Saturday Night...Much More Low-Key Than Before

Still walking gingerly from my intense leg work out from Thursday I picked up my old girlfriend and we went down to SOHO to Souen on 6th Avenue and Prince St.

Souen is a Japanese Macrobiotic restaurant in which they,...prepare our food simply and naturally, offering you the best quality grains, beans, and produce. No refined, chemicals, preservatives, meat or dairy products are used in our kitchen.

Souen says of Macrobiotics: It is thought that by eating balanced foods such as grains and vegetables that are more local and in season, we can maintain good physical and spiritual health and live in harmony with nature.

Now, although the science is behind eating grains and vegetables, I'm not so sure about this "living in harmony" with nature thing.

But the food was mostly great!

For appetizers we had:

Steamed Dumplings - six wheat dumplings filled with seitan, nappa, ginger and scallions. Delicious.

Brussel sprouts - with walnuts and peanut sauce. Again, very, very good, but grilling them on the BBQ like what I had this past Thanksgiving is healthier and taste fresher.

Edamame - was overcooked.

My girlfriend had the Pad Thai - sauteed noodles with onion, carrot, mung bean, scallion, shiitake, broccoli and baked tofu in all natural house-made peanut sauce with lime. It was so good. Awesome.

I had Macro Plate - a balance of steamed greens, vegetables, brown rice, beans and hijiki seaweed. It was healthy, of course, but it was boring. I am not a huge fan of the seaweed, or the the kale.

Afterwards we went to the legendary Waverly Theatre in Greenwich Village, now called the IFC Theatre. We saw the amazing animation film, and Oscar contender, "The Secret of Kells." It is not often people applaud after a film. It was an enchanting movie, really well done, and a breath of fresh air from typical Hollywood animation - I guess because because it is from Ireland.

We ended the night at your typical Village coffee shop with people reading books. There were a slew of sweets for sale and when my friend asked me if I wanted something I said, "What the hell, if they have something vegan." When we went to Red Bamboo last week she had a full vegan chocolate brownie that was stunning. I am not a big dessert eater (even though I have bouts with a sweet tooth), so I was not bothered in the least that there was nothing to offer. However, I started thinking, how can a Village coffee shop not have a vegan sweets alternative?