Friday, September 7, 2007

The Pure Luck Vegan Pub

A number of local bloggers have been raving about The (New) Pure Luck vegan pub on Heliotrope & Melrose, on our hip new "Hel-Mel" corner. Run by former Bicycle Kitchen volunteer Ben Ling, he bought out the former establishment this past May, which went under the same name, and had a soft opening leading up to the Bicycle Film Festival's block party at Hel-Mel in early July. The place serves up vegan versions of select Mexican and Asian dishes using plantains and jackfruit as a meat substitute, and aren't subjected to the overinflated prices you'd find at other vegan joints - everything is pretty affordable here. Their rosemary french fries are also a popular item, especially with the amazing selection of mostly microbrewed beer (Craftsman IPA, Fat Tire Ale, among others) on tap for just $4 a pint!

I'm not vegan - not by a mile - but I do like to eat healthy most of the time, so this adds to the choices out there. Plus, it's a great place to hang. Even Tai Kim of SCOOPS likes to drop by and hang out for breaks or after he closes down (TPL closes at midnight).

The Pure Luck was formerly a Korean-Chinese restaurant (which served HUGE portions -- I ate there in 2005 with five other friends and only ordered three dishes -- one of us still had to go home with a ton of leftovers), which had changed owners various times but still retained the name. Even before that (Circa '90s) it was an establishment known as the Mambo Cafe.


The Pure Luck
707 N. Heliotrope Drive

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

My brother is a server/cashier at Pure Luck. I'm a vegetarian which is awesome cuz sometimes we get discounts.
the food is realllyyyy good.
i love the sweet potato fries :]

Elsongs said...

You get a discount for being vegetarian? How do you prove that? Do you have a vegetarian ID card or something? :)