Good Grub: Soy & Sake

After spending the day wondering the city with my buddy Josh, we decided to try and find some light fair for dinner. A quick, "We're in the Village, of course we'll find something!" turned into us walking around and around for nearly an hour trying to find a place not too heavy or too expensive. We settled on Soy and Sake after seeing the large variety of choices and the very agreeable price point.

We were seated immediately, and were a little surprised to see the place sort of empty. After reading the menu, Josh figured out why. It was a vegetarian place!

::cue Psycho music here::

Yes, people. I found myself dining meat-less on a Saturday night! Fear not; it wasn't that bad.

Soy and Sake is not my first tryst with vegetarian or vegan vittles. Granted, it would not have been my first choice of cuisine, but being someone who expects people to have an open palate, it would behoove me to expand my culinary spectrum, too, and vegetarians and vegans are part of that spectrum.

Soy and Sake, if you can't tell from the name of the place, hovers around an Asian direction with their menu, although there were a bunch of American and Italian dishes that stuck out like sore thumbs. When I say "Asian", I don't just mean Chinese or Japanese. We're talking ALL of Asia. There were Vietnamese dishes, Filipino dishes, Singapore cuisine, an various other temping choices.

So, I went all in. I ordered Roti Canai as my app. It's one of my favorite things to get when I used to get Malaysian or Singapor-ian (sp?) food with my old buddy Christine. It's an Indian "pancake" served with a coconut curry for dipping. There was a piece of fake chicken in there and a small potato. The funny thing is that I knew that the chicken would be fake, but with the sauce covering everything, I couldn't tell it apart. I started to eat, and thought to myself, "This fake chicken tastes like a potato." Then, I bit into the fake chicken and realized I had just finished the potato. The fake chicken was rubbery and chewy. It was tasty, swimming in that coconut curry, but I don't think I could eat a whole bowl of it. Not bad for Round 1.

Fake Duck

For my entree, I ordered roasted "duck" sauteed with veggies and mushrooms. I'm a big 'shroom whore, and the first time I ate at a similar restaurant years ago (Red Bamboo), I had also ordered a mushroom dish which tasted awesome! This didn't disappoint. The sauce was spot-on and the veggies were crisp and fresh. The 'shrooms were great, too. The "duck" was tofu skin, rolled up and seared to resemble duck breasts. It didn't taste like duck at all. However, I am a big fan of tofu skin, so I thought it was delicious. I wouldn't call it duck, but it was really good.

We shared a bottle of sparling sake, and that was really good. Josh ordered two kinds of sushi. I forgot the "fish" one he got, but the fruity one was spectacular. It was a fried banana, pear, avocado, topped with mango and garnished with a mango puree. It was absolutely YUMMY! I call it dessert sushi. The only problem was that we were so stuffed, it was hard to finish everything. I ended up taking most of my entree home.

Dessert Sushi

Overall, I know a Vegetarian restaurant has an uphill battle with me, trying to get me to enjoy my meal. I love my meat, and often feel as though I haven't eaten anything if I don't have some sort of meaty protein within my meal. However, being quite chunky now and probably not in the best of internal health, I would imagine that healthier meatless options are going to be something more prominent in my culinary future. Soy & Sake did a great job, though. Even though the fake meats were not awesome, the dishes were still very tasty and I really enjoyed my duck dish and Josh's dessert sushi. The prices were also very wallet friendly in a very Village-trendy neighborhood.

The service was a little slow, but everyone was quite friendly, which I can deal with on a Saturday night. That was the only con.

All in all, Soy and Sake was Good Grub! If you're in the West Village, give them a try.

Soy and Sake
47-49 7th Ave South
New York, NY
(Between Bleecker & Morton)