Lebenbauer

Lebenbauer

One of my first evenings in the city was a dinner with friends including Babsi from Bejing. Since she had turned vegan during her time in China and Sylvia’s favorite Tibetan restaurant in Vienna was closed, we chose to accommodate her and tried a new place called Lebenbauer. The restaurant uses only whole foods and serves mostly vegetarian or vegan dishes. It has a few select meat and fish dishes on the menu but even these can be ordered vegan.

So all in all a very interesting concept. As you know I am very open-minded to all kinds of food as long as it is good. The cover charge (which was quite steep) included two kinds of spreads, both of them vegan. One tasted like processed cheese with paprika and the other one was so uninteresting that I forgot about it already. But to be fair I tried them both.

Then followed a “compliment from the kitchen”, again something vegan which I could taste right away. It should have been some kind of cold cucumber soup or so but the acidity of the yoghurt was missing. Soy just tastes a lot smoother. Next course for me were pickled summer vegetables with bocconcini, beautifully presented in a preserving jar. The taste and the mix of vegetables was not impressive. My friends tried different soups and seemed quite happy about them. But what would I know, I didn’t try them.

As a main course I ate stir-fried vegetables with or without meat, I can’t tell you anymore and I couldn’t recognize my dish from the attached pictures. It was definitely not memorable at all because the vegetables were far from being crunchy. For a restaurant that caters to the vegan/vegetarian crowd mushy vegetables are really a no-go. It’s the least I can expect at any restaurant. This review might not be fair because I am writing it two months after visiting the restaurant Lebenbauer but I still remember my annoyance with the main course.

Best course of the meal was surprisingly the desert, which we all sampled since one of us had a complaint (I can’t remember what anymore but it was certainly about the food) and the owner presented us each with a small dish of some cereal creme (that sounds awful which it wasn’t, I swear). It was lovely and creamy and even tough it looked totally bland it was very tasty. So never judge a book by its cover.

All in all I think this place might interest you if you are vegan (but even in that case you should rather go to Deli Bluem where you get better food for your money). Healthy doesn’t mean it cannot be tasty as well. Service was excellent though and I loved that tap water was served in Champagne bottles. Very stylish! Yours, Pollybert