For diners who newly happen upon Allie's Vegan Pizzeria & Cafe on Spokane's lower South Hill, it's often a surprise to discover the restaurant's comfort food menu of pizza, burgers and more contains zero animal products.
"That's like our biggest question when people walk in, the first thing they say [is], 'Everything's vegan?'" says Thai Lund-Hood, who took over Allie's with their partner Tanya Lund-Hood in October 2022.
Allie's celebrated its 10th anniversary this month. When former owner Atania Gilmore opened the restaurant in the Nevada Lidgerwood neighborhood in 2015, it was Spokane's first completely vegan restaurant. After that original location burned in a fire in 2016, the restaurant moved to its current spot on Grand Boulevard.
While Allie's menu is still focused on pizza, its current owners, who've been vegan for over 11 years, try to liven things up with regular specials like a one-day Cinco de Mayo menu, Mother's Day brunch, and fair food-inspired specials of hand-dipped corn dogs and funnel cakes.
For new vegans, cheese is often the hardest animal-based product to part with, partially because vegan alternatives have long had a bad reputation. Instead of shying away from cheese-oriented dishes, Allie's tackles the challenge with a menu that incorporates "cheese" into many of its dishes. Like most vegan cheeses, Allie's are cashew based. However, the restaurant also adds in kappa carrageenan, a natural powdered extract from seaweed that helps create a thicker, creamier texture.
"Our cheese would be very similar to any other starch-based vegan cheese if it didn't have that," Thai says.
Allie's also emulates dairy-based cheese's taste with nutritional yeast powder, used both in its cheese sauce, and as a topping on its macaroni and cheese ($12) along with other seasonings and bread crumbs.
Cheese is quintessential to any good pizza, and Allie's doesn't mess around when it comes to "cheesey" pizzas that meat and plant lovers alike can enjoy.
The restaurant does mess around with their bestseller, the "Hot Mess" pizza ($20), which has been on the menu since the start, originally as the "Legendary Hot Mess." It's certainly difficult to keep your hands clean while eating the dish, but it's worth it. The 12-inch pizza has a base of ranch sauce, topped with macaroni and cheese, fried "chicken," onions, hot sauce, and vegan mozzarella.
Other customer favorites include the Thai peanut pizza ($19) with peanut sauce, mushrooms, black olives, artichokes, bell peppers and "mozzarella." The pickle pizza ($16) with ranch, pickles, dill and "mozzarella" was a former 4/20 special that proved popular.
If you're eating solo, order a personal size 8-inch pizza from among Allie's signatures ($6) or build your own.
The Lund-Hoods take pride in Allie's variety of housemade dipping sauces like ranch, pesto, "honey" mustard, fry sauce, barbeque sauce, and sweet and sour sauce. With the generous amount of thin and crispy fries provided with entrées like the cheeseburger ($16), whatever sauce you choose will also become a star of the meal. Allie's uses vegan patties made from pea protein for their burgers, similar to brands like Beyond Burger.
"We have gotten a few good feedbacks where people are like, 'Wow, I eat meat all the time, and this tastes just like a real burger,'" Tanya says.
To make fries the main course, order the "Dad Bod" fries ($12), smothered in vegan cheese, caramelized onions, "burger" crumbles, fry sauce and a parsley garnish.
Scan Allie's QR code menu with your phone, and you'll be privy to the secret menu. The "buttery" garlic rolls ($10) with vegan parmesan and parsley have become a well-known secret, winning second place for secret menu item in the Inlander's 2025 Best Of the Inland Northwest Readers Poll.
Keep a close eye on Allie's social media (@alliesvegan) for updates about weekly and daily specials. Its owners suggest ordering online in advance as specials sell out fast due to limited supply.
"Sometimes we end up selling out, but we try to reduce our wastes," Tanya says.
"And just being conscious of our impact I think is one of our biggest things right now," Thai adds. "Offer a lot, but also like being very choosy and very mindful of all the resources that we're using."
This April, they hope to revamp Allie's menu to focus more on pizza, burgers and sandwiches. While some items like the falafel bowl ($15) will gradually be phased out, the couple hope a consolidated menu helps reduce food waste.
Tanya and Thai were both born and raised in Spokane and were longtime regulars of Allie's before working there and eventually assuming ownership.
"We both came [to Allie's] as the only place in Spokane that was fully vegan a long time ago, especially when they were on the north side," Thai says.
Tanya recounts going to live music shows as a teenager and seeing info booths for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA.
"That's pretty much how I was really educated on everything," they say. "I became vegetarian, but I didn't really understand how bad the dairy industry was. Until like around 2014 is when we started really looking into it more and then, yeah, we just went fully vegan in 2014 and never turned back."
"I just loved the impact [Allie's] had on the local vegan scene," Thai says. "It was like one of the only places where you can go and you're not like, 'Oh they have a burger, like a cow burger, right next to my vegan burger.'"
Like most restaurants post-pandemic, Allie's faces supply chain issues, exponential cost increases and slim profit margins. This winter was one of the slowest seasons Allie's has experienced since opening, according to Tanya.
"Most of our profits do come from tourists that come here, so we do have to heavily rely on that in the summer, which is why winters are always so hard," Tanya says.
The couple also notes how Fred Meyer, where they buy their vegan parmesan, is cutting back on its vegan inventory. Some of their distributors also suddenly stopped carrying some vegan products like tempeh, a fermented soybean product.
"Unfortunately, you would think veganism would be like accelerating, but it seems like it's decelerating," Tanya says.
To adapt, the couple had to decrease staff and make more products in-house, like their vegan "pepperoni," to counter inconsistent supply issues.
At the end of the day, it's regulars and the close-knit, local vegan community that's kept Allie's going 10 years strong.
"We really do appreciate them all, and we're really happy to have them," Tanya says.
Allie's Vegan Pizzeria & Cafe • 1314 S. Grand Blvd. • Open Wed-Thu 4-8 pm; Fri-Sun noon-8 pm • 509-321-7090
