Horizons

Horizons was phenomenal every time I went! I could definitely go vegan if these chefs prepared all my meals :)
Unfortunately, this establishment is now closed. However, when I went in early summer, our server said they will soon [early Fall] be opening a new place further in town. Not sure if it will have a vegan/​vegetarian focus, but it’ll probably be delicious!

I’m going to make this short and sweet because as we all know they closed down.
This was a great places for vegetarians and a lot of us will morn the loss of such an amazing vegetarian restaurant.
Their food was thoughtful and unique and I’m not sure that anything else will ever compare. The drinks were pretty amazing too!
I will probably never have better bbq seitan, but I am really looking forward to Vedge opening and trying them out.
Oh and I put them at 4 stars because the service was truly horrible the week they were closing, which is to be expected, but still not pleasant.

What am I gonna do without your golden beets?
I keep thinking about the grilled seitan too. I’m a fan of seitan, but I’ve never ever had it so good. I’m thinkin about it piled atop the yukon mashed potatoes, spinach, and horseradish cream. A little red pepper tapenade up on ya… I’m telling you, it was so good. Nicely charred, juicy, flavorful seitan… I couldn’t shut up about it to my husband when he came home later that night. It was wrong of me. It really could come off like bragging.
I told him that if that if seitan of that caliber was made from an animal, I would hunt, kill and eat that animal everyday. It was supposed to be a high compliment, but certainly is just yet another insane thing to say.
Every single taste was delicious. The eggplant and cauliflower braciole was delectable covered in herby salsa verde, the wood-​roasted maitake mushroom dish was amazingly rich and creamy, without cream… how do you do it? Smoky mushroomy goodness! More cauliflower is more better so some crispy cauliflower and pickled ramps were in order as well. Delicious. Everything. Delicious. Cheesecake? Delicious!
I kept repeating over and over how Horizons provides the best vegan food that I’ve ever had. It’s beyond that though. It’s just some of the best food ever. Beautifully prepared, gorgeous, satisfying, flavorful… All vegetables, all foods should be celebrated this well.
It was a great meal. I was in great company too. That means you, Blake and Adrienne :). I love sharers! Thanks wise Blake F. for this brilliant dinner plan. Had to hit up Horizons one more time…
I think I’m gonna have to get the Horizons cookbook. What am I gonna do without those beets, I asked you?!
I will follow (stalk, whatever) these chefs’ cooking. I will.
Now I’m looking out the window, across the street at Horizons. While my gaze is still incredibly creepy, it’s also tinged with sadness… I’M GONNA MISS YOU HORIZONS!

i done took my own advice and got back here for dinner last nite (just 4 days left, people!!) and am soooo glad i did.
on this visit, my dining companions — Unilocaler kathleen D and the soon-​to-​be-​yelping adrienne V — and i decided to do something unusual for all of us: we ordered 2 of the SAME app for sharing! crazy, i know, but after eying it up on another table and hearing kathleen sing its praises, we knew that just one order of the salt roasted beets split 3 ways wouldn’t be enough, especially without a future opportunity to get it again [sigh]. good call on our parts as we finished every last bite of the beautifully stacked beets, tofu, avocado, capers & accompanying dill sauce (perfect for dipping the complimentary bread when the pumpernickel runs out!)
we continued the sharing when the entrees arrived, passing around the plates of maitake mushrooms, grilled seitan and the eggplant & cauliflower braciole. oh, and a side of crispy cauliflower with pickled ramps because, well, why not? with each forkful, we found ourselves exclaiming how amazing everything was, how difficult it is to find such innovative vegetarian cuisine, how sad we were that horizons is closing.
tho full, we had to share just one more thing: dessert! we opted for the lavender cheesecake which was creamy, light, and mind-​bogglingly VEGAN. having paced our meal well (we were the very last table to leave…), none of us felt too stuffed upon leaving. it was, in a word, perfect.

191 reviews at the time of this writing, 4.5 stars and they are closing soon. Shame.
We sat outside on a beautiful Saturday evening and enjoyed the service and delicacies served up from the kitchen. This is only my second time dining at Horizons and I’m really sorry to see it go. Not only is Bella Vista losing a gem of a restaurant, I’m going to miss their highly creative offerings.
To start we split the Chilled Avocado-​Cucumber Soup. Light, fresh, and a perfect way to get us ready for our entrees.
I went with the Grilled Seitan. This dish had serious smokey flavor which is always a home-​run in my book. It sat over potatoes, wilted spinach and a horseradish cream sauce. On top, a dollop of roasted red pepper sauce. This dish was heavenly from start to finish. My dining companion went with the pan seared tofu. There were different varieties of mushrooms surrounding it and other diced vegetables in a tangy slightly peppery sauce. I really appreciated and ended up eating a decent amount of it too.
The service was on point, the menu was stellar and the food was seriously awesome.

