Red Bamboo
“And the restaurant is worth every single one for the buffalo wings alone – something i love and have been deprived of for too many years.”
“I tried the seitan jerk skewers as well as the coconut chicken and both were super duper great.”
“Wife ordered the Creole Soul Chicken and it was as good as advertised with a crazy good dipping sauce.”
Red Bamboo
Delivery: Yes
Take-out: Yes
Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
Bike Parking: Yes
Good for Kids: Yes
Waiter Service: Yes
Caters: Yes
PokéStop Nearby: Yes
Price range.
$$ Price range $11-30
8 reviews
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Red Bamboo was my first all vegetarian restaurant experience. I thought it was interesting that they do a soul food twist on the food.
Service was friendly. Very cozy inside.
Vegetable Tempura – $10.95 – Pretty standard. Good batter. My favorite thing I ate.
Southern Fried Chicken – $14.95
Creole Soul Chicken – $12.95
Cajun Fried Shrimp – $5.95
Very good tasting batter for the dishes. Sides that came with the dishes tasted fine. The "protein" resembled what it was supposed to, the shrimp even looked like shrimp but texture was impossible for me to get over. It had a rubbery bite that just threw me off. The taste was nothing like what the protein tastes like but it wasn't that terrible. Not everything tastes better fried.
I really wanted to enjoy it but it just didn't do it for me.
This is probably one of my favorite places of all time. It's really difficult to find good, satisfying vegan and vegetarian food. If I have to eat another salad or quinoa bowl one more time at a restaurant I'm going to fling myself out a window.
But this place, you get all the comfort foods you (used to) love in vegan/vegetarian form and it's amazing. When we went we ordered SO MUCH food and even though we had a ton of leftovers I still forced myself to eat the rest within a couple of hours just because it was so good I couldn't wait to be hungry again.
This is the kind of place we'll Uber 90 blocks to, and definitely a must for every visit we make to NYC.
I am reviewing based on my vegetarian wife's palate. I would be a carnivore if I could be, so I realize that I am biased.
She LOVES the chicken parm. It is cheesy and delicious.
The chicken wings are pretty cute; they really look like little drumsticks. The fibrous nature of them is appealing to her.
One thing that I really do like is the Cajan Fried Shrimp. It really tastes like fried shrimp, the texter feels really authentic which I enjoy. I feel like it may not be appealing to some vegetarians though.
Whether we eat in or carry out, the customer service is always fantastic.
For someone who is and has been a vegetarian their entire life (like me), this place was OK. For 23 out of 24 years of my life, I had never bothered to try anything that was "fake meat" aka veggie chicken, veggie steak, etc. The closest thing to fake meat I've ever had are veggie burgers (which I love) and veggie hot dogs.
With that being said, just looking at the menu itself baffled me. I understood that nothing in the restaurant was actual meat, but the menu options/titles frustrated me. We ordered a "Steak" Platter, "Chicken" Parmesan, BBQ Buffalo "Wings", and "Chicken" with Broccoli. The texture of the food was weird to me, and I felt odd eating something that looked exactly like the meat version of it. To be honest, they all tasted the same. They were seasoned differently according to the type of food it was supposed to be, but that was about it.
The place itself was insanely tiny, but the wait time was crazy. We waited 40 minutes because my friend raved about the place. Personally, I was not a fan. I think I will stick to my real vegetarian options going forward.
It's been waaaaaaay too long since I last came here but it's been approx 3 times…two of them during my pre-Yelp era. Years ago my best friend from high school was a vegetarian (is no longer, but she still avoids beef for the most part) and I've always been a carnivore (aside from being a rather picky eater overall, lol) so it was sometimes challenging to find places we could sit down in and do lunch or dinner at.
*Moves curtain to the left* Enter "Red Bamboo". She confessed to me that this was a vegetarian/vegan friendly restaurant…so friendly that they sell no actual meat here. After I pretend passed out and she used a spatula to peel me off of the sidewalk, she assured I would enjoy the faux meat here. I was VERY skeptical. Emphasis on VERY.
I opted for their Cajun-style southern fried soul "chicken" sandwich with fries. She got..well…she got something else, I'm pretty sure it was their teriyaki chicken…to be honest, I more remember what I got because each time I've gone I have ordered the same thing. I'm a creature of habit and a huge believer of "it it ain't broke, don't fix it".
