thing, so put on your loose fitting pants Los Angelenos and get ready to eat! A bit of what this place is all about, from their website:

“Mama’s Hot Tamales Café is an apprentice-operated business and job training restaurant that provides hands-on and classroom instruction designed to train low-and-moderate-income residents living within the central region of Los Angeles in the disciplines necessary to begin a career path toward success in the culinary world.

Under the watchful eye of Sandi “Mama” Romero, participants acquire the knowledge, abilities, and skills to pursue opportunities in the food service while working in Mama’s Hot Tamales Café. Featuring authentic presentations of regional dishes from throughout the Americas, this unique dining experience engages patrons as valuable participants in the education training process of our future food service professionals.”

Yeah all that, plus they make authentic made-from-scratch tamales and other foods in the traditional styles of various Latin American countries, including Guatemalan, Mexican, Columbian, Peruvian, Honduran and Salvadoran.

Let’s begin at the beginning. It’s the tamales which give this place it’s street cred, and let me tell you, that cred has been rightfully earned. This was the most delicious tamale I personally have ever tasted. I claim no expertise on the matter, it was just by far my favorite of any tamale that I’ve had the pleasure of eating, vegan or otherwise. I really like the Corn Maiden farmers market tamales, but these at Mama’s are in a league of their own. I’ve always enjoyed tamales, but in comparision to all the other amazing foods on earth, tamales are not the sort of thing I’d normally be raving about… but I’m raving now… these are not your everyday, pull it out of freezer at Trader Joes sort of tamale.

The tamales are individually wrapped in corn husks, banana leaves or avocado leaves depending on their recipes country of origin. Looks like banana leaves above, doesn’t it? Mama’s is not an all vegetarian restaurant, however they are very vegan friendly and aware, and even their menu (.pdf) is clearly marked with what all can be made vegan, which is nearly everything. The tamales themselves are not on the menu, I think because their selection varies daily.
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I had been hearing about the great vegetarian Mexican food being served at Cinnamon in Highland Park for a while now, so I figured it was high time to gather up some of my homegirls and go check it out for ourselves. I’d read some mixed reviews and none of us had been there before, so we really didn’t know what to expect. I’m so glad we took this adventure upon ourselves because the food was fantastic.

For starters I had the “Jumping Shrimp Cocktail”, the shrimp of course was made of soy. Loved it. I’ve got a thing for the texture that this type of firm and chewy soy shrimp has, and there were both whole pieces and smaller chunks mixed in with the yummy cocktail sauce. It doesn’t taste fishy, or even really much like shrimp, but that’s probably a good thing. The sauce was both sweet & spicy, accented with lime & cilantro. You could tell it had just been made fresh.

You’ll notice in the background there that I also got a soymilk horchata, a traditional milk and cinnamon drink that one doesn’t often (ever?) find vegan. It was heavenly, and it took all I had to resist ordering another after finishing the first.

For my main dish I had to try the vegetarian “Chicken Mole” as it’s one of their specialties. This came in the form of delicious little fake drumsticks that had been cooked in their incredible mole sauce. I must admit this was my first time ever tasting mole so I have nothing to compare it to, but I thought this was outstanding. The flavor was slightly smoky but also rather sweet and heavy on the cinnamon. My friends tried it and mentioned that the cinnamon and sweetness was a bit overpowering, but I really liked it just as it was. The dish came served with rice and beans, both of which were very good, and pleasantly lard free.

The food was delicious all around. Even the salsa that came with the corn chips to start us off was lovely. The place was clean, the food came fast and the service was friendly. The one issue we did have was that our waiter (who I think is one of the owners) didn’t understand the difference between vegetarian and vegan. The menu and website state that they are “vegan-friendly”, however the menu doesn’t specify whether the meat and cheese substitutes are vegan or only vegetarian, and no one working there seemed to know, or understand the question. It was frustrating for us to try to explain what the difference was to him between vegan and vegetarian, he was unfamiliar with the words casein and whey. I feel that if you’ve got the word “vegan” printed on your menu, everyone who works there should know what it means, and should know about the basic ingredients in the food being served. Imagine going to a kosher restaurant but neither the wait staff or the cook knows for sure if the food had been prepared kosher or not. That said, waiter/owner man was very sweet and attempted to be accommodating, but the whole vegan vs. vegetarian thing is a matter that they’re going to have to iron out if they want the strict vegans to embrace them en masse.

That said, if you’re a vegetarian who’s willing to turn a blind eye to a little bit of mystery surrounding the nature of your soylent green once in a while, allow me to recommend a visit to Highland Park for some fine, traditional Mexican food at Cinnamon. For that matter, bring your meat eating friends with you as the food here is so good that anyone should be able to find something they’ll enjoy regardless of their dietary inclinations. Other menu items include vegetarian steak fajitas, soy chorizo with potatoes, flautas, tamales, carnitas… and I count 8 salads on the menu (including exotic delicacies like cactus and hearts of palm), breakfast and fresh squeezed juices… something for everyone. Go hungry, leave full and happy!