The Shojin

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of going to The Shojin in Downtown, LA (Little Tokyo). It was "The Ukrainian"'s idea, which scored major man points for sure. Due to the amount of pictures, I made a collage (Tip: you may want to right-click the picture and Open In... New Window).

The Shojin is a vegan organic Japanese restaurant that throws around the words "raw" and "macrobiotics" everywhere. As you can see in the picture of the restaurant front, there was a lot of unique artwork around the restaurant. We were sitting inside right near that place that says "Organic."

The prices were moderate, though definitely NOT cheap.

Here's the fare we had:

- Cranberry Apple Detox drink: I've had a detox drink before, and this one definitely followed suit with the kick of cayenne pepper at the end.

- Avocado Salad: SO yummy! The dressing was so creamy and cheesy that I thought it was dairy. Edamame and pumpkin seeds added great texture.

- Miso: Standard... a little less salty than usual due to the low-sodium philosophy at Shojin. They use sea salt for flavoring. The miso also had tofu cubes sitting at the bottom. When they served this to us, they asked if we'd like a spoon. REALLY? I know I brought a foreign "Ukrainian" to the place, but still...

- Side salad: Came with our dinners. There was a nice miso dressing on top... very nice!

- Bigger "bento" box (bottom middle): Contained pickled veggies, pumpkin croquette, fake fish with tartar sauce, red bell pepper roll, zucchini-topped roll, veggie tempura (which was lightly battered), tofu skin with wild+sticky rice

- Smaller "bento" box (bottom left): Hamburg steak (yummy and beef-like but I didn't like the salty sauce), tofu skin with wild+sticky rice, tomato+"cheese" "ravioli" (not great), 4 pieces of spicy cucumber+avocado+wasabi sushi -- NOT a fan of wasabi!

We were so full that no dessert was necessary, but they had a few raw desserts like banana chocolate cake and carrot detox "cheese"cake. I would definitely come again once in a while. This place definitely put really good flavor into everything.