Vegans in Miami

We went to Miami last weekend and had an AMAZING time! We traveled for “work” but fit in lots of leisure too (which for us is essentially just amazing vegan food, lots of plants, and time with our pups). To learn more about some of the best ALL vegan eateries, how to travel with 3 pitbulls in tow (in a county with a “pit-bull ban”), visiting some of the best plant nurseries and edible plant sites, AND - added bonus, we always share how we manage to fit so much crap in the prius (because we also had my entire art display with us for a festival). YES.. it was an awesome trip, and we can’t wait to go back in the future!

I signed up for a bucket list event that I’d always wanted to attend as a visitor, AND only dreamed of attending as an art vendor. VEGANDALE - the largest growing vegan festival in North America. The event was set for May 21st in Miami, so we headed down a few days early with our dogs to explore, “vacation”, and eat our hearts out in a city with some of the best vegan food!

So my top recommendation for a place to stay anywhere across the US if you’re on a budget and are traveling with multiple pets is always going to be a La Quinta. With competitive pricing in any area to a lower end motel, but with cleanliness and comfort of something a bit higher end than your typical motel, we haven’t yet been disappointed by one. The ones we have stayed at when traveling also allow more than the usual 2 pets per room, with no size/breed restrictions, AND do not require any extra charge or fee for the pets stay. (This being said, each La Quinta may have their own rules about pets so please check each location’s policy and call ahead before staying to be sure!)

We stayed at the La Quinta near the Miami airport. Affordable, and pretty central to all the places we planned to explore on our trip. We had some hesitations about bringing our 3 pitbulls to Miami - the only county in Florida with BSL (breed specific legislation - a very outdated and ineffective way to promote public safety by “banning” certain breeds of dogs), but talked to a few people before traveling that said plenty of pits live in Miami-Dade without issue. Since ours are well-behaved and we initially did not plan to bring them around town, we weren’t too worried. Our hotel did ask us to write down the breed of dogs staying with us in our room and we just wrote lab mixes, since that’s what their shelter paperwork says. We also always travel with our dogs’ crates - they’re crate trained, and although they are not destructive, we always crate them when traveling to ensure no accidental damage or issues in the room, especially if someone were to come in to clean or something. La Quintas are wonderful though because they do NOT enter or clean your room during your stay unless you request it (which is much better than other places we’ve stayed since covid that have strict cleaning policies).

Anyway - on our first day, we made some stops along the way at well recommended nurseries on the way into Miami. We stopped at Pinders and Perfect Choice Nursery. Pinders is in Palm City and is great nursery/garden center with lots of landscaping plants, gorgeous houseplants, and a variety of favorites and rare finds including alocasias/colocasias, calatheas, philodendrons, and so much more. Perfect Choice is just North of Miami and is a MUST stop for rare plant lovers as they have every rare aroid and houseplant, plus extraordinary displays and beautiful plant rooms.

After our nursery explorations and a pit stop for the pits to pee, we arrived, checked in, and unloaded the car with all my art stuff, dog crates, and miscellaneous crap we brought and got settled in the room. Walked the pups and headed out to find some dinner! Searching for vegan restaurants was not at all difficult, but the decision making process was because there are so many to choose from. The Happy Cow App or visiting Happycow.net is my go to for finding vegan eats in any area. You can search fully vegan restaurants, vegetarian, or ones with veg options. You can also search bakeries, markets, etc. so it’s pretty helpful when traveling to new places and looking for food options. This brought us so many overwhelming options, but we were in the mood for Italian on our first night so we tried Ittle Litaly. 

Little Italy is in the Coral Gables area and had free parking out back. A small but intimate place to dine (also very cold, bring a sweater!). Food was delicious, would highly recommend! We shared the Funghi Ripieni, Angry Meatballs and a calzone. They were all delicious, but as a calzone lover I feel the calzone was more bread than filling and not the best one I’ve ever had. The appetizers were out of this world though!

We then drove around Wynwood area to admire some of the murals and try Nabati ice cream! When we aren’t traveling we usually eat WFPB most of the time at home (whole food plant based — so healthy with minimal processed foods and we avoid sugars and oils) so we do tend to gravitate towards healthier delicious options of food when traveling. This ice cream place was just that.. all vegan, no processed sugars, all SUPER wholesome ingredients and really unique flavors, we absolutely fell in love with the ice cream we got. We got a scoop of yuzu (Asian Mandarin), rose goji pistachio, and golden scoop (turmeric blend that tasted like a golden latte). Obsessssssed!

We headed back to our hotel to watch bad TV movies and cuddle with the dogs after taking them on a long walk. The next day there were storms in the forecast so we decided to bring Manny with us since he has really bad storm anxiety and we knew he’d freak out if left in the room. Our first stop was Love Life Cafe in Wynwood — I popped in first to see if it was ok to bring Manny with us to sit in the outdoor patio area and their response was “of course.. dogs are allowed on the patio AND inside too, this is a vegan cafe after all so we really love pets!” They immediately won me over. We parked on the street (easy to find parking) and brought Manny inside the restaurant where he was excited to be included in our outing and was very calm and behaved. We ordered a Wynwood salad, and what was voted as “the best veggie burger” (I was skeptical) but let me tell you.. this was BY FAR.. the BEST veggie burger I have ever had. Outstanding. The salad was wholesome, filling and tasty too. We rounded it all out with a blue magic ice cream sandwich, and similarly to Nabati ice cream, Courtney’s Cookies are made with completely wholesome, processed sugar-free, and natural ingredients. Best ice cream sandwich I’ve ever had. Love Life Cafe is voted one of Miami’s best restaurants for a reason.. make sure you check them out!

