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These memorable vegan eateries are worth the trip.
San Antonio’s vegan scene surprised me with its accessibility and variety. During my visit in December 2024, I never seemed far away from something good to eat.
These four restaurants and restaurateurs impressed me with their ethical commitment to the food they serve. All took a chance in the notoriously volatile and low-margin dining world by following their convictions and opening their restaurants. Plus, I want to eat at all of these places again.
Pharm Table
Ten years ago, Elizabeth Johnson quit her steady job teaching Latin American cooking at the Culinary Institute of America to open Pharm Table. The concept — Ayurvedic food as medicine, but with a Texas spin on things — is pretty out-there for San Antonio. But the restaurant has already lasted a decade, offering unusual dishes that draw from India and Latin America, while incorporating superfoods and fermentation.
“Pharm Table is the conduit that I use to try to heal people with food,” Elizabeth tells me as she sits on the patio one December evening, staying warm by an outdoor heater. “And try to raise awareness about food waste and treating the Earth in a better way. Working directly with regenerative farmers and really trying to reduce our carbon footprint.”
You won’t find dairy or gluten at Pharm Table. “I’m trying to reduce the major culprits of inflammation in the modern diet,” she says. “So I just focus on plants and then clean, sustainably sourced animal proteins.”
I tried things I’d never had before here, such as a dandelion cappuccino and an ice cream sandwich made with black tahini mesquite chocolate chip cookies and coconut mesquite gelato (more please). Elizabeth’s pineapple-sweetened molé sauce over sweet potato and mushrooms was a standout. I appreciated the wellness section of the drink menu, with mocktails like an aloe-rita and many fresh juices.
Elizabeth is serious about combating food waste, diverting many ingredients from the compost. She juices collard stems to add to green curry and repurposes turmeric and ginger pulp for ceviche. Water left over from roasting beets is used to flavor rice, and beet scraps find their way into beet bordelaise.
This year Pharm Table is expanding into the San Antonio airport, which is going to improve airport dining by 1000%.
Plantaqueria
Plantaqueria is one of the more delicious things to spring from the Covid pandemic. Sofia Renteria started in 2020 by making vegan tamales in her apartment and selling them on Instagram. That led to a few pop-ups, and then a brick-and-mortar location in 2023. The bright and cheery fuchsia and yellow walls remind me of Mexico, and the restaurant’s downtown location by the Alamo makes it a good lunch spot for sightseers to rest their weary feet.
“We try to do a lot of south Texas favorites, but all plant-based, of course,” Sofia tells me while taking a break after the lunch rush. Customers love her La Lucha breakfast tacos, made with soy chorizo and vegan egg and cheese. My jackfruit barbacoa quesadilla was satisfying after a morning of biking between missions.
“I grew up cooking,” she says. “I was a girl in a Hispanic family, so that’s just expected of you.” When she started to eat plant-based, she adapted traditional recipes. But it took a while for her family to understand her new way of eating. “There was a lot of making fun of me at first.” I nodded — I’m frequently the butt of my own family’s tofu-phobic jokes. “I grew up with very few vegetables, right? So in a Hispanic diet, it’s potatoes, jalapeños, tomato, onion. Those are the only veggies that you know.” She recalls being mystified the first time she saw an artichoke in real life.
Sofia has seen the demand for plant-based food in San Antonio grow over the last few years. And she’s thrilled when relatives now ask her to bring Plantaqueria food to family gatherings. “That’s really why we exist — to show people what vegan food can be.”
Green Vegetarian Cuisine
“When we opened in 2007, we were the only show in town,” Mike Behrend tells me as we sit at a table at Green Vegetarian Cuisine, San Antonio’s first vegan restaurant. It has a casual diner feel and is known for a big menu that offers both healthy dishes and vegan junk food, as Mike calls it. But even his top-selling take on a chicken-fried steak — a regional favorite he makes with Beyond meat — is a little healthier by replacing the usual fried okra side dish with kale salad. A light and crispy eggplant parmigiana and burritos made with beefless strips and doused in Korean sauce are two other signature dishes. Then there are the pan-sized cinnamon rolls. I brought one home in my carry-on and could barely lift my bag into the luggage rack.
Mike has spent his whole life working in restaurants. In 2005, after seeing a dog get hit by a car, he became a vegetarian. “It just reminded me how precious life is, even for animals,” he says. He no longer wanted to cook and serve animals in a restaurant. Religious and stewardship reasons supported his commitment. “It’s definitely better for the environment,” he says. “And it’s not good for you whatever your beliefs are to continue doing something that you know is bad.”
