Odd Provisions, DC

Who knew Columbia Heights had such a cool grocery store?!  Well, I teach yoga in Columbia Heights now and I happened to come across Odd Provisions as I was walking down the street. It's a totally cool, vegan friendly grocery store, with tons of unique food products, so it was like hitting the jackpot for me! Inside, there is vegan mac and cheese, Hodo Soy tofu products (the best!), unique hot sauces and spaghetti sauces, and an awesome selection of drinks. Not to mention, there's a great prepared food section. After buying dinner there for several weeks, I thought that it would be nice to write about the food I was enjoying!

I'll start by saying that everything in their prepared food area is delicious. I really have not gone wrong yet. My favorite thing to grab and go is the VegItalian sandwich. It may not photograph well, but what it lacks in unphotogenicism is made up by its flavor.  Layers of eggplant "salami," roasted peppers, caramelized fennel and onion are topped with "feta" and olive tapenade. The olive flavor is probably the boldest of all, but they all mesh together in the fresh bread for near perfection.

Next up is the Brussels Sprouts and Apple Salad. Shaved brussels sprouts are tossed with diced apples and walnuts. A dressing made with walnut oil, cider vinegar, salt, and whole grain mustard gives it its flavor and the fresh parsley is the icing on the cake. I love the flavor and crunchiness.

The Lentil Salad is another fantastic salad simply made with lentils, tomato, onions, fresh dill, and a dressing. I could eat this for dinner and be completely satisfied.

The Carrot and Radish Salad may not have the sexiest name, but it was one of my favorites to try. Why? Because of the spicy harissa, which I love. Half the carrots are pan-seared and the other half are raw making a nice balance of crunchiness along with chickpeas, radishes, and a delicious dressing of olive oil, lemon juice, cider vinegar, coriander, and salt. Yum!

Lastly, the Ginger Sesame Noodles are just as solid as they seem. With crunchy broccoli, red peppers, carrots, and celery, this sesame noodle dish is simple, yet tasty.

Items in this store are not cheap with small salads like the Lentil Salad selling for $3.95 and the VegItalian sandwich for $8.50, but know you are getting quality food for that price. I have also confirmed with one of the owners, Jess, that although all ingredients are not currently listed on the packages, there is no honey in anything labeled vegan.

Other items they sell that are fantastic include their hummus, Hummus Bialy sandwich, and Garlicky Kale salad. This store is simply awesome. Go support your local vegan friendly grocery and leave the rest up to them.

Odd Provisions
3301 11th Street NW
Washington, DC 20010
(202) 232-4050

Full Disclosure: Although the products were provided to me at no cost to review, that in no way influenced my veracious opinion.

Pepper Palace, DC

Brace yourselves, DC residents, because there's a new pepper in town and it's going to burn your socks off! I'm talking about the hottest pepper identified today and you can get a hot sauce made with it in DC at the new Pepper Palace in Union Station! A nationwide chain, Pepper Palace hails from Tennessee and can be found in states all over the country.

I only find myself in Union Station every couple of years so on this rare occurrence, I had to see if there were any new stores. And I hit the jackpot. Hot sauce is my name and Carolina Reaper is my game. So I went in hoping to find this famous pepper. In my way were a bunch of schoolkids who apparently got away from their chaperone, signed waivers they weren't old enough to sign, and tried a Carolina Reaper extract. I was lucky enough to show up just as they were all running away to puke up a pepper storm. Hilarious!!

Afterwards, I tried some Carolina Reaper, Ghost Pepper, and Habanero sauces and many were to my liking. This hot sauce shop is very much like the one I found in Austin, Texas, but it is in DC! They have hot popcorn, hot nuts, hot sauce, salsa, spices -- everything hot! I even found a sauce I haven't been able to find anywhere else. And you can try the sauces too!

I guess I will be visiting this store regularly as I build up my collection of sauces. The prices are not cheap, but I'd expect that of a specialty store. The ghost pepper sauce I bought was $11 and the Carolina Reaper sauce I bought was $15 and yes, they are small bottles.

So, what are you doing?! Go to Union Station and buy some freaking hot sauce now so they'll stay open in DC! Welcome to the neighborhood, Pepper Palace!

Seaport Oil & Vinegars, San Diego

While in San Diego, I stopped by the little village of Seaport. This was a touristy town with your typical tourist stores selling shell necklaces and t-shirts. In the midst of all the junk, however, I discovered an olive oil shop and you know I love my olive oil.

