Monday, September 1, 2008

Follow Your Heart Market & Cafe


You guessed it; I ate lunch at Follow Your Heart again! A little disclaimer about their online menu: They have recently overhauled their site and, in re-entering the menu, have omitted many important facts about each dish. Just so you know, almost every item on the menu is vegan optional with the exception, I believe, of the spanakopita and the lasagna. I might be missing another dish or two, but those are what specifically come to mind. I almost went for one of the brunch specials this time around, but instead opted for my favorite vegan reuben. It totally hit the spot!

Since I was dining with my dad, who is amazingly supportive of my veganism and happily eats at Follow Your Heart with me when he is in town, I also got to go grocery shopping in the little Follow Your Heart market. Believe me, they pack a lot of goodness into this market! I know many of you are fond of posting photos of your famers' market bounties, so here is a photo of my Follow Your Heart bounty:



Clockwise from back left: Purely Decadent Mint Chocolate Chip, Follow Your Heart spicy barbecue sauce, Spectrum organic toasted sesame oil, chocolate Silk, Living Harvest chocolate hemp milk, Muir Glen diced roasted tomatoes, 4 Larabar flavors (Jocolat chocolate coffee, chocolate coconut, cashew cookie, cherry pie), coconut Sweet and Sara marshmallows, Sunspire vegan carob chips (not pictured, Purely Decadent Peanut Butter Zig Zag).

I'll try to remember to write a separate post reviewing the Purely Decadent flavors I bought on this trip, along with three others I've tried in the recent past. Follow Your Heart's spicy barbecue sauce is incredibly delicious; I keep trying to make up reasons to eat it! I believe I've talked about the Sweet and Sara marshmallows. I really like the coconut covered ones. The vanilla ones are a little dull for my taste. I love Sunspire carob chips so much that I often just eat them plain as dessert. That was the quick run-down of what is pictured. In case you were wondering why I didn't buy any plain faux milk, the answer is that I favor Vitasoy fat-free plain soy milk that I buy at Trader Joe's. :)

Up until now, I've resisted trying Larabars. Their fat content is FAR higher than my comfort zone for such a tiny bar. However, my dad was generous enough to treat me to this little shopping trip and I decided to buckle down and see for myself why many of you rave about these. So far, I've tried the two chocolate ones and the cashew cookie and I wasn't impressed with any of them. The chocolate coffee was fairly bitter (and, if I'm going to eat chocolate, the darker the better, so that wasn't the issue). The chocolate coconut was a little better, but mostly because I liked that it had coconut and a bit more of a chewy texture. The cashew cookie occasionally tasted like cashew butter, which I love, but not consistently, and the texture was crumbly. I have yet to try the cherry pie and my mom just gave me a key lime and a lemon, so I'll try those, too. I'm curious about several of their other flavors, but I think three misses is a pretty good indication that Larabar and I have no future together, so I won't waste my money or my fat grams on them after I finish the three I have. That means more for you!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

i REALLY love that place. the only thing that gets to me is sometimes the line is a little long to get in, and i feel weird waiting all crammed next to the frozen aisle of the supermarket. other than that, the place is awesome. i've only tried the breakfast so far, but i honestly thing i could eat anything on the menu (that's vegan, of course)!

Anonymous said...

You know I'm eyeing those marshmallows there..! Sounds like an awesome place to both shop and eat. I wish there was a store/cafe like that around here!

Ruby Red said...

You're the first blogger I have heard of who doesn't like Larabars! Cherry Pie is the one flavor I really don't like, but maybe you will... Of course, you've heard about the peanut butter cookie flavor -- that's my favorite. You certainly got a good haul at the FYH market (it's nice that daddy treated you), and I am sooo craving your vegan reuben right now! The reuben is my all-time favorite sandwich!!

Liz Ranger (Bubble Tea for Dinner) said...

I'm not huge on the chocolate flavoured larabars, either, and when I do indulge in one of the other kinds, I usually wrap up half for later (100 calorie snack or so isn't so bad!). But you should try the lemon bar, it's really good, one of my favourites! And the gingersnap is also nice.

¡Yo Soy Liz! said...

Oh my god that Purely Decadent chocolate chip is insanely good!!!

I don't like any of the chocolate or all-nut Larabars, but the Cherry Pie and Apple Pie are my absolute favorite things on earth. I usually have one as my breakfast. And while they do have a lot of fat--at least it's all good fat from the nuts.