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Great Vegi Land (Vegetarian cuisine)  $

 8.5
JaT Rating

562 S Murphy Ave, Sunnyvale, 94086  (Directions)


408.735.8040


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Chinese vegan food serving a number of faux meat and vegetable combinations


Reviewer: Jason
Total Reviews: 1040
Reviewed: 7/18/2006
Rating: 8.5
My photo gallery 		We tried visiting Great Vegi Land the other day but they are closed on Mondays. I'd consider this restaurant off the beaten path as people will confuse the location with the other Murphy street. It's off El Camino Real and you'll have to drive 1-2 blocks to reach it. The strip mall is old and contains odd shops like Indian video rentals, sewing shop, and toothpick wholesalers. You won't find a Starbucks or Juice Hut around here.

Great Vegi Land caters to vegans, vegetarians, or a hungry person like myself. Cooked up with a chinese style to the dishes, items are fairly cheap ranging from $5.50 to $8. Check out the lunch specials on the whiteboard when you walk in.

The lady running the joint is a 9.9 on the friendly scale with 10 going to my grandma. Always with a smile, you can feel how genuine a person she is. She dropped off the menus and pointed to the lunch specials. The restaurant decor isn't filled with the most modern furniture and snazzy art frames but it's got a homely comfortable vibe. The table cover was a little sticky but other than that, everything else was clean.

I'm a big fan of tasting faux meats since I like comparing them to the real thing. I ordered the Vegetarian Chicken Curry with spring roll appetizer.

The spring rolls (picture #4) arrived on a small tray. They were glistening with oil and out of the fryer. Since I've burned my mouth plenty of times, I waited a couple of minutes to stick these deep fried goodies down my stomach. The rolls weren't tightly packed so the outside wrapper was flakey and crunchy. Not too much vegetables on the inside, about average tasting.

Veggie Curry Chicken - excellent amount of carrots, potatoes, lima beans. Orange and green veggies providing contrasting colors to give nice presentation to the dish. Veggies were firm and had good texture. Carrots and potatoes were sweet. The chicken was spongy and made of tofu. Mixed in was a aromatic curry with a distinct coconut milk smell. Rich flavoring and exotic spices had me enjoying every bite. Portion was large and I took home half of it with extra scoops of brown rice (50 cents a scoop).

It was a great lunch today. I'd would highly recommend trying the Veggie Curry Chicken. Great Vegi Land gets flying colors for meat substitute. I overheard a table next to us saying the Bitter Melon dish was absolutely amazing. I <3 Great Vegi Land.
 


Reviewer: Terry
Total Reviews: 739
Reviewed: 7/18/2006
Rating: 8.5
My photo gallery 		We hit up Great Vegi Land, and I was a little nervous walking into the place. Its in a cheezy, should-have-closed-down-long-ago strip mall, and the place itself looks ooooold. The restaurant, while clean, just looks a bit run down. Prices for the specials, however, looked cheap, so I guess I really can't complain as long as the food is good.

The place is all vegan, so of course no complaints from me. I love sitting down at a place and knowing that I can order whatever I want off the menu. It was a tough choice, but I eventually decided to just go with the daily lunch special.

For today this was: Braised Tofu, Shredded Veggie Pork in Hunan Sauce, Brown Rice, and Tofu soup. Jason and I split an order of the spring rolls.

Wait was not long and the spring rolls arrived first - super super hot. They contained vegetables and were decent, not a must order item. Will probably skip them next time.

My plate arrived and looked decent, not overflowing. This was fine with me. After a vacation in hawaii with nothing but eating, I needed a small break from big meals. The brown rice, not something that I eat often or enjoy terribly much, was decent. Just your basic cardboardy rice. The tofu was ok, a bit runny and just, well, tofu. I would not order this as a dish. But it was OK for the lunch special. The hunan pork was much better. Had a much more spicy kick to it, and the ingredients were more flavorful. I would order this standalone. The winner for me, though, was when I sampled some of Jasons Veggie Curry chicken. The curry was highly flavorful and the faux chicken was quite enjoyable. I would definitely order this dish in the future.

While the prices were decent, the portions were a bit small. I was going to give an 8, but I am struggling to find things that didn't appeal to me about this place. The waitress was very friendly and food arrived fast. OK, its an 8.5.
 
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