Vikas Sharma

I learned many years ago from a Chinese friend that if I wanted vegetarian food in a Chinese or Vietnamese restaurant, I should ask for “jai” or “chay.”

When speaking to my Asian friends over the years, I’ve heard different answers about what jai means. Everything from “Buddha’s food” to “vegan.” I guess technically, there is no lacto-vegetarian in most Asian cooking, so jai would really mean vegan.

I can remember going for dim sum in Toronto’s Chinatown (the one in the west end on Spadina) many years ago, and there must have been ten carts that rolled by and every time I asked for jai, the servers shook their heads and kept going. I might have one or two available options.

My buddy Viet (who is Vietnamese) had a place on King West in Toronto called “Bac Ky” and they had fantatic veg options, which I find intriguing as I think of beef when I think of Vietnamese cooking. And I went there to eat quite a bit.

It can be hard to find truly “jai” Asian food sometimes because there can be fish sauces. I was speaking to an owner of a well known Thai restaurant and he said that it’s important to ask if seemingly vegetarian dishes are without fish sauce. Simply looking at the main ingredients isn’t enough.

So, in advance of me moving to Vancouver full-time, Sara booked us for three restaurants during Christmas week (and a bit after), one of which was Do Chay, which means “vegetarian things,” which has a location in Yaletown.

Without coming across as lazy, I’m not sure that I’ll go through dish by dish, but I can tell you that our strategy was to basically order everything (okay, maybe half of everything) on the menu and put aside the leftovers for a take-home box.

Highlight? The crispy spring rolls which were wrapped in greens, which I’ve never had that way before.

Lowlight? For Sara, it would have been the Yaletown roll, which is a fresh roll with zucchini, vermicelli, pickles, and herbs; she felt it was too salty.

We both felt that everything on the menu was good. The service was good. The atmosphere was very nice.

You want a good vegetarian lunch? Head to Do Chay.

Return: Sure, but maybe not for dinner.

Rating: 6/10