Local Restaurants

Here is list of local Restaurants that have vegan friendly options. While the list is not all inclusive and will never be, as we will not list every Indian, Chinese, Thai and Middle Eastern located in the metro area, they all typically have vegan options, we will list the ones that are especially vegan friendly. We will also be updating the list as information becomes available concerning the restaurants in the area.

Middle Eastern Cuisine:

We are blessed here in the Metro Detroit area to have the largest concentrations of people of Arab descent outside of the Middle East, we have many Middle Eastern Cuisine restaurants in the area, to list them all would take several pages. The Middle Eastern Cuisine is extremely vegan friendly, the main thing you have to watch for is that they serve yogurt sauce with their mjadara, you can ask them for tahini sauce in place of the yogurt. Other dishes that you might want to try are the tomato kibbe, the vegetable ghallaba and the borgul. An area with a large concentration of Middle Eastern restaurants is Dearborn, especially the Warren Avenue area. One of our favorite Middle Eastern Restaurants in the Lebanese Grille located at Rochester Road and Maple (15 Mile).

Indian Cuisine:

We are also blessed here in the Metro Detroit area with having many people from South Asia, meaning we have many Indian restaurants in the area, once again to list them all would take up too much space. When you go into an Indian restaurant, many of the items that are listed as vegetarian are vegan, but you have to ask if there is dairy in the breads (watch out for Naan, most Naan has dairy), Paneer is an Indian cheese so any dish containing Paneer is not vegan and watch out for the Dal Makhani is usually cooked in dairy. The best thing is to ask your server if you have any questions. Two of our favorite Indian Restaurants are Star of India, just west of Woodward on 9 Mile in Ferndale, and Priya, located next to Good Food Company at Livernois and Maple in Troy.

Chinese/Thai Cuisine:

There are many Chinese and Thai restaurants scattered throughout the Metro Detroit area, you can usually get mixed vegetables or dishes made with tofu at the majority of them. A few things you really have to be careful about dining at many of the restaurants is that many use fish sauce or a lot of MSG in their cooking. It is important that you talk to your server and make sure that they use soy sauce instead of the fish sauce in their dishes. Our favorite Thai Restaurant is Thai Smiles located two blocks south of 12 Mile on Van Dyke in Warren, they are extremely vegan friendly. Our favorite Chinese restaurant is Red Star, 13944 Michigan Ave., Dearborn. Red Star rocks, they have vegan chicken and beef that you can substitute in any of their regular dishes.

Southeast Oakland County:

Inn Season Cafe 500 East 4th Street, Royal Oak, 248-547-7916. The premier vegetarian restaurant in the Metro area.

Zumba's Mexican Grille 121 North Main, Royal Oak, 248-542-1400. While not vegetarian, they have vegan option of bean or veggie burritos and tacos that just rock our world. and very inexpensive also. Listed on their menu is that the beans are vegetarian and the rice is cooked without chicken stock.

Om Cafe 23136 Woodward Ave, Ferndale 248-548-1941. The Om is Macrobiotic, so they do have fish on their menu, but their specials are out of this world, and their desserts are all vegan.