Local Restaurant Wins Award for Revolutionizing Its Menu
Mozzarella Fellas Recognized for Responding to COVID-19 by Switching From Meat, Eggs, and Dairy to All Vegan Foods
For Immediate Release:
July 7, 2020
Contact:
Nicole Meyer 202-483-7382
A Vegan Business Award is on its way from PETA to local Italian restaurant Mozzarella Fellas for unveiling a new eco- and animal-friendly all-vegan menu amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
“In light of everything going down with coronavirus and not knowing if I was going to have a business, I figured I’d go out on my own terms if I do not make it,” says owner Brian Ricciardi, a longtime vegan. “It’s what I’m passionate about, so I’m taking a leap of faith.”
The new menu features vegan takes on Italian-American classics, including “mozzarella” sticks, “chicken” Parmesan, and penne carbonara (with cashew cream sauce, hot Italian vegan sausage, and fresh veggies), plus decadent vegan nachos, mac and “cheese,” Buffalo cauliflower, and much more.
“In the face of a deadly pandemic that is linked to confining and killing animals for food, Mozzarella Fellas decided to kick meat to the curb,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA is recognizing this trailblazing business and its delicious cuisine for showing that the future of dining is vegan.”
The novel coronavirus originated in a “wet market”—one where live and dead animals are sold for human consumption. Health authorities confirm that influenza viruses and coronaviruses are zoonotic (transmissible from other animals to humans)—and filthy farms and markets crammed full of stressed animals are breeding grounds for such deadly maladies.
Every person who goes vegan saves the lives of nearly 200 animals each year; reduces their own risk of suffering from heart disease, cancer, strokes, and numerous other health conditions; and significantly reduces their carbon footprint, as the meat and dairy industries are leading producers of the greenhouse gases driving the worst effects of the climate crisis.
Mozzarella Fellas will receive a framed certificate.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.
