Vegan Experience

A Great Mixed 6 Pack of Vegan Beer c/o Seddon Wine (Beer) Store

OzBassoon — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 06:46:19 +0000

As the title suggests, I dropped by the Seddon Wine Store for a special treat of a mixed 6 pack of vegan beer. I selected: Holgate Pilsner & ESB, 3 Ravens 55 Lager and Golden Ale, Burleigh Brewing‘s Pale Ale and Two Birds Golden Ale. I was supposed to get some Moo Brew for the wife but got Flying Horse‘s Dirty Angel instead and I’m very much looking forward to having a taste of that champion porter!

Good Vegan News from Carton United Brewery/Fosters

OzBassoon — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:08:50 +0000

Thanks to @timc_hoar for letting me know about these exciting developments at Fosters. According to a company email, they are in the process of reviewing their brewing processes with, hopefully, the aim of eliminating the use of many animal-based ingredients/agents. Follow this link for an update on which beers from Fosters are vegan (at the bottom of the page).

Three Troupers Beers Don’t Make the Vegan Beer List

OzBassoon — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 06:18:48 +0000

Sad to say that Three Troupers have got back to me and have told me that their beers aren’t vegan. Fortunately there are plenty of super microbrew vegan beers out there anyway!

Grill’d: Vegan Burgers and Chips in the Melbourne CBD

OzBassoon — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 02:52:59 +0000

A rare night on the town last night afforded me the opportunity to try Grill’d’s vegan options. Their menu features three vegie burgers, all of which include various animal products as standard but are easily excluded on request (e.g. mayo, cheese etc.). I decided on the Bombay Bliss which included a chick pea patty, roasted capsicum, salad, onion and relish with a side of chips. I had to exclude the tzatziki for obvious reasons.

The burger was quite good if a little dry (for which the tzatziki would probably compensate) and the chips were very, very morish. I noticed that there were a few vegan beer options in the fridge at Grill’d too: White Rabbit dark ale and pint-size bottles of Little Creatures Bright Ale should cover any vegan’s bases.

I would definitely eat at Grill’d again; you can’t beat the combination of its central location (Degraves St in the CBD on this occasion), quality food, good vegan beer options and easy vegan ordering. Two thumbs up!

Grill’d Vegan Options thanks to “Vegan About Town”

OzBassoon — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 22:35:37 +0000

So, I always thought that if chips were cooked in vegetable oil they’d be vegan but apparently the chips are routinely pre-coated in tallow! Bad times indeed. Grill’d of Melbourne have recently sourced and now use vegan chips so you can quite easily get a hearty vegan burger & chips meal in the CBD of Melbourne! Will have to check it out ASAP.

In the course of discovering this information I stumbled across a Melbourne-based vegan blog which looks well worth a further reading: Vegan About Town.

Two Birds Brewing is on the vegan beer list.

OzBassoon — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 08:12:41 +0000

Thanks to Two Birds Brewing (@twobirdsbrewing) for responding to my email enquiry. I can now add them to my own list and it should come up on Barnivore in a little while too. I had a couple of schooners of their golden ale at Beer Deluxe last night and, without approaching it particularly critically, would say it was tasty and refreshing; probably one of the better golden ales I’ve had of late.

What do you mean “is the beer vegan?” – Vegetarian Network Victoria explains.

OzBassoon — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 02:54:14 +0000

While most people understand what veganism means when it comes to eating, fewer contemplate its implications for the clothes you wear or the household products you use. Fewer still realise that many alcoholic beverages aren’t vegan, i.e. animal products are an ingredient and/or have been used in the beverage’s production. Check out the Vegetarian Network Victoria site for a simple explanation.

Vegan bolognese one night, chili beans the next. Good times.

OzBassoon — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 10:09:32 +0000

A good friend of ours, @Nayc_Sampson, passed a few staple recipes our way recently and we’ve tried two of them out over the last two nights. Both have been awesome and will probably become staples in our own household.

First we tried the vegan bolognese sauce (which we combined with fettuccine). Instead of meat, red lentils are used; an application that had never occurred to me before. All the other regular ingredients are there: celery, carrot, tomato etc. The texture and flavour were fantastic.

Tonight we tried the chili bean recipe which called for zucchini, pumpkin, onion, mushroom and tomato among many other tasty veggies. Chili beans are mixed in at the end to finish off an awesome, spicy and veggie-ful meal.

We’ve been kicking some serious vegan goals of late!

Vegan Dinner at Seamstress, Melbourne

OzBassoon — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 10:25:43 +0000

Had a very rare dinner out and took the opportunity to check out Seamstress which actually denoted which meals on the menu are vegan. We had the steamed silken tofu hotpot, caramelised eggplant, sides of gai lan (without oyster sauce), rice, and snow peas with water chestnuts. For less than $100 including drinks between 2 people, this was a really good value and quality meal.

One of the things I really enjoyed about the meal, in hindsight, was not having to quiz the staff to make sure the meal is vegan. The staff were really switched onto it.

Given that the menu specifies which dishes are vegan it would be nice to see the same applied to the drinks menu although that might be a little unrealistic. Fortunately I didn’t need to research the beer list to know which beers were vegan.

Lord Nelson Brewery – Vegan Enquiry

OzBassoon — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 23:08:04 +0000

Just fired off an email to the Lord Nelson Brewery to see if their beer is vegan. This comes off the back of a work trip where the local bottle-o had Lord Nelson beer and not much else. I settled for Coopers Pale Ale (which was fine, and definitely vegan) but I really wish I’d looked into Lord Nelson earlier!

Looking at their site, it definitely looks very likely that their beers are vegan, but let’s wait for official confirmation.