The V.V. Vegan Fried Chicken Showdown 🍿, Battle 2: Chickpea & Olive vs. Sol Sips

I’ve appreciated the burger wizardry of Chickpea & Olive for many years… and was excited to try Sol Sips, an all-vegan eatery in Bushwick owned by a 23 year old that has a lot of buzz. But this is a vegan victuals food battle! It’s the food that does the heavy lifting here! So let’s get to it.

Contender 1: Chickpea & Olive

Chickpea & Olive’s ChK’N Fried Tofu Sandwich is the real thing. Thick, crunchy fried tofu that is… perfect. The tofu is not just wet and white, but texturous and in a loving and symbiotic relationship with its thick breading (i.e. They don’t just abandon each other like separate entities upon first bite.) And you can choose 1 or 2 pieces on your sandwich. My one piece was hot and crispy (important!), along with a cold tomato (important!), some lettuce and buttermilk ranch. And I went on about their buns in my Burger Challenge plenty. I have absolutely no criticisms for this fried chicken sandwich. I know, right?!

So darn good! And you get to pick your sauce to correspond with your heat requirements.

Look at that textured tofu. I feel like they must do that freeze technique.

They are going to be very difficult to beat. Now… and later.

Contender 2: Sol Sips

Sol Sips has a Chick’n & Buiscut [sic] [Also, I’ve always wanted to have cause to type that.] sandwich that consists of fried oyster mushrooms on a delicate and flakey chia seed and turmeric biscuit smeared with raspberry and rosemary jam. Inventive and I appreciate that! What I don’t appreciate is the off-putting and cringingly histrionic conversation two hipsters were having very loudly in the small space. It was an introvert’s nightmare and most assuredly impacted my tolerance level.

I like the sandwich but have a lot of constructive feedback. In order of importance: fried oyster mushrooms were hard to chew through. So when you took a bite the entire colony of mushrooms had to join the ride to your mouth. They also were bland and in need of a period of time in a marinade. That’s the thing with mushrooms. They serve a textural purpose, but can make things bland as they are 90% water. I liked the idea of the raspberry jam but it wasn’t really a jam. It lacked a tart sweetness or any kind of sweetness actually! Though it was a beautiful color contrast with the turmeric biscuit, which I loved, though the ratio of biscuit to mushroom was off.

I look forward to checking out more of their offerings! But this battle goes to…

🍿 Winner-Winner Vegan Chicken Dinner: Chickpea & Olive!

How will Chickpea & Olive fare against Bay Gyal Vegan‘s oyster mushroom-based Country-fried ChickUn? You’ll have to wait through two more battles, then the round 1 winners face off again! 🥊

Up next will be Orchard Grocer‘s Friday special, the Chick’n Tofu, and the seitan-based Vegan Fried Chicken Sandwich from Clean Meals Brooklyn. But Clean Meals is a delivery service slash pop-up with not too much information available on their web spots. I may just have to finish up my Bao Super Bowl until there’s something organized.