Alright, Horizons served me up the best vegetarian meal I’ve ever had in a restaurant; it was spendy, sure, but everything about the food and drinks was excellent. Of course, I could gripe about how much space was between the tables in the restaurant, but that’d just be me wishing this place were in cramped Manhattan, where you have 18 inches of space between your two top and the four top next to you. Anyway, if it were in the city, I’d be paying twice as much to eat there. Thankfully the restaurant is far, far away in Philly, which is nice, cuz otherwise it’d break my bank.
I’m going to go into a bit more detail on what my friends and I ordered; things were good enough that I want to remember ‘em. We each got a cocktail or two and an appetizer and an entrée.
For cocktails I got a standard sazerac, which wasn’t on the menu but which the tender made for me; it was solid, and they charged me only for a rye, which was a nice surprise. I followed the sazerac with an elder sage, which I would make myself at home to drink over the next couple of sweltering months – if I could remember what was in it: basically Hendricks, some herby liqueur, and a sage leaf. Tasty. Friends got some sweet bourbon drinks that I didn’t taste, and a very well made corpse reviver, which I did.
My appetizer was golden beets atop avocado and capers. Amazing. Friends got BBQ seitan and mushroom empanadas: also amazing, the seitan for the way it approached gen-​you-​whine fire-​roasted, smokey-​crispy animal flesh, and the tang of its sauce; and the empanadas for being deep fried mushrooms, thank you.
For the entrée, I got a heart of palms cake with lentils and curried squash; also quite good. But my friend’s entrees really took the cake: seared tofu, which was some of the best tofu I’ve ever had, and the seitan, which had a texture so good it almost made me cry. For desert friends got beignets. Pretty tasty, or even awesome, but I don’t really have a sweet tooth.
Oh look at that, a five-​star restaurant. Go Horizons! Or, go _​to_​Horizons.

Horizon’s is one of those places where I feel obligated to really go through our meal dish by dish so here we go:
Tofu Banh Mi Bruschetta — our first dish, and the tofu was grilled to perfection to really give it some texture. the spicy mayo and pickles (which i wish had real fish sauce in them) made for a pretty solid appetizer.
Shaved Brussels Sprouts with Mustard — the heat of the mustard and the bitterness of the sprouts really work
Smoked Maitake Mushroom entrée — this one was mine and i can’t help but say I wasn’t a little dissapointed. The mushrooms themselves were smoked wonderfully but the truffled brussels sprouts that came with it couldn’t really be taste.
Grilled Tofu with Edamame Rissoto and Smoked Dashi — I was really taken aback by how good this was. The tofu had a perfect consistency and never got mealy, mushy, or soft. The korean chili seasoning wasn’t overpowering (not an easy feat) and clicked with the smoked dashi in ways that most dishes simply don’t. I wish I’d ordered this one but my girlfriend was the luckier of us two.

It is rare that I have a meal that doesn’t involve nutrients from some sort of animal. When I dine, I like to think that the flesh of the beast I’m eating is filled with that animal’s memories and hopes for a brighter tomorrow. I consume these hopes and convert them to strength. Since plants have hopes that hardly go beyond «oh yay sun!» and «I like rain!,» I tend to leech very little power from their consumption.
That being said, Horizons is an excellent restaurant and I did not miss my precious meat at all when I dined here.
The BBQ seitan has a metal name and a fantastic flavor. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that this dish actually did have dreams of a brighter tomorrow. It had a soft, marinated brisket texture. It was very good.
The salt roasted garden beets appetizer is tasty as hell. It is served in a circular cake-​like format with avocado, capers, pumpernickel and an excellent dill sauce.
The fresh heart of palms cake is my recommended entrée. Mint, palm, squash, and lentil work very hard to make you happy.
The cauliflower and smoked eggplant dish was OK.
Dessert-​wise, Horizons has a pretty good vegan cheesecake with some sort of clever dogfish head/​apricot sauce. I liked it.
Oh, the Kale beer isn’t very amazing. I got it just to be wacky and wasn’t blown away. I do not recommend it.
On the action-​movie-​parallel-​satisfaction-​scale, this place is Aliens.

