Seaweed City

It was odd that it happened, but this week I had dinner at TWO vegan Japanese restaurants. Now, normally, I wouldn't eat at vegan restaurant one...but these were special circumstances. My old friend Zach, vegetarian though he is, seemed worth connecting with over something steamed and covered in hijiki. Then Eve popped up wanting to eat something healthy. So Wednesday night it was Cha Ya in the Mission, and Thursday found me at Medicine Eatstation in Union Square.

Look, I still don't really know what an Eatstation is (can you play Katamari on it?) but this place won the vegan Japanese food battle Buddha's hands down. We are not simply talking about its hokey-yet-alluring-anyway zen spa aesthetic versus Cha Ya's more sterile white-box-with-schlep-through-kitchen-to-the-bathroom vibe. Those of you who go out to eat with me know that I actually prefer holes in the wall to tarted up temples to marketing. But the food was just no contest.

Cha Ya's food was tasty enough but wildly overpriced. I popped for a $5 pot of tea, because I got to select from a menu of exciting options - sencha, genmaicha, etc. Then when the tiny little porcelain pot comes out - we're talking ugly, we're talking $2 pink Chinatown teapot - it's got a freaking TEA BAG dangling from it. I could have bought a whole tin of loose leaf green tea for that $5 thank you very much.

The food was fine, well prepared and brightly flavored, but the portions were small. I had a "sushi bowl" of rice mixed with hijiki seaweed (sigh) and topped with steamed vegetables of great variety...plus (!) tofu pouch. (Tofu pouch means inari sushi wrapper.) I actually really liked this bowl, but I could have used a side of pickles, and...I could have used two more bowls.

Perhaps I ordered badly, but the 500 page menu didn't do much to ease my experience. We steered well clear of the dessert menu (terrifying!) and went out for some real tea elsewhere.

Medicine was in stark contrast. Despite its weird mall setting, the experience was definitely relaxing and, I dare say, rejuvenating. I ordered a set menu. I was served up a creamy and sort of darkly complex shiro miso soup, a tangy and light "cole slaw," and an ephemeral little plate of maitake mushrooms piled on bitter broccoli rabe, set beside a classic grilled yakimochi (rice cake) and a tiny snow red peach that tasted like gummi and felt like a lychee in my mouth. Oh, plus there was a side - a little ceramic cup of "artisanal tofu." (In San Francisco, if your toilet paper isn't artisanal, no one will take you seriously.) In all seriousness this little cup of artistry was profoundly satisfying, light and silky - so I applaud the artistry.

I left happy, surprisingly full and glowing with that special self-satisfied contentment that only comes from eating at vegan establishments. Lucky me that I didn't have to put up with the usual self-righteous wait staff, flax seed shakers and lectures about paper towels in the bathroom. (I get to make nasty comments like that, by the way, because I worked in a vegetarian restaurant for years.)

I don't know if there are more vegan Japanese places in town that I ought to visit, but I'm starting to feel prepared for the journey. Bring on your tiny peaches, San Francisco.