Still in Dubai for work, but I think I’m doing pretty well food-wise! We did not go to Pizza UNO above, but I think it’s cool that even all the stores with English names have Arabic versions of the names and logos right next to it. This is actually the first country I’ve been to that has an alphabet with different letters than mine. We tried to suss out the breakdown of the English vs. Arabic of the sign above during out wait for a taxi. Maybe I’ll now the letters before I leave in October?
Luckily the people who brought us here have been very accommodating. For lunch I was given a stack of menus and told to choose. We went for Chinese. Noodles with veggies and fried veggies and tofu in sweet and sour sauce. I was trying to eat real food with the sweet and sour and didn’t realize it was fried, oops. Yummy though!
Pineapple and coconut milk virgin colada (there is no alcohol served at any of the restaurants in the mall).
We went to California Pizza Kitchen at a nearby mall for dinner to escape the hotel food. Seriously, with some minor differences here and there, being in Dubai is so similar to being in America. Funnily enough, I had never been to California Pizza Kitchen in the States. It was pretty easy to get something vegan here, I didn’t even have to alter stuff. Above is some smoky tomato-corn soup with tortilla chip slivers on top.
Here is a salad with avocado, sun-dried tomatoes, lots of other veggies and a balsamic-Dijon vinaigrette. I wasn’t a huge fan of this, but at least I got some non-fried veggies in, as we’ve been eating a lot of fast-food.
My hotel has soymilk so for breakfast I managed to get a nice oatmeal made with soymilk, which I topped with slivered almonds, golden raisins and other toppings from the cereal bar. It was probably my favorite meal of the day, more tomorrow! I even got a soy latte. Not bad.
I stay at hotels very rarely as I tend to be super frugal when I travel and only end up in a hotel when a flight gets canceled or for work. I’ve been surprised the last couple times by how veggie-friendly they’ve been, way more than I remember going on trips when I was younger. The hotel I got put in after Hurricane Sandy trapped me in London also had soymilk and even veggie sausages!
What about you? How do you stay healthy during business trips or similar? Any good vegan-fu stories about things you’ve created from the hotel food bar? Horror stories about no vegan options on a group trip for work (or fun)? Let’s hear ’em!
Any vegan tips for Dubai? Please give a shout if you’ve been!
I didn’t think that there was alcohol anywhere.
No, you can get it in hotels. As such, all clubs and bars are somehow affiliated with a hotel as far as I’m aware. haven’t had a chance to check one out, but there is alcohol in the hotel I’m staying at!
Mmm, that colada looks divine!
My mocktail of choice! Also the not mocktail version, but the whole limited alcohol thing makes it difficult here, and really, and who wants to mess with the taste of coconut milk and pineapple juice anyway?!