Investigation: L.A. Vegan Restaurants Found with Un-Vegan Food

July 22, 2009

Courtesy of

aurants.php

The two anonymous bloggers at the popular vegan blog, Quarrygirl, went all out

and published a large investigative report today, finding that a handful of

vegan restaurants, mostly Thai in nature, are in fact not vegan.

Spending their own money--around $1000, they said by e-mail--on

scientific industry tests, using strict practices and a positive

control, they investigated at least one dish at 17 restaurants with ten

passing as vegan. Seven, including a favorite of the theirs, Pure Luck,

failed to be vegan when one or a few dishes were tested. Five were Thai

vegan eateries (Vegan House, Lotus Vegan, California Vegan, LA Vegan

Thai Vegan Joint), which led them to researching their suppliers and

calling Taiwanese officials, finding out that real meat in faux meats

was a problem with new legislation addressing the issue actually taking

effect this week Wednesday. The last restaurant found not to be vegan

was Green Leaves in Los Feliz.

Kudos to the folks at the blog for doing this, especially for most

appropriately noting that these tests are not necessarily a final

conclusion on each of the restaurant's daily food service. " While these

tests show some very specific results, and were conducted under

laboratory conditions, they are really a snapshot of the moment in time

and may not be completely representative, " they wrote. " If we were to

do the tests again today, would the results be the same? Could

conditions at the exact time we bought the food have a bearing on the

outcome? "

Enjoy life and smile.

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