VegNews Best of… Survey

VegNews is running its annual survey of the best of vegetarian products and services.

I voted for Native Foods (LA, Palm Springs, Palm Desert) as the best vegetarian restaurant. I was torn because I also cannot get enough of A Votre Sante (Brentwood; not purely vegetarian). When I travel to LA, I swing by A Votre Sante virtually every trip. But when I’m in Palm Springs, I make my trip almost daily. Honestly, I could eat at Native Foods for every meal.

[Addition: two other restaurants of note–Udupi Palace in Sunnyvale, a mandatory stop every time I’m in the South Bay, and Smart Alec’s in Berkeley, another place I could eat at every day.]

I struggled with favorite vegetarian celebrity. There were many good choices! I admire Alicia Silverstone for her recent hard-core vegan wedding. Pamela Anderson has done positive high-profile work for PETA. Tobey Maguire is…well, he’s Spiderman. They didn’t even include Kelly Monaco on the list (I guess she was too low profile before Dancing with the Stars). But in the end, I voted for Natalie Portman. She’s so classy!

I must confess to being shocked at the choices for best vegetarian cookbook author. Tanya’s Native Foods cookbook is great (but complicated), so she was the best of the listed choices. But Nava Atlas’ recipes are generally wonderful–where was she? And, even more critically, where was Mollie Katzen??? Mollie got my write-in vote.

UPDATE: The winners.