Rob Inderrieden

Dosa at Mayura

There are as many kinds of dosas as there are moms in South India -- which is to say, a lot. This Indian breakfast and snack food is a thin, crispy crepe made from a lightly fermented batter of ground rice and lentils. The batter is ladled onto a hot griddle and then quickly spread to paper thinness by circling the ladle on the griddle in ever-expanding circles. A homemade dosas might be the width of a dinner plate; a restaurant or street-vendor dosa could be the length of your arm.

A dosa is eaten by hand -- tear off chunks with your thumb and first finger of your right hand while anchoring the dosa with the other three fingers. While plain dosas were used for comparison's sake here, there's no need to limit yourself: They come wrapped around spiced potatoes (masala dosa), spread out even larger and thinner (paper dosa), made out of a wheat batter (rava dosa) and in many more variations. Turn the page for our five favorites.

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Christine Chiao

Red chili oil wontons at Bean Sprouts Restaurant

Taiwanese cuisine has gained recognition for its street food, night market eats, and even beef noodle soup, but what might be overlooked is the accessibility of vegetarian fare throughout the island. A Jan. 13, 2011, article published in CommonWealth Magazine reported that flexible vegetarianism becoming a greater part of of the average Taiwanese diet has led to a greater variety of options. The options as a result can range from upscale restaurants to convenience stores with "a wide array of meat-free selections."

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Sotto Restaurant

Chickpea panelle at Sotto

The sensibility of Zach Pollack and Steve Samson's Pico-Robertson restaurant Sotto is clearly laid out on their menu. Take the appetizer of chickpea panelle, a traditional Sicilian street food, which has been available at the Southern Italian restaurant since it was opened in 2011.

"They're basically chickpea fritters. They're really easy to make, but they're also really easy to screw up. It's one of those things that you have to have patience with. It might not come out as well as you would like the first time, but you'll get it if you keep trying," Samson says.

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Christine Chiao

Burmese Gin Thoke Melon Salad

A three-week trip to an ashram in the Indian town of Ahmednagar in 1981 shifted Susan Feniger's (Street, Top Chef Masters, etc.) aesthetic and approach as a chef. Before then, her professional purview was almost exclusively located within traditional French restaurants on the East coast to the West, including Ma Maison in Los Angeles with then-chef Wolfgang Puck.

"I was completely blown away by the flavors. It really changed the direction of my palate and what I was drawn to," says Feniger. "I loved the whole culture. It was my first introduction to bangles and I've worn a million bangles of all different styles ever since then. I'm still drawn to those colors too, like turmeric, cayenne and cumin."

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Anthony Albright via flickr

Last week, the news came out that nearly half of all meat in the US is contaminated with superbugs. Unsurprisingly, this information was met with a huge reaction, and much of the chatter was around whether the abundance of grossness in our country's meat supply was a reason to give up eating meat altogether.

"April 17, 2013: the day I became vegetarian," tweeted Brett in response to our story about the contamination. "Gross. Another great reason to be vegan." tweeted @DrivingFrank. We got a lot of other responses that were similar.

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Hope Lee

faux shrimp at Soho Thai

Lomita is known for two things -- a railroad museum and as the place where Olympian Jim Thorpe died -- and veganism isn't one of them. But thanks to Soho Thai Fusion Bar & Grill, that might change.

Soho's menu features a "Vegan Zone," which includes soy chicken, soy shrimp fish, soy crab, soy salmon and tofu steak. These items can be substituted into any of the eatery's "regular" meals, with a handy reassurance that you aren't getting animal flesh because the menu states that these dishes contain "No Meat, No Fish, No Poultry, No Eggs, No Milk, No MSG, No Fish Sauce, No Animal Products."

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Alyssa Tembrina Photography

Turmeric-spiced yellow split peas

Becky and Kedist Tsadik's Ethiopian supper club Bereket began as a class assignment. In her second year of business school at UCLA, Kedist, 29, drew up plans for an upscale Ethiopian restaurant and entered the campus international food festival for empirical research. Her food kiosk ended up winning the best food category at the festival.

"I saw firsthand the reaction people had to food that I was used to eating all the time. The reaction was so exciting and overwhelmingly positive. People wanted to know why they haven't had this before. The line never stopped and we sold out. Everyone was talking about Ethiopian food," says Kedist.

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Christine Chiao

Artichoke flatbread; recipe by Danny Elmaleh

When creating new dishes for sbe restaurants Cleo and Mercato di Vetro, Danny Elmaleh leads a team of four in search of something that gives what he calls a pop of flavor. This can come from anywhere: an herb, a certain spice, or one in the range of vinegars they are experimenting with. It's an ingredient capable of cutting through everything but bringing it all together at the same time -- the kind of culinary paradox.

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Anuar Pinto Velasco

Vegan pate at BLD

A vegan pâté, or any charcuterie not reliant on meat either faux or real for that matter, is not commonly found as a regular menu item at restaurants in Los Angeles. That may be why the smoked mushroom vegan pâté at BLD on Beverly Boulevard was met with wariness at first.

"Initially, when we first launched it, there were a lot of people who were a little hesitant. So I tried to give out samples to bring people in," said Lewis Chan, the restaurant's chef de cuisine.

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A. Broder-Hahn

beets at Coastal Organics

This week we ask Chris Reynoso, sous chef at Tavern in Brentwood. He's waiting for the elevator and pulling a cart loaded with boxes of produce.

"This whole bottom layer is just beets, red ones from Coastal Organics and yellow from Jimenez," Reynoso says. "We just roast them really simply and dice them for our vegan Cobb salad. It's got, really, all the vegetables, squash, beets, avocado ..."

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