Sacramento Vegan Chef Challenge Starts Saturday!

I'm always so excited when October rolls around because that means it's time for the annual Sacramento Vegan Chef Challenge.  For the sixth year in a row, local chefs will be preparing a variety of fabulous vegan dishes all month long.  Here are the restaurants that have signed up to participate so far this year, and it's the biggest group yet:

• Pizza Rock Sacramento
• The Porch Restaurant and Bar
• Old Ironsides
• The Rind
• Thai Basil Restaurant Mid-town
• Evan's Kitchen
• Tower Bridge Bistro
• Capitol Garage
• El Papagayo (Carmichael)
• Metro Kitchen + Drinkery
• Orchid Thai Restaurant & Bar
• Highwater
• Lou's Sushi
• The Green Boheme (Roseville)
• Baagan (Roseville)
• Nectar Café (Auburn)
• Sun & Soil Juice Company
• VEG
• Localis
• Nourish Health Bar & Café (Citrus Heights)
• Nido
• Culinerdy Cruzer food truck
• Gabriel Levan Aiello of Burly Beverages and monthly Meatless Monday pop-up dinners at Old Ironsides

The special vegan menus aren't available yet, but I will post updates on my Sacramento Vegan Facebook page as I find out about them.  With so many restaurants participating this year, I know I won't be able to get to all of them, but I'll visit as many as I can.  I'll post pictures on Facebook and Instagram of the wonderful vegan dishes I order, and I'll do a blog post every Sunday night with a wrap-up of the restaurants I visited and the food I ate during the previous week.  I can't wait!

One caveat:  most of the participating restaurants do not serve vegan food exclusively.  They probably do not have separate frying equipment or a separate spot on the grill just for vegan food.  If this is a problem for you, you may want to patronize only the vegan restaurants or order only foods that aren't likely to have come in contact with non-vegan items.  

More information on the Sacramento Vegan Chef Challenge is available on their website at http://sacveganchallenge.com/ or on their Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/sacveganchefchallenge/?fref=ts.