(4.5 Stars)
The best way to persuade a vegetarian teetering on the edge of carnivorous dining to eat meat is to take said person to Horizons…
…because that BBQ seitan is just so damn delicious. It’s enough to make a vegetarian of a decade or so want to cross over and eat copious amounts of pulled pork, chicken wings, and anything meat glazed with BBQ sauce. (It’s that sort of savory, melt-​in-​your-​mouth phenomenon of southern sweet county fair BBQ with a sophisticated edge.)
The best way to persuade a vegetarian teetering on the edge of carnivorous dining to become a full fledged vegan is to take said person to Horizons…
…because the Salt Roasted Golden beets are a beautiful twist on Ahi Tartare, and just as luscious…
…the Cauliflower and Smoked Eggplant Braciole could persuade any defiant three year old to «eat your vegetables» without fuss. Three cheers for vegan lasagna without slimy, tough pasta sheets and crazy amounts of cheese.
Oh yes, and as far as bottled beers go, try the Organic Green Tea beer. It’s crisp, slightly bitter, but more so in that green tea way than in the beer way. Plus it’s the perfect complement to your good-​for-​the-​environment dining experience.

This was my first vegan restaurant experience. And, man, I was not disappointed, I think I might be spoiled for life and expectant of this level of cuisine at a vegan/​vegetarian restaurant. Was in Philly with a good friend and fellow Unilocaler and he suggested that we try this place due to the fact that I am on a temporary meatless diet. We were both blown away with the experience. We had the BBQ Seitan, The Brushetta, The Olives and Pickles followed by the Steak Seasoned Tofu and the Hearts of Palm Casserole all topped off by the Sticky Toffee. All amazing.
We ended up both getting the Horizons Vegan cookbook and will be making some of those recipes when I get home.
The vibe in the place was slow when it first opened and a little dull, but after an hour or so the place started to pick up, some good music on the speakers and a nice buzz was present. We will definitely be back.

I have been wanting to try this place for a long time. Really like vegan food and this place has a great reputation. It is well deserved!
With my buddy Paul, went upstairs to find a really nice space with about 50 seats and a bar.
Asked the server, Lisa, for recommendations and she took good care of us.
For appetizers:
The BBQ Seitan was great. Texture like meat and incredible flavor.
Next the bruschetta was served. Absolutely fantastic. May have been my favorite dish of the night and I don’t remember what it was!
A side of pickles and olives was then delivered. Nice and crunchy pickles with nice flavor.
We shared two entrees:
The pan seared tofu was a large portion of tofu that tasted great.
The hearts of palm was the other entrée. This was really tasty as well.
So I didn’t describe the dishes with the same detail I normally would because I didn’t pay much attention to ingredients. I just took Lisa’s recommendations. She came through. We didn’t leave a thing. Not sure what we ate but I would go vegan with food like this everyday if it was accessible. Felt healthy and it was delicious. We finished up splitting the sticky toffee pudding. Sweet and fantastic. A great end to the meal.
Had a glass of Tempranillo. Not so good, with the great meal it was not a good complement for this food. Not biggie. A great restaurant and I can’t wait for my next visit with the family.
They also sell two different cookbooks. I bought the newer one. I will strive to have more vegan in my diet, especially with the recipes I now have in my kitchen.

I had never been to a vegan restaurant before Horizons, but when my friend invited me along last minute when her dinner date canceled, I became wildly curious.
The ambiance has a very southwestern 90s vibe, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing. White tablecloths, lots of light wood and sunset motifs. We had a reservation but had to wait anyway, and I indulged in a $ 10 cocktail served by a very cute bartender.
I ordered the grilled seitan for my dinner and it was fantastic. Although I order tofu about 99% of the time at all Asian restaurants, seitan was a protein I had never experienced before. The texture was great and the grill marks really made it look and taste like– I know this is cliché, but– CHICKEN. The seitan was plated on top of a pile of wilted spinach, mashed potatoes and the best-​ever-​totally-​creamy-​kick-​in-​the-​mouth (that’s what she said) horseradish sauce. Couldn’t believe there was no dairy in it– however, I could believe that the mashed potatoes were vegan. Not creamy at all.
Mind you, we waited about 30 – 40 minutes for our entrees. Our waiter actually came by and asked if we were interested in dessert before we got our food. He apologized and the food came out within minutes. When we actually finished eating, he came by and asked about dessert again. I had assumed he would have offered us something complimentary, and I told him so.
«I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that,» he said kind of strangely. «We were going to give you dessert for free anyway.»
Well then why didn’t you offer it before you asked if we wanted dessert? What if we said we didn’t want dessert? Would anything have been comped?
We got oatmeal raisin cheesecake (HOW DO THEY DO IT?!) and a sampler of goodies like crème brûlée, toffee pudding, and chocolate mousse. The chocolate mousse was best by far. Every bit melted in my mouth.
Like other Unilocalers have mentioned before me– Horizons ain’t cheap. It’s definitely a special occasion place. How can they charge $ 19 for a block of tofu when you can get a block twice the size at the store for $ 1.89? Fine dining, shmine shmining. It’s soy protein, people!

