hometown tuesdays – bel air cantina

it’s the last day of vegan mofo! this month went by really quickly, and i’m pretty proud of myself for posting so much — a total of 29 posts, on 27 days this month! BUT, i am hella behind on my blog-reading… i don’t know about you, but i plan to play catch-up over the next several days, which probably means i’ll be the creepy weirdo suddenly commenting on a bunch of your posts all at once. sorry dudes.

also, i feel like a total jerkface, because i was twice(!)-nominated for a liebster award (once by soy division and once by banana curl vegan girl), but i was kind of treading water just to make my usual “theme days” during mofo, and i didn’t get to do the liebster thing. should i still do it anyway, even though mofo is technically over? i really hope they don’t think i’m an a-hole. i promise i’m not.

anyhow, for my last hometown tuesdays post, i’m featuring an established restaurant in milwaukee that is about to open their third location. bel air cantina first opened on the lower east side a few years ago, and we were really excited to learn that they had several vegan-friendly options on their menu. their rice and their black beans are both vegan, and they also offer several different taco/burrito fillings that are vegan or easily-veganizable (i.e., by holding the queso fundido or something obvious). their menu is tweaked on a near-constant basis, which gives me a bit of an eye twitch, but so far they haven’t taken away anything that i dearly love, so i’m trying not to sweat it.

yucatan tacos (marinated tofu, pineapple, corn & avocado salsa)

we frequent the lower east side location because: (a) it’s less than 3.5 miles from our house, (b) they have a super great patio during the warm weather months, and (c) their tacos are muy bueno. we have a friend who loves nachos as much as we love tacos, and the three of us have made somewhat of a habit of bel air lately. yum.

a little over a year ago, bel air opened a second location across town (in my sister’s neighborhood, nice!), and it’s been doing a swift business. hooray for spreading the love! then, earlier this summer, news broke that a local pizza place was going to close, and bel air was planning to plunk down their third location in its place. i flipped out pretty much immediately, because said vacancy is a mere 1.5 miles from our house. as in, easily walkable on a lovely fall day. y’all, i am about to experience a serious influx of guacamole, chips, and tacos.

 2 black bean & corn tacos; 1 soy chorizo & potato taco

there have been a few false starts as far as the opening date is concerned (translation: they have been toying with my emotions), but yesterday and today there have been some official-news-type reports, so i think it’s really real this time: they’re opening on monday! whee!!

thanks so much for reading my ramblings this month! i hope you had a lovely vegan mofo! ❤