Local Restaurant Wins Award for Revolutionizing Its Menu

Shoals Sound & Service Recognized for Responding to COVID-19 by Switching From Meat, Eggs, and Dairy to All Vegan Foods

For Immediate Release:
June 24, 2020

Contact:
Nicole Meyer 202-483-7382

An Essential Business Award is on its way from PETA to local bar and restaurant Shoals Sound & Service for unveiling a new eco- and animal-friendly all-vegan menu amid COVID-19, which originated in a meat market.

“It seemed at this point, after the coronavirus hit, we needed to make a big change as a whole in the restaurant industry, and moving to a plant-based menu seemed like the best way to do so,” says owner Omar YeeFoon. The new menu features Latin American–inspired offerings, including the Smoked Barbecue Torta (with jackfruit, black beans, and other toppings on a baguette), the Beyond Arepa Burger (with savory tomato jam on a corn patty); and Shitake Ceviche (served with plantain chips).

“In the face of a deadly pandemic that is linked to confining and killing animals for food, Shoals Sound & Service decided to kick meat to the curb,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA is recognizing this beloved 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.

Shoals Sound & Service 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.