A restaurant where the kitchen is almost the same size as the dining room? That is right. Plant Base started as a lab, and a vegan think-thank for chefs to try the recipes before reaching higher flights. With a half a tone real Italian pizza oven, and a fully equipped kitchen, Plant base was thought to be a platform for new ideas, and a safe spot for vegan foodies to sample interesting food from all parts of the globe. Open for a little over one year, we have so far featured donuts, empanadas, poutines, pizzas, calzones, burgers, hot dogs, pastas, lasagnas, from different chefs, and we don’t plan to stop.Our model is simple: Chefs are welcomed to use our facilities to prepare their dishes during our closed hours, or just drop their miseenplace ready for us to serve when doors are opened. Our in-house chefs are in charge of finalizing the dishes and serving to the final customer. As an incubator, our idea is to save time and money from new entrepreneurs, giving them a chance to try their concepts before fully diving into their ideas. Our goal with that is to enlarge the landscape of vegan possibilities in Lisbon, while learning a thing or two along the way.
It all started in 2018, with 2 friends. Vinny used to run a popular hostel in town, and Mari, who had spent a big part of her life working for some of the coolest indie movie rooms in Lisbon, had just launched her food blog “My kitchen or yours”. At the time Vinny had just got back from a trip to London, where he had spent a week keeping his jaw from falling with the vast vegan landscape of the British capital.Inspired by the Full Nelson, Purezza, and the Temple of Seitan, both friends agreed that if they wanted to see a green- er Lisbon, far from animal exploitation, they needed more than the classic pricey boutique-ish, gourmet-ish Lisbon had to offer. Lisbon needed street food. Dirty, unpretentious and fun.
Coming up with delicious food for vegans and non vegans and tearing down the lame stereotype that vegans only eat salad became our obsession. We started working on burgers, mayos, and sauce recipes, until we found our first spot, a cute neighborhood cafe where
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