Nice ambiance/​vibe. Definitely good chi.
Attentive service — they always kept my glass full.
The presentation, delivery and execution of the dishes were impressive. I highly recommend the BBQ seitan appetizer. As the waitress said, if you’ve never had seitan before, this is the place to have it for the first time. I’ll definitely go back JUST for the sticky toffee pudding!
No matter what the night, always make a reservation.

I have visited Horizons a couple of times. I love this place a lot. I am not someone who often moans while eating, but I really had to control myself after every bite of the Pacific Rim Grilled Tofu. The ramen bowl was tasty as was the golden beet salad… which I have ordered each time I have gone.
The cost will keep it a special occasion spot for me.

Can’t say enough great things about this place. Such a cozy atmosphere… great place for an intimate dinner with friends or a date.
The Porcini Shepherd’s Pie is a must… so much flavor — black trumpets, portobello, truffled celery root purée, and grain mustard sauce. I’m all hot and bothered just thinking about it.
Definitely make reservations. You’ll be waiting at the bar for a while if you don’t.

OK, now before you think «The nerve of her to give Horizons anything less than 4 stars!» (even though that probably already flitted through your mind), let me do some explainin.
After reading the reviews on here, I expected at least something vaguely similar to ecstasy during my meal but to be perfectly honest, it didn’t live up to the hype. Now don’t get me wrong: the food is very good and we didn’t have any complaints. But as a food snob, I wasn’t blown away and neither was my brother (who isn’t a food snob).
As an appetizer we ordered the beets which were flavorful but a bit too salty for my taste. Entrees were the deviled oyster mushroom crêpe, pan seared tofu and grilled seitan, all of which were tasty except the tofu (I thought it was kinda bland). For dessert we had the autumn crisp which had a nice warm/​cold/​crunchy/​soft texture but again, nothing special.
Final verdict? If you’re looking for a new place to eat and a unique food experience, go ahead to Horizons. But make sure you have the money to spend or have someone pay for you because I don’t think its really worth $ 20 each for the entrees and $ 28 for a small pitcher of sangria. Just sayin’
P. S. Everything had too much of something creamy in the food. I know its not actual dairy products but whatever supplements it, it was all over everything. Needless to say, my stomach wasn’t very pleased the rest of the night.

The best vegan dinner I’ve ever had. But the décor? Very 1974.
First off, this was vegan food done right.
Appetizers: Vietnamese tempeh tacos, with the smoothest tempeh I’ve ever had; and mushroom carpaccio that was perfectly thin and delicious
Entrees: my grilled tofu was excellently cooked and accompanied by a delicious sauce and nice vegetables; but the grilled/​smoke seitan with yukon potatos was out of this world. Probably the best single vegan dish I’ve ever had.
Desserts: incredible chocolate ganache-​style pie and peanut butter ice cream; and a perfectly sweet peach cobbler, also with ice cream.
The staff was very nice and helpful. The only reason I’m not giving this 5 stars is because the place needs a serious makeover. It screams 1970s meets Outsider Art meets Korean massage parlor. Stylistically it’s a mess.
But the food is not to be missed.

