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For
The Love of Your Heart
Easy Esselstyn Diet Recipes
with Pictures: Regional
Restaurants
G-Zen – Branford CT |
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Posted by:
Klaus Exploring restaurants is fun but finding restaurants that serve complete 10% diet-compliant entrees, dinners or desserts is cumbersome. G-Zen offers a great exception since the chef is more than willing to create customized dinner experiences. Heavenly wonderful! |
Restaurants around CT 06510 that serve Esselstyn Diet-compliant Meals: |
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G-Zen 2
E Main St (at Montowese St) Info: All vegan menu including beer, wine, desserts,
breads, and raw food. All ingredients are plant-based (except cow milk
offered for coffee only) and mostly sustainable and organic. Main entree
prices range $18-$22, handholds and other dishes less. Opened in October 2011
as reported to HappyCow.
Has outdoor seating. Accepts credit cards. (after
happyCow http://www.happycow.net Park: On streets in front, left or right of the restaurant. |
G-Zen offers an
European-like dining experience
outstanding in atmosphere, food, presentation and service. The staff was
wonderful and compassionate in accommodating my needs for a low-fat and
low-salt diet. Several dishes were available and others could have been be
easily modified to fulfill such special requirements. Voted by Shape
Magazine (click also on picture to the left) as one of the ten best upscale
vegan restaurants in America! |
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Raw Pasta $22 (glass of wine 8.50) plus
Tax |
Dim Sum Plate $14 (glass Mimosa 9.00) plus
Tax |
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Dinner Served |
Brunch Served |
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Raw
pasta is a dish of raw shredded vegetables in sundried tomato marinara,
sprinkled with vegan cheese and served with dehydrated spicy kale chips (N,
E, S and W on plate) on a bed of fresh Mesclun greens:
Carrots (ES and NW), red beats (SW) and daikon (NE) as well as a center of
carrots and beats laden with marinara sauce. The contrast of the spicy
crunchy kale and the creamy-moist shredded veggies produces a heavenly
gustatory experience without any other earthly comparison. Ask for regular
nutritional yeast as toping. |
Dim sum is a vegetable dumpling of deliciously
mild flavors. Served on a bed of Mesclun green it comes with different
sauces. I ask for fat-free sun-dried tomato marinara that provided the right
support as did the included vegetable roll. It combined a filling of shredded
red beat and daikon with fresh whole mint leaves producing an unexpected
refreshing tangy bite. What a great combination of mild steamed dumplings and
raw spicy roll. This brunch (only on Saturdays
11a-4p) was rounded off with a cool mimosa and a side order of spicy kale
chips (my favorites). |
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Custom No-Fat Brunch Plate $12 (Izzy’s
spritzer 4.00) plus Tax (No Mimosa serving outside L) |
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Brunch Served |
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Chef
Frank Shadle offered to create a custom brunch platter
so that I would have some diversity in my no-fat a-la-carte orders. He prepared
a custom plate of cuscus with broccoli and a pickled vegetable roll on a bed
of Mesclun Green. This combination was just fabulous. The warm cuscus with
red bell pepper, shredded carrots and chives was joined with lightly steamed
broccoli rosettes. As compliment the pickled vegetable roll combined red cabbage,
kale greens and thinly shaven carrots, a great colorful and substantial
serving. For having some sauce to dip in the dry vegetables I ask for a
fat-free dressing like their carrot-ginger dressing but was provided only
with a nice paste-like vegetable salsa. (I would have given everything for my
fat-free Annie’s raspberry balsamic or Cindy’s pomegranate vinaigrette
dressings, which I unfortunately left at home with my Emergency Kit. L Next time I will remember! J ). |
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G Zen uses exclusively
Bridge Tofu A 3oz
serving is roughly 1/5 of a brick, i.e. a very small volume. Thus,
unfortunately tofu derived dishes might be well out of reach in a 10% fat
diet. (From
The Bridge website) |
Label: One serving = 3oz (85g).
Servings per container about 5.
The Bridge
is a Connecticut company in Middletown specializing in artesian tofu.
However, they cannot produce low-fat tofu (<1%) requiring steam treatment
of the rolled soy beans for fat extraction. |
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