We wandered around Wynwood a bit to explore some more murals and check out the town and then headed to Historic Virginia Key Beach Park where our Vegandale event was taking place the following day. We checked in and worked on some of our set up before enjoying the beach area at the park with Manny!

We then headed to Geicha69 for some vegan sushi! They’re located in Brickle and have free valet parking at the hotel next door. Also, unexpected, as we were about to find seating outside they invited us and Manny inside for fine dining and quickly provided Manny with a water bowl and even offered him food. Their owner and chef are Israeli and vegan and make amazinggggg food! Their whole menu is Asian-inspired sushi and Mediterranean. We got an Israeli pastry filled with vegan cheese, a sushi roll (I forget what was in it but we picked four fillings including a rare root veggie we never tried before, some cream cheese and other tasty vegetables), and an incredible sushi bowl with their homemade vegan “salmon”, a vegan “tuna” and a “spicy tuna”. This place is still new and trying to get the word out about their restaurant, so please go check it out, especially if you love sushi! Everything on their menus is fully vegan and will not disappoint!

We couldn’t end the night without dessert, so we headed to Coral Gables for some vegan croissants from L’artisane Creative Bakery. We got there just before closing, and like the other places, they surprisingly invited Manny to come inside the bakery (three for three - all the food establishments we visited for the day invited a pitbull inside despite the county having a pitbull ban). This place has won countless awards for their delicious and creatively made vegan French pastries (yes everything is completely vegan!). We got a pistachio & apricot croissant that was SOOO good, and then decided we needed another and wanted to try a creme brûlée. They were ready to close for the night and gave us a couple of extra treats for free even when we tried to pay for them. Eating these blew my mind and I wish I could eat these every single day. If you only stop at one place on our list when you’re in Miami, please go here for a treat!

We found out that Courtney’s Cookies, the baker who made the ice cream sandwich we bought at the cafe earlier in the day, actually has a pop up in Coral Gables on certain weeknights and it was right around the corner! So obviously we walked there, and I got myself a raspberry vanilla sandwich which was just as delicious as the blue magic one we had in the morning. We got back to the hotel, more long walks for the babes, and another night in watching movies before waking up early for Vegandale the next day!

We got up super early to go arrive and set up at Vegandale. We set up our booth, and had an amazing (and HOT) long day eating tasty foods and selling art.

After the festival was over we grabbed dinner at Della Bowls which was right near our hotel. We then got a good night’s sleep before our last full day in Miami! The next day we went to what might be my favorite place, Aquacate Sanctuary of Love! Aguacate has yoga classes, a juice bar, a delicious full food menu (everything healthy, wholesome DELICIOUS), a sanctuary of rescued animals (I will comment and say they have a lot of animals for such a small space but it’s obvious the animals are cared for and the sanctuary is doing their very best for them), a farm with home grown food and a farmers market, and a whole outdoor plant shop. We visited the animals, bought some out of this world delicious food, and bought some plants. If I was a local I would go here ALL the time, please go check out this amazing oasis in the middle of South Miami.

We next headed to a few more plant nurseries on our way down to our destination at the Fruit and Spice Park in Homestead. Isaac’s Nursery was a great place for succulents with endless incredible options - if you love succulents you must check them out. We also stopped at Casa Planta which was a garden center with a nice variety of plants including rare finds - we picked up some plants at both places and enjoyed wandering and shopping for a bit.

And although it’s always about the journey more than the destination for us when traveling - our goal for the day was to end up at Fruit and Spice Park - a county park with tons of edible plants that you can eat from. We enjoyed all the stops along our way but were so excited for this adventure to wander the grounds and explore so many edible plants and fruit trees! Depending on what is in season there will always be new things fruiting and anything and everything that has ripened from a tree and fallen to the ground is fair game to eat. If we lived in Miami we 100% would go here ALL the time! If you love fruit and enjoy trying new things, this park is a must next time you’re in Miami!

We wrapped up our Homestead visit by going to Robert is Here - our favorite tourist trap fruit stand we’ve visited every time we’ve been down this far in south Florida over the years. Their fruits are pretty overpriced but it’s an opportunity to find and try almost every type of exotic fruit you’ve probably never heard of before. My favorite thing there is the smoothies! They have milkshakes too but the smoothies are dairy free - literally just ice and your choice of up to 3 exotic fruits they have there that are blended fresh into the smoothie. It’s a good value and delicious, without added sugars or ingredients (you can add cane sugar or other sweeteners if you’d like though!) We got a guanabana and canistel blend - two hard to find exotic fruits. Delicious! On our way home we stopped at Vegan Cuban Cuisine to grab dinner to go which we had later in the room when we were hungry again - so delicious!!! They have fast food style Cuban deliciousness and it’s all vegan. We also stopped at Bunnie Cakes for vegan cupcakes for dessert.

Finally it was our last day in Miami and we had to pack up the car to go home. Dog crates, art stuff, lots of plants… and finally the dogs. It was a process but we (mostly Josh) has mastered the process by now and we had a safe and fun trip home! The trip was filled with good food (can you tell we are foodies?), cool plants, lots of exploring and fun. I’m so grateful for my artist life that affords me the time and luxury of going to cool new places and exploring them as we go! The bonus is we have 3 big dogs that are friendly and love to travel as much as we do. I hope if you plan a trip to Miami you check it out and explore some of the cool places we got to go to :)