Even Subway has a veg patty option now..

Really, when a veg option is on the menu.. all vegetarians care about is just veggies it seems.. I imagine there could be hundreds of combinations of veggies that could be had on the menu.. so if you like beets, or tomatoes.. or bell peppers, shitake..

But nope.. restaurants generally just put whatever veggies they feel like.. and consumers just eat whatever the restaurants feel like making up at the moment.. based on the limited selection on the menu..

OP, thanks for the thread and blog.

Well, that is rather a blanket statement, and frankly isn't correct. I think that many veggies are concerned about finding a balanced meal which is well prepared, not just eating vegetables. Too often mid-range restaurants or chains offer just a cold salad, or a carb and/or dairy overload, or a pasta with tomato sauce. Often the meal isn't balanced and sometimes it barely includes any vegetables. (Being vegetarian doesn't mean just eating vegetables)

And often as noted earlier in the thread, we can find chefs in higher end restaurants who are excited by the challenge of creating a balanced meal which is decent quality.

Would anyone classify Subway as a 'top restaurant'? Even if they do offer a veg sandwich, it is one of the last places I would ever consider eating, even if they are appearing in all corners of the earth these days.

Yeah, I can vouch for Luger's suckiness if you don't eat steak. I had fish there (yeah, I know, not really vegetarian, but whatever) and I could easily have prepared it better at home for about 10% of the cost. But my sister was pretty psyched to eat her steak there, so it was worth the trip. :)

I rarely starve anywhere! The most memorable exception was an incredibly highly rated by those who like such things, offal based restaurant in Rome. There really wasn't a single thing I could eat. All the food was served family style, everything had an elemet of meat in it somehow and the kitchen shrugged and pulled the salami off the top of the cheese and offered it back when I asked in my best Italian if there was something vegetarian, even a plain salad. It seems they only buy the food for each evening, and there is no menu, so they make everything and bring it out and that night there was nothing that wasn't meatified!

Steak restaurants I normally do fine - a baked potato, some sour cream, and hopefully a chop salad (tomatoes, onions, blue cheese mmmmm) - I am such a cheap date at a steak house!

I don't disagree that there are places where you (we!) could "do fine". But how do you identify those places? That is part of my project with the blog. I went to the 21 Club, which bills itself as one of NYC's top restaurants, and what their chef was able to "whip up" was a bunch of sides thrown together. http://withoutbacon.wordpress.com/20...-club-2-stars/

Other times, I've been to places as, prior posters have noted, the cooks have put together something great. Some steakhouses do quite well for vegetarians -- I'm thinking here of the Hillstone's/Houston's veggie burger -- but most are very bleh. Even look at something like Top Chef: Just Desserts. these people are great chefs, and they put chicken liver or bacon in their desserts! I would not expect that if I was out looking for dessert.

The point of my blog is, how do you identify the places where you can get a great, five-star vegetarian meal? Lots of great, five-star restaurants don't accommodate vegetarians, but many do. How do we separate the good from the bad?

I couldn't agree more. I don't think that we should have to 'just settle' as we do in so many mid-range restaurants in the US. And while I do just fine at steak houses with a combination of side dishes, that gets old and boring quite quickly. How many times I have eaten tomato slices, asparagus, and mashed potatoes for dinner. Hence I really appreciate your blog.

I have had wonderful veg meals courtesy of Ducasse, Bocuse and Schuhbeck, amongst others. I know that I can always find something enjoyable at Käfer. Those meals are interesting and balanced as well as tasty, and go far beyond the usual sides of veg or pasta with tomato sauce found at so many restaurants in the US (and I recall trying with great difficulty attempting to find something actually vegetarian at a Lone Star and a TGIF once, as most items were premade and the offer was to 'pick off the bacon' :rolleyes: )

I feel very strongly that as a veggie we should not have to 'settle', or make up a meal of sides, or be relegated to Asian restaurants in the US, or 'choose' the one token item on the menu, or eat at Subway. There are many other options out there, and I appreciate the fact that some of them have been compiled into one easy place of reference.

Generally speaking, I'd say any highly regarded restaurant that talks about vegetables on its menu as integral parts of all (or many of) its dishes is going to pull off an excellent vegetarian meal even if they don't have vegetarian entrees listed.

Peter Luger, not so much.
Craftsteak, looking better.
Jean Georges or Eleven Madison Park, no problem.

Craftsteak is on my list... though they don't have any vegetarian entrees on the menu.

I should clarify.. I meant that the restaurant itself thinks that different combinations of veggies don't matter to vegetarians.. but really, the combination of veggies does.. matter to the customer..

Subway is bottom of the pile example.. but even Subway customizes is my point..

I went there in LAS once as part of a bachelor party. The organizer had ordered some sort of family style prix fixe that was supposed to get us samples of almost everything on the menu. The steak eaters in the group (i.e., everyone but me) were horribly disappointed as the steak portions were tiny while the veggie and chicken portions were huge. Since I do eat poultry (I'm not a real vegetarian) I was thrilled and was able to eat my fill of delicious mushrooms, veggies, etc.

Veggie burgers are one of the things I almost never order, because most kitchens don't have a separate grill for 'flame grilling' veggie burgers. Sometimes when there is no other option, I will ask that the burger is cooked in a frying pan, or, on occasion (and one well known fast food chain certainly used to do this for its veggie burgers) microwave!

Can't say that I've ever tried a veggie burger, or patty.. Although I should, and understand from some of those I've talked to that the patty tastes sort of like meat..

I'm changing up my diet and eating alot more vegetables nowadays.. So with a steak dinner, I don't mind getting a large side salad, carmelized veggies, and no carbs..

I've done 3 meals in the past couple of weeks straight seafood and veggies..

The veggie burger issue raises another question: whether vegetarian food should be trying to imitate non-vegetarian food? I think soy, seitan, etc., can imitate meat decently in some cases (Mexican Radio in SoHo has a good "carne asada" with seitan), though I think the best vegetarian entrees are those that try to do well on their own and not just because they manage to look/taste like meat.

Try Dirt Candy in NYC. Excellent vegetarian place.

Did you like it? I thought one or two of their dishes (particularly the carrot one) were pretty darn good, but found most of it just so-so.