Vegetable-forward cooking is tipping into ubiquity across the country, but nowhere has it gone more mainstream than Los Angeles, the city at the white-hot center of the wellness revolution. With so many plant-based menus popping up, you can easily go meatless for every meal of the day. Check out three new healthy havens—and the dishes to order—morning, noon and night.
For brunch:
“Our menu is based on what’s available seasonally, and, luckily, in California that’s always a lot,” says chef Josef Centeno of his vegetable-focused cuisine at P.Y.T. on Main Street in downtown L.A. Centeno stocks his kitchen with produce from Lala, a farm at a local school, and he makes particularly good use of it at brunch. Try his restorative pozole with celery root and lovage.
For lunch:
You can add protein to any of the bowls, wraps and salads at Beefsteak in Fairfax, but Marcel Vigneron offers compelling reasons not to. “We don’t use it as a crutch,” says the chef, who finds brilliant alternatives to add richness. Instead of anchovies, olive brine brings an umami punch to a sunflower-seed-packed Caesar, and cashew cream thickens pumpkin soup.
For dinner:
Fried seaweed chips with a yuzu-spiked guacamole are just one example of how Nick Erven is reimagining meat-free food at his Santa Monica restaurant Erven. “It’s forced me to be more creative and informed,” says the chef, whose $35 tasting menu is one of the best deals in town.
