Our visitor Kate has been introducing us to a variety of vegan restaurants, delis, and markets that are all around the Bay Area. We never knew some of these places even existed, so this time together is expanding what we know as our food options. Souley Vegan is one of those places we did not know existed, but it came up in Healthy Cow as one of the top ten Vegan places to visit. So read on, to learn about vegan soul food in our area.
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Vegan Soul Food
After Greens Restaurant and Butchers Son, we were planning on where to eat the next day. We started to rummage through all the vegan places we had yet visited that were listed on Happy Cow, when we ran across a vegan soul food place. The on-line menu listed a variety of southern comfort foods, and I thought this might be a unique place to visit.
I also wondered how may vegan soul food places could there be? I looked and all I could find is that vegan-only restaurants are an extremely low fraction of a fraction of all the restaurants in the USA.
- Spring 2018 there were 660,755 restaurants in the USA (1)
- 1,474 vegan only restaurants in the USA (2)
Vegan writes that: Soul food is an enigma, in that it’s traditionally heavily based on animal ingredients and shunned by wealthier people. But, oddly, it’s also one of the easiest of all cuisines to veganize. And in part because of Jamaica’s vegan-leaning Rastafarian culture, which reinvented American soul food, there are numerous vegan soul food restaurants in the United States.
Well, this was unique to my experience so I pushed Souley Vegan as the next restaurant we would get take-out from.
Souley Vegan Restaurant
Joy and Kate were out exploring Oakland’s Jack London Square. Then on the way home, they picked up lunch from Souley Vegan.
Souley Vegan is a 100% plant-based, authentic Louisiana Creole restaurant with outlets in Oakland, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Chef Tamearra Dyson, is the owner, and she has been cooking her signature plant-based dishes since her teens. From her personal story, the store began in 2009 and is surviving well to this day. When Joy and Kate visited the site, they were busy with a multitude of visitors and orders for pick up.
As we thought there would be no indoor seating (there was), I had ordered brunch on-line, and paid for it, so all they had to do was pick our order up. Although there was a mix up with them finding our order, once home and tasting their food, all was forgiven.
Everything appeared handmade, from fresh ingredients and herbs, and we ate a sampling of real, basic, homestyle southern dishes. The food was, I think, one of the best of all we have eaten from restaurants.
We each chose something different so we could sample each others plate. Frankly, everything was tasty, with honest flavors, good combinations, and solid food. Here is what we bought:
- Tofu Scramble Plate with “sausage” and fresh fruit
- Fried Candied Yam Tots
- Chik’in Waffle Brunch
- Sweet Potato Waffle Plate with breakfast potatoes and cheese grits
- Beignet
Our Food
Patty’s Food
My order was for the Sweet Potato Waffle Plate with smothered potatoes and cheese grits. The order came with a small container of syrup and melted butter.
I had assumed the word “smothered” meant the potatoes would be served with a gravy. But none were received, so either they forgot to add it or I do not understand what the word means.
On a positive side, the waffles were thick and very satisfying. The potatoes were cooked with green bell peppers and onions, were very flavorful, and also filling. The grits were thick, creamy, and pushed me over the top. I felt I was eating a homemade meal. I would order everything again, it tasted so good.
Kate’s Food
Kate ordered the Chik’in Waffle Brunch and was also provided a thick waffle, and a flattened “chicken” protein. Plus a couple of small containers of butter and syrup.
Kate liked the seasoning and coating of the protein, but found it a bit too chewy. She did not finish the protein, although she did eat it later in the week. Meanwhile, the waffle and syrup were simply delicious. Kate would order the waffle again, but would skip the “chicken”.
Joy’s Food
Joy ordered the Tofu Scrambled Plate that came with a “sausage” protein and mixed fruit.
She liked the tofu scramble but found the “sausage” did not taste like sausage. At home she eats Morning Star’s breakfast sausage and expected something that tasted like that, whereas this did not have any sausage flavor. The texture was bready, not chewy, and it easily fell apart. She would order the tofu scramble again, but would skip the “sausage”.
On the other hand, Kate tasted the sausage and thought the flavor and texture, although not sausage like, was still very good.
Sides
One side we ordered was the Fried Candied Yam Tots. These were round balls of mashed orange sweet potatoes fried in, I assume, canola oil. These round fried balls were as yummy as mashed sweet potatoes generally are, nothing real special, not extra sweet or candied, and not really “tots.” You do have to eat this the day it is prepared, for the next day the leftovers fell into flattened oily mush, still tasted good though.
There was one thing I would change to this dish: it’s name. “Tater Tots” give the consumer a sense of shredded sweet potatoes, formed into a cube and fried. Additionally, I expected these to be fried and sugared or caramelized. But what this dish was, and Kate came up with this name: “fried sweet potato bombs.”
As the left over was a bit too oily for me, and it just so happens our dogs like sweet potatoes too, so I cut up one of the leftover bombs and rolled it into little pebbles for them — they both gulped them down, really fast.
Although we ordered only one Beignet as our last side, we received three. Good thing cause we loved this aromatic, puffed, doughy, sugary pastry. It did not last long.
Summation
I have written about Southern Cuisine and the role of Indigenous Grits; and have lived in various southern states for a bit in my childhood (Louisiana, Oklahoma, Kentucky, and Georgia). So I have a bit of background that places southern food in the “comfy” category. I know, with my history in Germany and Japan, adding Southern makes for a weird combination of cuisines — but hey, it is my history. So I experienced this restaurants’s food with that background.
Kate experienced it as another source for vegan food, providing some hits and misses.
Joy, however, is not a fan of Southern Cuisine in general, but she really did like the waffles.
I personally would go back for this food as it tasted homey, comfy, and filling. Plus, I am curious what their gravy tastes like.
—Patty