So this soul "chicken" was freakin' amazing. Juicy, flavorful and has I not been told that there was absolutely no actual chicken worked into this I would have sworn up and down that it was maybe a chicken/tofu blend. But IT'S NOT. It's completely vegetarian.
I also had the pleasure of trying their "Death by Chocolate Chip" cake. Now, this was quite some time ago so I don't even know if this is a thing they still make/sell – but I hope it is because it was so insanely fluffy, moist and decadent that I couldn't believe it was vegan. No milk, special flour, special chocolate…this cake was special in an infinite number of ways. So, so, so good. Just to make it clear, it was really, really good cake, lol.
Ladies and gents, meat-loving Steph wholeheartedly endorses a veggies only restaurant. I've been meaning to come back because I have a different vegetarian friend and yeahhhh…I hope to come back soon to try their buffalo "wings" and more!
Came for an earlyish dinner with a friend. It didn't take too long to be seated without a reservation. The outside is unassuming but a few steps down is a casual, clean and not too cramped. Lighting is warm and slightly dim.
Ordered the portabella mushroom since I had a day of gorging myself on sweets and was craving something light and full of veggies. After a quick wait, I was served.
I was slightly confused because they dish had mushrooms in it but not didn't look portabella, but I went in and tasted it. There were chunks of textured protein which had a tough, chewy texture. From my vegetarian days, I was never big on fake meats because of how they're unsettlingly off in some dimension or reminded you of meat but never fully coming close to the texture, taste, appearance. Sadly that was also the case here, though the seasoning and mushroom gravy were really umami satisfying. The asparagus was crisp and nice to have, though the squash tasted like frozen and cooked.
It turns out they they mixed up my order and accidentally served me a different entree – the Dante's Cuisine. They asked if I was okay with sticking with the one I got or if I wanted the Portobello. Since, I wasn't feeling it I sent it rest back, felt bad about wasting food and having made another person wait.
They came back with the portabella mushroom dish about 10 minutes later. The entree consisted of chopped up and diced braised mushroom with other veggies and a small side salad. Tasted fresh, right amount of salt, but a little heavy on the balsamic.
The service was pretty good despite the mishap and quickly turned around my intended dish. They also took my soft drink off the tab too and I appreciated all the attempts to make it up.
So i'm always the one that likes to try new/odd things so when I saw southern fried chicken being offered in a vegan/vegetarian restaurant I just had to know how that would taste. The portion was quite large (it did say it was half a herb breaded veggie chicken with 2 drumsticks after all). I was impressed, they really did try to get it to the consistency of chicken…close but still not quite. I liked it but I think I liked my friend's Creole Soul Chicken better which is just chicken nuggets with sauce, mashed potatoes and steamed veggies.
My favorite dish of the night was the eggplant parm. Huge portion and delicious. A dish I would definitely re-order. Least favorite dish of the night had to be the soy beef (i think it was from the thai beef curry). The beef did not come close…had an odd consistency and tasted like….soy sheets. I was expecting something that tasted like the soy roast pork (fake cha shew) from buddha bodai..i was sorely disappointed. Our group also found the mashed potatoes awful and bland. You'd think a vegetarian restaurant would ace potatoes with flying colors but the fake chicken was definitely better than the real potatoes.
The service was great; friendly and attentive. For desserts the oreo cheesecake was better than the death by chocolate which was too sickeningly sweet. The death by chocolate slice was huge though.
When I think vegetarian, I always think tofu and greens. Boring right?
But then there's Red Bamboo who take vegetarian to the next level so they can present you with some amazing dishes.
Walking in, you'd think you're walking into some shady little basement in the village but no. It's actually a legit great eatery. I did feel that the maitre d may have been a little curt and not friendly at all which kind of put me off for a moment but I let it slide. I get that you're super busy but I am not at fault for that so treat me like you would if the place was empty.
There was about a 7 minute wait for our table even though we had reservations and our waitress brought us water and menus right away. We ordered the eggplant parm sandwich, steak and potatoes and other small eats. The steak was awful. Super chewy and not very edible. I thought I was eating rubber at some point. The potatoes were good and so was the eggplant parm. That was actually fantastic. The dessert cake we ordered was the highlight. So so good, I'd go back just to get a slice of that.
Prices are great and parking is super easy to find at night. Overall I enjoyed some of the food and would definitely go back and try some other dishes. It's the perfect eatery for vegetarians who would like to hang with meat eaters but they could enjoy it too.