A Meatless Lunch

Having had the next 4 month's worth of meat servings all in one weekend, thought I'd give my system a break. I took my friend, Jazzy, to Sipz Fusion Cafe for lunch today. He's been wanting to try this place ever since he became a vegan last year. The restaurant is known for its Asian style vegetarian dishes, note that a not all dishes are vegetarian or vegan. You can check out the menu on the website, but it's not inclusive of all the dishes on the actual menu.

Once again, sorry no photos. I had planned on bringing my camera but completely forgot. Jazzy suggested using my cell phone camera but it doesn't take very good pictures at all. Not even worth trying. I tried that once before and it was just bad.

Back to Sipz. The restaurant is in the strip mall across the street from Buga Korean BBQ. We were surprised by the size of the restaurant. Much bigger than I had expected. By the time we sat down and ordered our food, the place was starting to get packed (about 11:30 am). I ordered the House Special Tofu in medium heat and Jazzy ordered the Garlic Tofu in hot heat. Shortly after our drinks was served, our meals came out. We each got a large Asian noodle-style bowl that contained our tofu dish and a decent scoop of rice. They smelled good.

Both dishes were in a thick brown sauce. Mine came with snow peas, carrots, baby corn, black and straw mushrooms, onion, celery, green peppers, bamboo shoots, and green onions. Jazzy's came with baby bok choy, straw mushrooms, onions, carrots and a few other things. There were lots of large pieces of firm tofu (what I would refer to as bean curd). In my family, tofu and bean curd meant 2 different things. Tofu is the white stuff, like those chunks you get in Miso soup. Bean curd is the more spongy-like soy items, often a brownish or tan color. Bean curd jerky is one of my favorite snack items.

My dish was very tasty but only mildly hot in heat. I would definitely have been able to handle the hot. The sauce gave it a very savory flavor, slightly sweet, and it matched the tofu very well. Jazzy's dish was even milder in heat than mine, but I think it's because my base sauce is suppose to be spicy where his isn't. But there was just enough hint of heat to compliment the garlic sauce. Jazzy liked it very much. I tried a bit of it and it was tasty. Overall, we both enjoyed our meals very much and would certainly go back (I'll remember to bring the camera next time). Apparently many people agree with us based on how many tables were occupied when we left and the amount of take-outs in just the 45 minutes we were there. Total cost for our meal including tip was just a little over $20.

Sipz
5501 Clairemont Mesa Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92117
858-279-3747