Times have changed. With growing awareness, it is now possible to find good vegan restaurants in almost any city. Although is a problem when you travel. In new cities like St Louis, it can be difficult to find a good vegan restaurant that caters to specific dietary restrictions, allergies, and cuisines. Finding a vegan restaurant may be downright impossible. No need to panic though, we’ve put together a list of tips and tricks that will help you find a vegan restaurant in almost any city. So here we go:

Use online apps and specialty websites — There are thousands of websites and apps that will find vegan restaurants in almost any city. For example, you may be in the mood for Chinese vegan. In that case, you can try websites like Happy Cow to locate restaurants in cities while traveling. Just put in the keyword ‘St Louis restaurant Chinese vegan,’ and the website will locate the restaurants in your city. Apps are even better as they use your location to find restaurants located close by. When you put in the keyword, the app will find and list restaurants according to location, cuisine, menu, costs, etc.

Ask Nicely — There are times when you will find it difficult to locate an exclusively vegan restaurant. In these cases, all you have to do is ask nicely. Many ethnic cuisines can modified easily to produce vegan food. Chinese cuisine, in particular, is quite easy to modify. If you check the menu, you will easily find dishes like vegetable soups, vegetable noodles, mix fried rice, spring rolls and other dishes that are exclusively vegan or vegetarian. If you aren’t sure about the ingredients, you can always chat with the server or the chef for recommendations.

Check special dishes — Restaurants always cook separate meals for their staff members. Most of these time, these dishes are low in salt and fat and they can quite easily be adapted to produce vegan dishes. If you don’t want to pay for this kind of staff food, you can ask the chef for special dishes. There is a chance that the chef may not know what you require. In this case, please specify the ingredients you cannot eat like sour cream, cheese, egg, fish broth, fish sauce, or chicken broth. Most chefs will be more than happy to provide special dishes or adapt staff food to suit your tastes.

Phone ahead — The term ‘vegan’ can be misunderstood. You may land up at a vegetarian restaurant that uses no meat but does use milk, clarified butter, sour cream, butter, and cheese in their dishes. This does not follow the vegan guidelines and you may have problems ordering your dishes. In this case, we do recommend that you call before you visit the St louis restaurant. By doing so, you know exactly what the restaurant has on the menu and you can also preorder items to be ready when you arrive. This is because the chef may have to prepare a separate dish for you and substituting ingredients may take time.

Eating out is supposed to be fun but it can be difficult if you follow a specific diet. For vegans specially, it can be difficult to find restaurants that follow specific vegan guidelines. The good news is that almost every restaurant is willing to create simple vegan dishes for guests. All you have to do is call beforehand, or discuss your requirements with the chef and they will adapt their cuisine to suit your tastes.