What Vegetarians or Vegans Eats In The USA?

If you are an Indian and vegetarian then you don’t have much choice when you go out for dinner or lunch. Yes, you will find Indian restaurant in every major town. But, they aren’t cheap. And you can not eat that food every day. I have seen most of Indian restaurant offers very few vegetarian dishes compare to non-veg.

Now, like me, stuck in small town, where nearest Indian restaurant is 50 miles/80 km away can’t go to Indian restaurant when you want to eat out.

So, you have to turn to American restaurants. You should be able to breathe all kind of non-veg food smell while you are there.  When I first entered Taco-Bell, I came out in 5 minutes without taking anything. It smelled horrible. But, you would be used to it if you can’t stay hungry.

Now, it is big task to find something eatable for a vegetarian. And if you are vegan then you are in big trouble. It would be very difficult to find something without animal product in it. Most difficult for Indians like us would be the taste of the food.  All steamed vegetable would be plain steamed and mostly without salt or any spices. It wouldn’t be tasty. It the USA, spices means salt and pepper. Any food you will get wouldn’t satisfy your spice need. But, after sometime you will develop a taste of that kind of food.

So, based on my experience, I decided to help those who are in dilemma what to eat in American restaurants. I have prepared list of some fast food chain or restaurants where I have been. See below

Whenever I have doubt I’ll ask them and before ordering I’ll make sure it doesn’t have any kind of meat or fish. Yes, sometime fish is vegetarian food for them. Most of them are very polite and would help you find out something you can eat. Don’t hesitate to ask.

You can always ask them to cook your dish separately then normal cooking plate, griddle or grill. Normally, they would cook where they are cooking meat dishes.

Here is the long list of restaurants which you can try.

1) Subway, Burger King, McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Wendy’s, Danny’s

2) Pizzahut, Domino’s, Sbarro, Panera Bread, Ruby’s Tuesday,  Applebee’s, Chili’s

3) Red Robin, Olive Garden, Cracker Barrel, Chinese, Mexican

Do you have any suggestions or thoughts?