Quick Vegan Guide: Mall of America: 2018 Edition

 Updated: Vegan options have greatly increased at Mall of America, since my previous quick vegan guide to Mall of America.   Also in very exciting news Mall of America is getting an all vegan eatery called Earth Burger!   Sadly, it wasn't open yet so here is what we got for you. ... Many restaurants and fast food places are now offering vegan options, although I can't say any of the food is amazing!  In fact, it was so unremarkable we forgot to take pictures of it!   Sorry!

But I have to say the options are really much improved from our last trip a few years ago.  One note though: vegan food is fairly limited before 11 am.   If you are staying at the mall get food the night before (the Marriott has mini-fridges) and if you are visiting early bring your own. 

With options so numerous we will list them below with a few notes.  For more details, we will be working on an updated Bloomington book and separate Twin Cities book probably available sometime early next year.   But for now:

Chipotle:   The usual-I'd guess most people have heard of it!   Fairly easy to eat vegan there.   Burrito/Mexican food.

Earth Burger: All vegan.   Wasn't open yet when we visited so can't really comment. 

Masu Sushi: Probably the most vegan options of any place until Earth Burger opens up.   As a sit down it's a little more expensive and portions aren't that big.   They have probably at least 8 vegan dishes, not even including a number of vegan sushi rolls and appetizers.   On third floor.

Naf Naf: Middle Eastern food- Doesn't have a huge number of options-but I'd say at least half of there menu is vegan and items that are vegan are labeled vegan.   Until Earth Burger, probably my top choice for a fast food option.   On third floor in food court area near the golf course.   

Noodles and Company: The Japanese pan noodles are vegan and an off menu option is the spaghetti and meatballs without the meatballs. On third floor. 

Panera:  Has a vegan lentil/kale soup type thing.   Sometimes seems to come with bread sometimes doesn't: not sure why!  Small and a bit pricey for what it is, but a bit healthier than a lot of other options.   Also fruit cups.   Also have peanut butter and jelly, but beware it comes with a yogurt stick, so be sure to request they leave the yogurt off.  On third floor.

Qdoba:  Burrito/Mexican Food.  Similar to Chipotle.  On third floor food court near the golf course.   

Subway:  Beware the veggie patty is not vegan.   However, you could get a sandwich with just bread and vegetables. 

Thai Express:  Can make a lot of the menu vegan.  Has special vegan sauce, so make sure to specify vegan.   It is labeled on the menu which dishes can be made vegan.

As far as we know, the mall doesn't have a grocery store, although they do have a few places that sell food products such as Five and Under. 

And one other side note I feel worthy of mentions on the shoe shopping front:  Tom's actually has a number of vegan shoes and labels which shoes are vegan.

Mall of America is huge and I'm sure I've missed something.   If you know of additional vegan options please let us know in the comments! 



                                    

Good news: Arlington County Virginia just made it more expensive to park

It just got more expensive to park in Arlington County Virginia.   The  so called "walkable" community of Arlington despite bragging about "carfreeism" and walkability, generally in practice favors drivers.

But in good news the county in the 2019 budget included an increased parking meter fee of 25 cents per hour and extended paid hours to 8pm, instead of the current 6pm. 

Granted this is mainly a revenue move, but it will have great benefits in that it will discourage bringing cars into areas where they are absolutely not needed.   Most central urban areas of Arlington have a metro station, multiple buses and there is a decent sized biking community.   Not to mention many pedestrians.  Even more so eliminating the 6pm to 8pm time slot might have an even bigger impact on discouraging SUVs which are 3x as likely to kill pedestrians and cyclists.  As many kids go to bed early this will discourage families with their mostly 2 kids, who probably drive SUVs because they can't cope with their existence as parents; despite claiming it is for other reasons or just getting defensive when the topic is brought up.   By the way the statement that SUV drivers don't like to acknowledge the existence of their offspring,  actually comes from auto company research. 

Anyway, yay for parking meter increases!   Keep them coming- in Arlington and elsewhere. 


                                       

This is what public transit and train travel looks like for a family in Oslo, Norway vs Washington DC/New York City, United States

The city to city train

United States: Pray that someone will help you get the stroller and everything else you need up the difficult steps.   Think about not taking the stroller next time and then realize you don't want your child to run onto the tracks.   Get on the train and pray that the air conditioning/heating isn't broken.  Try to confine a small child to the seat, as they try to escape.   Try to keep them entertained with what you have on your back.      Hope that no one gets too annoyed by the crying from screaming child who wants to run around, although at this point you really don't even care if they are annoyed.   

Norway: Board in a special car designed for families and have attendant help you with the stroller.   Take your child to the playroom where they can run around, watch tv and drop books in a hole in a desk.   Enjoy happy screams, that no one there is offended by because it is the kids car.      