Opening San Antonio’s first vegetarian restaurant was a leap of faith. It hasn’t always been easy, but Green Vegetarian Cuisine has been in business for 18 years. And some of San Antonio’s newer veg restaurateurs got their start by working for Mike.
HASH Vegan Eatery
After a sometimes-rough childhood, brothers Roger and Mike Sanchez both cleaned up their acts and got sober. The introspection and mindfulness of their recovery led to an interest in vegetarianism and animal welfare as they considered the interconnectedness of all species. Mike was partially inspired to give up meat because of his young son’s love of herbivorous dinosaurs. In 2020, they opened HASH (Heal and Spread Healing), a vegan restaurant and sober bar serving San Antonio’s mostly Latino and not-so-affluent South Side.
“I remember being really annoyingly loud about my lifestyle and drinking and using drugs and stuff like that,” Roger tells me as I sit with the brothers in their restaurant on a Monday afternoon. The stacks of board games and mishmash of artwork make it feel like we’re hanging out in a cozy clubhouse. “And then what happens a lot in recovery is people want to be like, real reserved and stuff, which is fine. But I’m a very loud and outgoing-type person. So in recovery, I wasn’t going to change that. Recovery saved my life. I’m not going to be shy about it.” A portrait of their beloved mother, Cynthia Ann Sanchez, hangs over the door. She died of cirrhosis and her sons work to keep her memory alive.
This loud approach to recovery led them to open the bright blue and pink HASH on South Flores Street, the main corridor leading to the South Side. HASH Vegan Eatery serves as a community center. It hosts regular game nights, clothes drives, and dollar taco nights to clothe, feed, and bring people together in an uplifting atmosphere.
And the food is really good, too. The Sanchez brothers draw on their careers in hospitality, including a stint at Green Vegetarian Cuisine. HASH’s menu includes waffles, wraps, sandwiches, breakfast burritos, and Mexican specialties. “One of my biggest compliments I ever get is when the little Mexican grandmas come in here just because it’s a restaurant,” Roger says. “They try my pozole, and they’re like, oh, that’s so good. They don’t even know that it’s vegan.” I concur with the Mexican grandmas. That is some darn good pozole.
Honorary Mentions
The plant-based eating doesn’t stop with these four restaurants. Many places in San Antonio have healthy and/or vegan options. A few more favorites during my stay included Vegan Avenue, with good salads and veg Mexican food, the massively sugar-filled cinnamon rolls at all-vegan Cinnaholic, and Revolucion for juices and smoothie bowls.
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RECIPE: Squash Coconut Moqueca
- Yield: Serves 5
Description
Soups are a great way for us to use trim in the restaurant. We can go through a pile of veggies that are reserved for stock and usually come up with enough ingredients to make a soup.
Ingredients
- 1/2 yellow onion, julienne
- 1 Tbsp minced fresh ginger
- 1 Tbsp minced fresh turmeric
- 1/4 cup unsweetened coconut flakes, plus more for garnish
- 2 qts water, divided
- 2 cups seasonal squash, roughly chopped (peel if using winter squash)
- 1 cup sweet potato, steamed, skin removed
- Himalayan salt, to taste
- Lemon or lime juice, to taste
- Toasted pepitas, for garnish
Instructions
- Using an electric pressure cooker, sauté the onion, ginger, turmeric, and coconut flakes with 1 cup of the water until soft. Add the squash, sweet potato, and remaining water.
- Pressure cook on manual setting for 8 minutes. Release the steam and allow it to cool.
- Blend the ingredients from the pressure cooker until smooth. Season with salt and lemon or lime juice to taste.
- Garnish with toasted pepita seeds and unsweetened coconut flakes, and serve warm.
Notes
Read about Pharm Table and other plant-based dining options in San Antonio.
RECIPE: Detox Seed Tea
- Yield: Makes 2 quarts dry tea 1x
Description
After making tea, the seeds can be recycled in stocks and bone broth.
Instructions
- Dry toast each seed individually on the stove top.
- Place the toasted seeds into a container and cool.
- To make, steep in hot water for 3 minutes.
Notes
Dry tea keeps for 60 days in a sealed glass container.
Read about Pharm Table and other plant-based dining options in San Antonio.
You seriously missed out on the best vegan restaurant here in San Antonio — VivaVegeria. The mushroom chicharron tacos will change your life.