(Green) Eating NYC: Top Veggie-Friendly Picks Around the City!

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With the weekend coming up, what better time for a post to help tourists, newcomers, and lifelong New Yorkers alike eat their (veggie-friendly) way around NYC? While I only moved back to the city at the end of this past spring, after a brief stint in Boston, I've cumulatively spent about three years living in New York.

To follow along on my adventures in real-time, follow me on Instagram @danaikadzere

In that time, I've had a lot of fun trying many different vegetarian, vegan, and veggie-friendly places in the city. Here's a list of my favorite standout places over the years - they're the ones I go back to and highly recommend!

Pure Ktchn

Location: 352 W 46th St
Price: $10-15 per meal
Great for: Quick healthy bite, vegans, a casual midtown dinner that won't weigh you down
My favorites: Their pure caesar salad!

Peacefood

Location: 460 Amsterdam Ave (uptown west) or 41 East 11th Ave (downtown)
Price: $15-20 per meal
Great for: Plantbased brunch, vegans, newbies to plantbased eating, and comfort food that's good for you!
My favorites: Raw sushi and the assorted veggies!

Hibino

Location: 10-70 Jackson Ave, Long Island City (there's another location in Brooklyn that's actually the original location, but I've never been)

Price: $15-20 per meal

Great for: Sushi, Fish, Pescatarians and omnivore/herbivore groups, a cute date night that won't break the bank

My favorites: Tsukemono, seaweed salad, and the salmon sushi!

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Review: Genuine Health Fermented Vegan Proteins+

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I'm not vegan and I'm actually not even vegetarian anymore - after 12 or so years of being strictly vegetarian, I'm now a pescatarian. That manifests itself as occasionally ordering salmon at a restaurant or, more frequently, enjoying sushi and sashimi. 

It's a recent change, but I've been positively surprised by how easily my body adapted to it! I have a sensitive stomach and worried it could cause me some pain, but my body has been happy having fish once or twice a week for the last month or two, since the switch to pescetarianism. Yay!

Still, I love vegetarian and vegan food and the vast majority of the time I still order vegetarian and vegan food when I'm out and still eat mostly vegetarian food at home. A mostly plantbased diet gives me energy, keeps my stomach and my skin happy, and just suits my tastes the best. Since most of my days are still vegetarian, I'm still always interested in learning about healthy plantbased sources of protein. 

So many protein bars and powders are full of ingredients that I wouldn't even want in a skincare product, much less in something I'm eating. Genuine Health is different - they're committed to creating products that are actually good for you. 

They're the self-proclaimed fermentation experts and the products in their fermented vegan proteins+ line feature fermented organic spirulina, fermented alfalfa, fermented mung bean sprouts, fermented organic quinoa sprouts, fermented pea protein isolate, fermented organic hemp, and fermented brown rice. I love that it's all stuff that I recognize as food!

Why choose fermented protein, especially when there are so few brands out there doing it? Easy - fermented plant protein is 40% better absorbed and utilized by the body than the same protein, unfermented. 

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Guest Post: 7 Tips for a Perfect Night of Sleep

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Sleep is SO important - I am not a pleasant person when I'm sleep deprived and I doubt many of us are! Luckily, there are several things we can do to improve our sleep and here's a guest post on how to do exactly that, from sleep expert Sarah!

Hi there! My name is Sarah and I'm a proud mother of two lovely children, Patrick and Anna. I'm passionate about helping people sleep better and am one of the editors at The Sleep Advisor blog.

Try These Seven Tips for a Perfect Night of Sleep

If you’re like me, you fall asleep like a baby every single night. I absolutely recognize that not everyone is quite as lucky, but I promise you that this wasn’t something that happened overnight. It took me a couple of weeks to get my environment and routines properly set up and adjusted for amazing rest. Here are my top seven tips for a perfect night of sleep:

1. Make your bedroom a soothing environment

If your bedroom is a soothing environment, your body will start to feel relaxed the moment that you walk through those doors each night. Try painting the walls a light soothing color like light blue, gray, or cream, and choose decorations that make you feel at peace for the best environment possible.  

You can also invest in some night-time accessories designed to help you get a better night’s sleep, like noise-cancelling headphones, a white noise machine, or even a diffuser and some essential oils.   Eucalyptus is the best if you have issues breathing at night, and lavender is the essential oil that provides the most relaxation and puts you to sleep swiftly.

2.     Limit your daily caffeine & alcohol intake

Caffeine is a substance that almost everyone recognizes as a stimulant, and something that’s in coffee or soda and good for a rough morning or when you need a pick-me up. It’s easy to convince people that caffeine should be avoided right before bed, but the truth is you should really limit your caffeine throughout the day to be able to sleep better at night, as it can linger in your system.   

The best thing to do is not drink caffeine at all after 3pm. As for alcohol, many people believe that alcohol is good to drink to be able to fall asleep more easily, and while this is true it actually doesn’t last — someone who falls asleep because of alcohol will wake up more frequently throughout the night and often not be able to go back to sleep later on. Also, both caffeine and alcohol are dehydrating for the body, and that can also cause you to wake up throughout the night and not sleep soundly.

3.     Follow a regular diet & exercise schedule

If you normally lay off the junk food, or avoid fried foods, you should keep that same diet each day. If you suddenly change the foods you eat on a daily basis, you can face heartburn or indigestion at night, which can prevent you from falling to sleep.  

Additionally, if you normally are used to exercising and suddenly change your schedule your body needs some time to adjust to that. The best thing to do is to do the same exact thing every single day, so your body knows what’s up and what’s appropriate for any given time or situation.

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