The Subway

United States: In DC pray the elevator works...but mostly pray that you don't get to your destination to find the only elevator is broken and the only options are a giant multi-story escalator or heading back home. In New York abandon any hope of their even being an elevator and plan on taking advantage of the swing gates while first scanning at a gate you can't even go through if you have anything bigger than an umbrella stroller because the wider gates require you to have a handicap card.      Both: Pray they don't close the doors on your stroller.   

Norway: Take it as a given that elevators actually work.  

The Tram

United States: Would be easier to complain about the tram if more of them existed.   After all why would you put a platform in the street when you could overpay some contractor to build a gigantic structure around every train stop (maybe if your you might even get a kickback from said contractor!).    

Norway: Get on the tram with child in stroller...and ride.   

The Bus

United States: Struggle to hold onto toddler while struggling to fold stroller-if you are lucky someone helps.  If you don't fold stroller be prepared for bus driver to waste 10 minutes arguing with you about how you can't get on the bus instead of stopping bus and helping which would take about 2 minutes (yes I actually saw this happen on wmata and it really was 10 minutes).  Have someone on the bus comment on how car seats should be required for bus, while they sit in the seat you desperately need to be able to hold onto your stroller and toddler.  Ask them exactly how you are supposed to carry a folded stroller and a 25 pound toddler in a car seat at the same time and what you do if no seats are available?   Even if this is possible wonder how this would work for a parent with two small kids?   Repeat drill when getting off bus.   But wait actually this is only a visualization of how this would work/what you have seen happen to other people because this whole process is so complex you pretty much can't fathom riding the bus by yourself with a toddler, requiring your spouse to waste sick leave so they can stay home while you go to a doctors appointment and only venturing out with toddler to what is walkable to you or near a subway station (apology for the terrible run-on sentence).   

Norway: Push your stroller with toddler in it onto the bus....the end.   

The Walk Down Mainstreet

United States:  Dodge jaydrivers in their oversized vanity SUVs, knowing full well the police will never do anything about these selfish idiots who care more about vanity than other peoples lives.   

Norway: Enjoy a mostly car free mainstreet, where you don't have to worry about turning vehicles for the most part.    Realize that even the few crossings don't have many cars because Oslo smartly removed parking.   

                             

The flu season-why it's really so bad and how we caused it

In short here is the answer-global warming.   But how you say?

Let's trace backwards:

• A massive outbreak of flu hits.   

• People don't get what they need to fight the flu effectively.  IV bags are in short supply, allowing victims of the flu to spread it more rapidly through hospitals and elsewhere.   Rather than hanging an IV bag, nurses sit in patients rooms pushing fluids which give the nurses more time to get exposed to the flu and then to spread it to other patients.   Secondly, people's immune systems are weaker because they aren't getting the vitamins they need in natural form because so much produce is being shipped from really far away this winter.   But why these problems?

• The IV bag shortage happened because in North America Puerto Rico produces the vast majority of IV bags.   When the hurricane hit production halted and then only slowly returned.   Meanwhile much of the US produce supply is grown in Florida.   When the hurricane hit Florida much of the produce supply has destroyed.   But why?

• Now that much of the mainstream media is owned by companies that do a lot of polluting they are blaming El Nino.   El Nino, as far as I'm concerned, is fancy scape goat which people blame for stuff they don't want to admit they caused.   For example, one author wrote a whole book blaming it for why Africa and other parts of the world are poor-obviously it had nothing to do with European countries colonizing and oppressing these countries (sarcastic).   The same goes for hurricanes and global warming.   We will discuss how next.   Add in the Trump regime that didn't want to send aid to Puerto Rico-its own territory-only to ignore just how useful Puerto Rico is in that it produces much of the medical supplies for North America.  

• We are seeing more storms like hurricanes because there is more water in the atmosphere.   Ice is melting in both the Arctic and the Antarctic.  This is causing more water in the atmosphere.   But why?

• The earth in warming due to global warming.  And most people are doing little about it.   Most people still eat meat and dairy, causing there to be far more cows than natural.  Turns out the gas (farts) cows produce does a lot of harm and it not at all sustainable.   Rather than invest in public transportation , safe walking spaces and protected bike lanes, instead in the United States and China remained obsessed with private vehicles and even worse yet wastefully bought more SUVs than ever.  Eight year of a Democrat in charge equaled public transit systems that were often the same or worse than eight years earlier and the highest vehicle use the United States has ever seen.   Meanwhile the media gave the message all you have to do is get reusable bags and the world will be saved-even if you drive them to the store in your massive gas guzzling SUV that you don't need and fill them with grass fed meat and dairy.   Nope if you do that, you might enjoy patting yourself on the back, but you are the problem.    