Seaport Oil and Vinegars is a small store right on the water selling olive oil, vinegars, and sea salts. Their selection is limited due to their size, but they have a pretty good selection. It is set up the same way most olive oil shops are set up so they allow you to taste all of the oils and vinegars before buying.

They offer flavored, fused, and infused olive oils in flavors like blood orange, harissa, and chipotle. One particular stand-out was the cilantro and roasted onion EVOO, which was particularly tasty.

The balsamic vinegars included both white and dark with flavors like cranberry pear white, blackberry ginger dark, and jalapeno white. I decided to buy a bottle of the jalapeno white balsamic because I  thought it would be great for a spicy salad dressing.

As I went up to pay for it, I was a bit shocked at the price. The 375ml bottle was priced at $22.99 whereas in most other olive oil shops, you'd pay around $17.99 for the same bottle. I guess because they are selling mostly to tourists, they can charge whatever they want. And I really liked the flavor so I bought it anyway.

If you don't have any olive oil shops near you and you find yourself in San Diego, this is a great way to try some premium olive oils and vinegars and perhaps take a bottle home. Just remember to check your bag before boarding.

Seaport Oil & Vinegars
809 Harbor Drive, Suite G
San Diego, CA 92101
(619) 232-6096

Whole Foods Vegan Foods Counter, Austin

There I was in one of the biggest Whole Foods in the world in Austin when I encountered a vegan food bar. All vegan, all fresh and mostly raw. I was in vegan heaven. The bar looked like it was part of the Health Starts Here campaign that has been promoted nationally in all Whole Foods. Austin is Whole Foods' headquarters' home so it would make sense that this store would be cooler than my local one.

They offered items like broccoli cashew crunch, chickpea chix salad, pumpkin seed cheese, and raw German chocolate cake. After seeing these offerings, we decided to eat at Whole Foods for lunch on our last day in Austin. Besides what was in the case, they also had a menu. I decided to order the raw flax seed tostada from the menu and the chickpea salad from the case.

The raw flax seed tortilla was topped with kale and avocado, spicy cashew cheese, mock sour cream, cilantro and pico de gallo. The flax seed tortilla was very fresh and went well with the greens. I found that the sauces really made this dish though. Overall, the tostada was delicious! The chickpea salad was tasty and filling as well.

If you are a raw foods enthusiast, I would recommend stopping by this counter. I honestly could have eaten here every day.

Tears of Joy, Austin

While walking down 6th Street on a 95-degree day in Austin, we stumbled across Tears of Joy, a hot sauce shop. Oh, how I love hot sauce! The last time I had been in a hot sauce shop was in Louisiana. There really should be more shops like this across the U.S.

Inside, it was a hot sauce lover's dream. The hot sauces were all rated on a scale of 1 to 10 in hotness. There were sections for sauces, chips, spices, and salsas.

But what really caught my eye was the coffin. Inside the coffin were all of the sauces that were rated a 10 including pure extracts! Wow!

It was quite the selection. Eventually, after trying many sauces and burning my taste buds off, I chose to purchase The Executioner Ghost Pepper Hot Sauce, The Hottest Fuckin' Sauce (that is what it is called) and Deano's Jalapeno Chips. More on these items at another time.

As I was checking out, the woman at the register told me to try the extract that was there, I picked it up, smelled it, then decided against it. In the process, a tiny bit got on my finger so I licked it. It almost killed me. For hours later, I could taste it -- it was that hot. I have no idea why anyone would need anything that hot, but now I aspire to get to a point where I could handle that. For now, I'll stick with the ghost pepper sauce, which is plenty hot enough.

This is a great place to visit while in Austin. Highly recommended.

Tears of Joy
618 E. 6th Street
Austin, TX 78701
(512) 499-0766

Under the Olive Tree, Tysons Corner, VA

Did you know that the DC metro area now has at least three premium olive oil purveyors that allow you to taste their olive oil before you buy?  Under the Olive Tree located in Tysons Corner, Virginia is one of them and I'm so excited to welcome them to the neighborhood! I finally had the opportunity to visit the store in the Tysons Corner shopping center a few weeks ago. It is similar to many of the other olive oil and vinegar stores I have been to across the country, but we didn't have them in this area until just a few years ago.

