By Lu Chang, Shanghai Star. 2001-06-21

No smoking, no alcohol, no eggs, no meat and no MSG.

THE table linen was decorated with a pair of ostriches and their flocky babies resting in a green grassland. This view of the joyful family puts the idea of protecting animals and nature foremost in the mind of every customer at Jujube Tree.

The restaurant name is symbolic. Jujube tree is pronounced zao zi shu in Chinese, which is similar to zao chi su - which means "Become a vegetarian as soon as possible."

But it is not only a vegetarian restaurant, but also a venue for the discussion of vegetarian lifestyle topics - animal welfare, environmentalism and organic agricultural products.

The owners, a Taiwanese couple, frequently come to customers' tables to chat about the dishes and the vegetarian lifestyle.

The design of the restaurant focuses on the nature and wildlife which provides a calming atmosphere for the diners.

The owners themselves became vegetarian two years ago and were very careful in choosing their staff - the head chef has been a vegetarian for four years.

Even the 30-member construction team for the restaurant had to become vegetarian for the 40 days it took to remodel the restaurant.

After dining at Jujube Tree, you can see why long-established State-owned vegetarian restaurants, such as the Gong De Lin and Jue Lin, are losing more and more customers to it day by day.

If going to traditional vegetarian restaurants is a kind of painful activity according to the religious doctrine, eating in Jujube Tree is a pleasure, and you will find that vegetable dishes can be as delicious as conventional meat ones.

Some dishes were labelled pork, beef or chicken, but vegetarian ingredients were to imitate meat dishes.

Crab roe is tasty. When you ladle out a spoon of it, the steaming white and golden paste sends out a familiar smell of crab meat in vinegar and it tastes the same as the real one, tender and with some granules similar to crab roe. However, it was actually made of carrot, radish and potato paste.

The restaurant highlights its use of organic food, which is one of the rules of the restaurant, together with no smoking, no alcohol, no eggs, no meat, no MSG, the use of only pure water, and only organic tea and fruit appetizers as a first course.

Thus, in the Jujube Tree, the order in which dishes were served was reversed and the first dish served was fruit, which increases stomach absorption of food.

In addition, all the fruit and vegetables in the restaurant were bought from a specific organic food farmer in Shanghai.

The home-made fruit jelly is very fresh and you need not worry about fertilizer and colourings.

The soup in a small bowl was stewed with herbs and "meat" (actually deep-fried mushroom) which enhances the body's inner balance.

The various kinds of exquisite dim sum, such as small cakes stuffed with date paste, are lovely and delicate.

The whole dinner will be simple, delicious and will not feel heavy on your stomach.

In one corner of the restaurant is a stall selling natural products such as green food and wooden photo frames. The shelf displayed more than 10 different bottles of herbs and a tag on each of them explained its function.

The herbs are used to prepare 20 kinds of tea, which the restaurant serves in the afternoon.

The restaurant changes its cooking methods and ingredients according to the different habits and requirements of customers, and it also has a Western set menu.

Prices match the quality of dishes, about 80 yuan ($9.6) for two persons.

Add: 77 Songshan Lu

Tel: 6384-8000