If you’re in need of a vegan restaurant that will sate the meat eater in your life, this place will do the trick handsomely.
If you’re a discerning vegan or vegetarian eater who’s looking for more than that, you may feel a bit let down, as I did tonight at Horizons.
Horizons menu seems purpose-​built to calm the nervous carnivore who’s unwittingly entered hostile territory. The entrees emulate or hew close to the meat model. There’s even an entrée called something like ‘head to fin,’ modeled in concept after a fish. What you won’t find is much in the way of honoring the deliciousness of vegetables.
I started, as many do, by sitting down … in what absolutely was one of the most uncomfortable chairs in the history of furniture. Picture beige Pottery Barn microsuede stretched over a wood composite frame without the benefit of a cushion in the middle. Your butt slams straight down, and you find yourself jammed between either end of the frame. Grade Lame minus!
Next I ordered a tequila drink with ice tea and a pinch? punch? of jalapeño. It arrived in an exciting, campy glass in the shape of a Texas boot. The fun ended there, though: the jalapeño was so strong, it sent me right to the vommy edge. One sip is all it took — I fought the good fight, but that almost toxic chemical flavor stayed with me for the rest of my meal.
I let the server know I was happy to pay for my mistake (because dem’s the breaks) but I wanted to replace it immediately. New drink, new mistake: something called Aviation, which is gin plus marachino, violet, and lemon. Well-​executed … and yet I hated it? To me gin equals gasoline. However as I’m the one who ordered it (because I liked the thought of sipping from a violet) … I have only myself to blame.
While waiting for my food I was presented with two whisper-​thin slices of focaccia boldly displayed in an iron Belgan frites cone complete with grease paper. I say boldly because would you put two french fries in there? Of course not. Two slim anythings would make no sense in a holder the side of a Get Well vase. In any event, the contents, focaccia 1 and focaccia 2, did not impress. Dry yet gummy, and flavorless, too. Hazelnut (?) flavoring oil layered on the extra bonus of a bad-​breath vibe.
Between bread and app, I took in the music. I think I’ll call it Power Bottom Massage Music: think standard massage soundtrack, just faster, more insistent, laced with nonsensical vocals in the echo-​y Brazillian Samba style and punctuated with a shake here, a shake there of a giant rain stick. It was also loud. The whole restaurant was loud. Odd for a place made to look so serene with the water-​feature wall hanging a prominent, if not primary, element of the interior design.
With some ambivalence, for my appetizer I chose the Vietnamese Tacos. Namely: a white, store-​bought wrap filled with run-​of-​the-​mill tempeh, with a bit of daikon crunch and a gob of sriracha mayo, its sole source of flavor. The wrap itself was a huge disappointment, as clearly it was some packaged junk, and at minimum it should have been warmed up. Sriracha mayo is not hugely impressive either: it’s become a Philly staple, in the way dijon, then stoneground mustard took hold of the popular imagination in decades past. In any event, this item is precisely the kind of meal I would make in two seconds as a midnight snack. It simply doesn’t rate as a $ 10 app.
So: chair, gross drink, overly ambitious presentation of two nothings of bread, and a tired app, I had … ok, a huge chip on my shoulder before my entrée made an appearance.
Fortunately it saved the meal.
I got the Pacific Rim Tofu, which I’ll grade a B+. It’s a garden-​variety square of tofu, not different from and as tediously square as every other block you’ve ever torn out of a package, grilled with that Outback Steakhouse grill-​mark look. Stick on some Asian flavoring, plate it on mushrooms, and $ 19 later either you’re happy or you’re not. Flavor-​wise the dish worked: a bit smoky, a bit soy, a bit green-​vegetable-​y, with kind of a crunchy mushroom action. However my biggest bust is that temperatures were very uneven: sometimes mushrooms were hot, sometimes not. When that happens it’s an unpleasant affair.
For no reason other than to provide this review, I also got dessert. I chose chocolate-​filled beignets with a little side of iced coffee with whipped stuff on top. I’m sorry but the beignets were terrible. Thick, undercooked, brazenly undelicious dough, holding servicable bittersweet chocolate filling that didn’t balance out the unseasoned dough in any way. The little coffee with the tiny straw was a nice, albeit dated, touch.
On the plus side, the service is great, and the waitstaff clearly are committed to giving you a high-​end experience worthy of the bill you most certainly will be receiving.
No doubt this review comes off as bitchy and entitled. There’s no getting around it. Maybe the place will grow on me.

This is the best food, vegan or otherwise, I’ve ever had. I keep thinking about this place, like it’s my lost lover. Everything was artfully prepared and presented with top-​quality service. The golden beet tapas were succulent and its accompanying edamame purée just amazed me. The portobella carpaccio was delicate and tender. The Bourbon BBQ tempeh was filling and tasty, but I found that the Pacific Rim Tofu was tastier and had better side dishes (ponzu brocolini, edamame mash). For dessert, make sure to try their cheesecake or their chocolate peanut butter ice cream brownie, both of which were world-​class.
The prices are high, but the quality of the food is five-​star gourmet and worth every penny. This is a great, fancy place to take a date (upstairs level) or a hip, friendly place to get a drink and some light dishes (on the lower level).
For this vegan, Horizons is the top restaurant in the US, and easily beats would-​be competitors like Candle 79 and Millennium.

I’m not a vegetarian, but I love to see what can be done with a little bit of creativity. The Jamaican BBQ seitan is amazing! It’s very upscale and vegan, which is something you don’t normally find. They only have local beers on tap (yards, philly brewing company, slyfox), which is pretty darn cool if you ask me.
The food presentation is awesome! They make it look like a masterpiece, and it makes me kind of afraid to destroy to by eating it. But it really tastes as good as it looks!