Under the Olive Tree is a family-owned business and I was lucky enough to meet one of the owners, Marcel Beraud, while I was in the store. He walked me through the store showing me all of the products that they offer. You can sample any of the olive oils and vinegars that you'd like as well as the gourmet sea salts.

They offer a nice variety of premium olive oils infused with spices and fruits like the chipotle and garlic flavors. Even one of the "butter" olive oils is vegan! I tried a bunch of the olive oils and finally ended up buying the wild mushroom and sage infused one that I plan to use for risotto.

For vinegars they offer flavors like the cinnamon pear balsamic, grapefruit white balsamic, and pomegranate balsamic. I really liked the seasonal pumpkin spice vinegar the best.

They also sell herbs, spices, and fine sea salts. There is an organic chimichurri spice mix that Marcel's wife developed that they swear by. They also sell vegan pastas from southern Virginia.

I'm thrilled to have an olive oil purveyor in the DC metro area.  For the holiday season, Under the Olive Tree offers gift packs of small olive oils and vinegars that make perfect gifts.

Under the Olive Tree
1961 Chain Bridge Road
McLean, VA 22102

(703) 356-8880

Nut Kreations, Santa Cruz

I don't typically review stores, that is, unless they are incredibly unique and/or funky.  When I was walking around the downtown area of Santa Cruz, I stumbled across a nut shop that met that very criteria. After looking around and trying a few products, I quickly realized that I needed to write about this place!

Nut Kreations is a specialty nut store that was founded last year by a local Santa Cruz couple. In fact, today is the 1-year anniversary of their store's opening! Happy anniversary Nut Kreations!! The business grew out of an experiment they tried for Christmas a few years ago in which they took orders from family and friends and assembled 200 gift packages out of their home. Soon thereafter, they opened their own store that now offers close to 120 types of nuts, dried fruits, seeds, granolas, and other natural treats.

The store itself is beautiful with glass cases showcasing all of their offerings. I was overwhelmed by the unique selection. Especially of note was a selection of hard-to-find dried fruits such as strawberries, Australian ginger, cantaloupe, pears, peaches, and chili mangoes.

I picked up an incredible mix that included strawberries, figs, kiwis, golden raisins, tart cherries, persimmons, dried mangoes, peaches, cantaloupe, and goji berries. Every piece of fruit tasted like it had been dried yesterday - so soft, fresh, and flavorful. They are definitely the best dried fruits I've ever had. And considering that many of their dried fruits don't use many of the preservatives you find in most dried fruit mixes, they are much healthier than most. 

That's not to mention the amazing chocolate covered dried fruits -- most of which are vegan!

I tried a bunch of them before settling on the chocolate covered banana chips. They were dried to a crisp, then covered with just the right amount of chocolate -- a great combination!

There were so many nuts and nut mixtures. You could even create your own mixes by mixing fruit, nuts, and/or granola together. The possibilities are endless! I recommend the Thai Curry cashews and Salt & Pepper cashews.  The Thai Curry cashews (shown below) made me "mmmm" out loud! No joke! They are that good. Talk about a perfectly spiced cashew. This one is worth ordering online.

Another simple, yet delicious nut was the raw red walnut. These walnuts are native to California and lower in oils and acidity in comparison to regular walnuts. I loved the flavor of them in my steel cut oatmeal.

The coconut cinnamon vanilla pecans are delicious and would be amazing on top of coconut milk ice cream with chocolate sauce! Okay, now I need to try that.

Other ones that looked good were the raspberry almonds, wasabi tamari almonds, and garlic almonds. Oh, and the spiced pistachios looked great too.

They allow you to try everything so you can be sure you like it before you buy. Then, you just tell them what you want and how much of it and they'll package it in their cute little bags.

They also sell nut butters, containers for nut storage, and other gift items. If you are in Santa Cruz, this place is a must-visit.  It is too bad they only have one store, however, I predict they'll be expanding soon. In the meantime, I'll be placing my orders online at www.nutkreations.com. UPDATE: They are offering all of my readers 25% off on orders if you use the following code upon checkout: YEAROFNUTS!

Please note that all vegan items are labeled as such in the store, but only some of them are labeled online. They are currently working to add these labels to all products in their online store. If you have any questions, just give them a call or shoot them an email -- they are happy to help!

Nut Kreations
104 Lincoln Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
(831) 431-6435