The next Milwaukee Vegan Meetup will be at the Fresh Eco Cafe & Juice Bar in Mequon. I've only made it here once since Mequon is a bit of a hike for me on an average day, but it was TOTALLY worth it. It has a casual cafe atmosphere and you usually order at the counter and they bring the food to you.

Pictured to the left you can see my Italian Tofu sandwich with a side of some kind of mashed potatoes which were amazing! It has been about a year since I've been there, but what I can tell you is that they really take care in putting together delicious, flavorful healthy food. There's a copy of their catering menu online, although the restaurant does not have a full website.

Unfortunately I'm going to miss this meetup since I'll be in Key West (reports of awesome vegan vacation food to follow soon thereafter!), but I highly recommend this meetup, especially if you don't make it out to Mequon too often because this is a great chance to try something new with a bunch of awesome like-minded people! In addition, this restaurant is the site of the upcoming Raw Foods Dinner & Demo, so check out some of their raw dishes or desserts and then sign up for the dinner-demo too!

Details
When: Saturday June 2 at Noon
Where: Fresh Eco Cafe & Juice Bar
Address: 10994 N Port Washington Rd, Mequon, WI
RSVP on the Vegan Meetup site and make sure it's accurate because the restaurant will need a head-count!

Have you ever been interested in raw foods? Well, now is the chance to have a delicious vegan raw foods dinner and learn how to prepare it! Not only that, but it benefits a great cause--the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

To get an idea of what you're in for with this fantastic event, take a look at Sharon Kleigman's YouTube Demo of raw zucchini spaghetti preparation. Sharon is an RN, certified Food-for-Life Instructor and personal trainer, so you'll be in good hands as you learn more about raw foods.

Here are the details:
Date: Sunday June 24, 2012
Time: 5:00PM
Place: Fresh Healthy Eatery in Mequon
Address: 10994 N. Port Washington Road Mequon, WI 53092
Cost: $40 includes dinner, the demo, printed recipes, one raffle ticket to win an IPOD Nano, and a $25 donation to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.
How to sign up: Get all the details and sign up from their Evite link.

If they get a good response, they hope to have more events like these in the future!

Mark your calendars--the Second Annual Heartland Farm Sanctuary Gala is coming up August 10,2012!

If you follow Vegan Milwaukee on Facebook, you probably saw photos from my visits to the Sanctuary and realized that I'm in love with that place! As an animal activist, I'm so happy that we have such a great organization nearby in the Madison area that is not only saving farm animals, but also reaching out to their community to help educate people of all ages about how special each and every one of these creatures is.

Now, let's talk about this Gala! This is a huge event held at the Madison Concourse Hotel (fancy!) that includes a formal dinner (both vegetarian and vegan options offered), live entertainment, and live/silent auctions. The vegan meal sounds fantastic--it includes "a mouth-watering mixture of rosemary polenta and grilled summer vegetables, topped with zesty basil puree."

Tickets are $60 per person or $100 for a pair. All the proceeds go directly to the Heartland Farm Sanctuary to help save more animals like Toby the calf who I'm feeding in the picture below. Tickets will be on-sale until July 24th, but make sure you get yours before they sell out!

You can buy tickets directly online or by printing out the PDF form and sending it in. Please let them know that Vegan Milwaukee referred you in the "Referred By" field.

Hope to see you there! :-)

Before Palomino opened, there weren't any places to really "pig-out" on American-style food in Milwaukee. I remember being overwhelmed by all the choices and the abundant portions served up when I first visited. One thing I've loved from the start is their fried pickles--I've been known to eat a whole order myself (it WAS my birthday, so I felt it was OK). I like to dip them in the vegan pinky horseradish sauce...in fact, I love to dip everything in that sauce. Don't worry if that's not your thing though, they have offerings ranging from vegan Toffulo wings (pictured below), Tot-Chos (huge pile of tots with vegan chili, salsa, cheeze sauce, etc), Chick'n Fried Seitan, Faux Boys (one of my other favs), Sloppy Joes, and much more. They even have vegan mac and cheeze now made with Teese sauce! Everything vegan is clearly labeled, making choosing your meal a little easier.

The next Milwaukee Vegan Meetup will be at Palomino on March 3rd at 5pm--a rare dinner-time meetup. At the time of this writing, the meetup is already full at 20 people, but keep an eye on it for a spot opening up. Or, you can always visit another time--they offer brunch on the weekends, lunch and dinner all week long. Their kitchen is usually open until 11pm for late night vegan munchies too!

The next Milwaukee Vegan Meetup has announced and it will be at one of my favorite middle-eastern restaurants--Shahrazad. It's located on the East Side on Oakland near Locust St. They have excellent vegan options on the menu, but on this day they will be providing a buffet just for the meetup! It sounds like the buffet will be $8.99 which is a great deal to stuff yourself with falafel, hummus, baba ghanouj and much more.

The Meetup will take place on Saturday, February 4th at Noon. Make sure to visit the Meetup site and RSVP because space is limited. Enjoy!