The Veg Edge

The Veg Edge is a one-hour special that airs regularly on the Cooking Channel, Scripps' new cousin to the Food Network. Since I spend about 20 hours or more per week watching foodie-centric television, it was time to pass on the fruits of these labors.

This program highlights trends in vegetarian dining nationwide. Some of the places and people featured on The Veg Edge include the veggie dining scene in Austin (including Casa de Luz, Daily Juice, Mr. Natural Vegetarian and vegan food carts like Iggi's Vegan Texatarean and the Vegan Yacht), a seasonal prix fixe restaurant in Seattle called Sutra, adorable vegan pastry chef (and Cupcake Wars champion) Chloe Coscarelli, New York haute cuisine outposts like Dirt Candy and Dovetail (which features a meatless Monday menu although it isn't a vegetarian restaurant), the vegan web show Heavy Metal Vegan, and the vegetarian scene in Portland, which runs the gamut from food carts like Native Bowl, Magic Beans, Sushi Tree, Ruby Dragon and Homegrown Smoker, higher end places like Blossoming Lotus and Portobello Vegan Trattorria, and the fantastic Portland vegan mini mall, with animal product-free shopping for every part of your life from the kitchen to your tattoo collection.

This show does an excellent job highlighting how national dining trends such as food carts are catering to growing segments of the population (i.e. vegetarians). It also shows how the increasing sophistication and internationalization of the American palate has created a wider variety of dining options for vegetarians as well as those looking to minimize their intake of animal products