Binge Kitchen aims to promote health with its vegan eatery

The vegan restaurant will feature a breakfast menu, including waffles and French toast sticks, once its dining room reopens. (Courtesy Binge Kitchen)

This story was published in Community Impact Newspaper.

When Yarnisha Lyons first opened Binge Kitchen in 2017, she was still a student at Texas State University balancing classes and managing her vegan eatery with the intent to promote health and wellness.

Three years later, she has a brick-and-mortar in San Marcos and has recently expanded her wellness mission into San Antonio.

“My entire family or at least all my immediate family is vegan—our intent is health and wellness,” Lyons said. “We thought what better place than [San Marcos], with college students—the future.”

Lyons started Binge Kitchen with a food truck in 2017. A year later, she left the food truck behind to better accommodate her customers in a restaurant, offering the “first fully vegan menu” in town, according to Lyons.

“We decided to tackle the food issue first, to promote healthy eating habits, and then we plan to move forward with a fitness program,” Lyons said. Those ideas were quickly brought to a halt by the coronavirus pandemic.

With the expansion to San Antonio, Lyons has temporarily closed dine-in services in her San Marcos location, but the pandemic has prolonged that closure. For now, the restaurant is only offering preordered meals for pickup on Sunday mornings.

“Prior to the shutdown—due to the pandemic—we actually had plans to fully reopen the San Marcos location, but the situation put a pause on that,” Lyons said.

Binge Kitchen offers prepared meals for individuals and families. Some of those vegan meals include meatloaf, shepherd’s pie, lasagna, barbecue ribs, spinach and cheese chicken, and desserts.