                                         

Quick Vegan Guide: Oslo

 While I loved Oslo, I certainly would not say the best thing about Oslo was the food.  In fact, it may have been the worst thing about Oslo. 

First, let me start off my saying this: Food in Oslo is VERY expensive.   Especially for the quality. 

We stayed at a hotel (Comfort Hotel) that offered a free breakfast buffet.  A lot of the options were not vegan, but being a large buffet there were also vegan options including baked beans, lots of fruit, oatmeal (that you make yourself with nothing added), dried fruit, some vegetables, bread, peanut butter, jelly, olives and pickles.   And they did have soy milk. 

In some ways, I certainly liked the Comfort Hotel, but kind of regretted not getting an apartment style hotel with a kitchenette or kitchen instead.   Because as far as vegan food in the grocery store goes you are basically looking at canned goods (like beans), fresh fruits and vegetables, bread, nuts, one of two grocery stores had soy yogurt, the other had hummus but not the one with soy yogurt, soy or oat milk, and at one of the two soy pudding.   Enough to get by on, but not really super exciting.  In fact, I'd say Reykjavik supermarkets were a lot better than Oslo ones, despite Iceland being a much smaller and isolated country than Norway. 

We did eat out at one vegetarian restaurant with many vegans options.  The food was decent, but it cost about $30 dollars a person, so we didn't end up doing that again.  We were keeping a budget on this trip, so we kind of skipped the restaurant thing even though there are a few vegan/vegetarian restaurants in Oslo (by which I really mean a few). 

In Oslo's Central station Flavours Food Market and Olivelundun do have some vegan items.   Actually, the vegan options were pretty tasty at both...oh and did I mention pretty expensive.    Get the theme here, $$$ if you go to Oslo! 

And one other tip.  Don't fly Scandivanian Airlines (who code share with United) if you actually want your vegan meal (or to be treated half decently).  I'm pretty sure they just ignore vegan meal requests.  A rude flight attendant accused me of never ordering a vegan meal.  They even refused to make a tray with only the few vegan items.   This was really only the beginning of the abuse we took by this terrible airline (which perhaps I'll blog about another time).

Have you been to Oslo?  What do you think of the vegan food in Oslo? 


Looking for my other quick vegan guides.  See below:
Budapest
BWI E terminal
Dublin
International Air Travel
Kansas City
Little Rock Airport
Mall of America
Reykjavik (Iceland)


                                    

Karl Johan Gate -Mainstreet Oslo where people matter more than cars

Warning: Envy Trigger

So what is Karl Johan Gate (pronounced Karl Yohan Gata) ?   Is it truly car-free?   Is it handicap/stroller accessible?  Does no one go there because of the lack of parking (okay I think all of us smart people know the answer to this one).

Karl Johan Gate is the mainstreet in Oslo, Norway.   It's mostly a pedestrian/cyclist mall that goes from the Palace (don't miss the changing of the guards at 1:30pm) to the Central Train Station (which is also a bustling giant indoor shopping center).

First of all it is much bigger and longer than I expected it to be.  It's not a block, it is block after block.   It's bustling.  These pictures were taken on a Sunday so you could see the street-it's so much busier on weekdays.    And if it rains all of a sudden, well instead of heading into their cars and leaving, everyone heads into the shops and restaurants and businesses make even more money that way.

I would not say though that it is completely car free, although I'd say it is very car-low.   At each street there is a crossing where cars can go straight only.    I assume this will change when/if Oslo goes car free in a few years.  As of currently there were few cars at these crossings anyways.   I wouldn't miss the crossings  and from the looks of the number of people vs cars can't imagine many other people would either.

During weekdays you also get a number of delivery vehicles.

And it is super handicap stroller friendly too.  Lots of stroller and wheel chairs too!




                                    

Product Review: Heidi Ho Ne Chevre (black lava)

Product Review: Heidi Ho Ne Chevre

Thought I would delve into the ever increasing market of vegan cheeses and try one that looked particularly interesting and original.   

Rating: 8 out of 10

Pros: Tastes really good.   Vegan certified.   Healthy ingredients.

Cons: Unfortunately, it doesn't take like how I remember goat cheese tasting.

I would absolutely buy this again.   It was yummy.  Really good on its own, really good on crackers, and really good stuffed into mushrooms.

But I do have to say, it tastes like a cashew dip (and a real good one at that), not cheese.    If I were to put this out at a party I'd call it cashew dip not imitation cheese.    It is also not good in the pasta dish I tried to use it in.  

It's also nice it pretty much all contains ingredients I feel good about eating.   Nuts, lemons, black lava salt, etc.   The calories are not too bad for cheese (vegan or otherwise).  The whole container has 480 calories, but it's not the kind of thing you'd eat the whole container of in one sitting.