Looking for Nick the Greek vegetarian options? You’ll find real ones: falafel, hummus, a build-your-own Mediterranean Bowl, and one salad that’s vegan straight off the menu. Nick the Greek is a fast-growing Greek fast-casual chain out of California, and it treats vegetarians better than a gyro-and-souvlaki concept has any obligation to. This guide covers exactly what to order, what to skip, and what to double-check before you go. For what’s vegetarian at other chains, we’ve got you covered too.
A Quick Look at Nick the Greek
Three cousins started Nick the Greek in downtown San Jose in 2014, and all three of them are actually named Nick, after their shared grandfather, in keeping with Greek tradition. Big Nick runs the company as president, Little Nick handles development, and Baby Nick runs marketing. Their fathers had run an 8-unit Bay Area diner chain called Flames Coffeeshop before that. Nick the Greek started franchising in 2019 and grew steadily until YTG Enterprises, the group behind Anil Yadav’s roughly 600 restaurants including the country’s largest Jack in the Box franchise, bought a controlling stake in December 2022. The founding cousins kept real ownership and still run the brand day to day.
The growth since has been fast. Nick the Greek opened 14 new stores in 2025 alone, passed 100 US locations by mid-2026, and now operates across 8 states: California, Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Kansas, Missouri, Utah, and Tennessee. Restaurant Business Online ranked it #302 on its 2026 Top 500 chains list, up from #318 the year before and #377 the year before that, on system sales that grew more than 20 percent two years running. Entrepreneur magazine placed it #385 on its 2025 Franchise 500 list, and Fast Casual named it one of its Top 100 Movers and Shakers the same year.
Chef Luis Moreno has driven a string of recent menu changes that matter for a vegetarian reader too. The Mediterranean Bowl became the chain’s top seller in 2025, with bowl sales up roughly 70 percent, and the Tahini Crunch and Chopped Salads became the top-selling salads the same year. Those aren’t just new items, they’re genuinely good vegetarian orders. Nick the Greek runs a build-your-own model at every location, so the vegetarian swaps described below aren’t special requests, they’re printed right on the menu board.
Nick the Greek Vegetarian Options: What to Order
Nick the Greek tags most items right on its own menu board, V for vegan and VG for vegetarian, which makes ordering simple. Here’s how the vegetarian-friendly items break down, checked against the chain’s current menu.
| Menu Item | Vegetarian | Vegan |
|---|---|---|
| Falafel (side) | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Falafel Pita | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (default tzatziki sauce, a dairy sauce) |
| Hummus with Pita | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Mediterranean Bowl (falafel, no tzatziki sauce or feta cheese) | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Tahini Crunch Salad | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Greek Salad | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (feta cheese) |
| Chopped Salad | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (feta cheese) |
| Prasini Salad | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (feta cheese) |
| Pita Bread | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Fresh Cut Fries | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
| Greek Fries | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (feta cheese) |
| Baklava | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (honey, butter) |
| Froyo | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (dairy) |
Bowls, Pitas, and Plates
The Mediterranean Bowl is the best vegetarian play on the menu because you build it yourself. Pick falafel as your protein, add rice, kale, tomatoes, cucumbers, hummus, toum, and harissa, and skip the tzatziki sauce. That’s a fully vegan bowl using only standard menu options, no special requests needed.
The Falafel Pita and Veggie Pita (zucchini, mushrooms, tomatoes, and onions) both come with tzatziki sauce by default, which is a yogurt-based sauce, so order them as vegetarian only unless you ask for the tzatziki sauce left off or swapped for hummus or tahini. Everything else on the pita and plate side, the beef and lamb gyro, steak pita, chicken gyro, chicken souvlaki, pork belly gyro, and Greek burger, is meat by default and not a vegetarian option. The Gyro Bowl works the same way as the Mediterranean Bowl: it lets you swap in falafel for the gyro meat, but it comes with tzatziki sauce, feta cheese, and a spicy yogurt sauce standard, so it takes more asking to make vegan than the Mediterranean Bowl does. If you want the vegan route with the least back-and-forth at the counter, the Mediterranean Bowl is the better starting point.
Salads and Sides
The Tahini Crunch Salad is the one salad on the menu that’s vegan as sold, no swaps required: lettuce, kale, cucumbers, tomatoes, pickled onions, fried chickpeas, pita crunch, hummus, and a tahini dressing. The Greek Salad (tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, bell peppers, olives, and feta cheese in a red wine vinaigrette) is vegetarian but not vegan as built. The Chopped Salad adds pickled onions, banana peppers, Persian cucumbers, chickpeas, olives, pita chips, feta cheese, and scallions and dill in a lemon zest dressing, and the Prasini Salad is a simpler version of the same idea, lettuce, scallions and dill, banana peppers, cucumbers, and feta cheese in that same lemon zest dressing. Ask for any of the three without feta cheese if you want them vegan.
On the sides list, hummus with pita bread, plain pita bread, and Fresh Cut Fries, Nick the Greek’s version of french fries seasoned with salt and oregano, are all vegan. Greek Fries and Nick’s Fries both come topped with feta cheese and scallions and dill (Nick’s Fries also default to gyro meat or falafel), so stick with the plain Fresh Cut Fries if you’re avoiding dairy.
What’s Vegan at Nick the Greek?
Order these as they come and they’re vegan without any changes: the falafel side, hummus with pita, plain pita bread, Fresh Cut Fries, and the Tahini Crunch Salad. Build a vegan Mediterranean Bowl with falafel, rice, vegetables, hummus, toum, and harissa, and leave off the tzatziki sauce and feta cheese. Nick the Greek doesn’t carry a branded plant-based meat like Beyond or Impossible as of 2026, so falafel and the zucchini-and-mushroom veggie mix are your only plant-based protein choices.
Special Dietary Requirements and Allergies
A few things to check before you order if you’re strict about vegetarian or vegan eating. Nick the Greek doesn’t publish whether its feta cheese uses animal or microbial rennet, so ask in person if that matters to you. Tzatziki is a dairy yogurt sauce and comes standard on most pitas, bowls, and plates, always ask for it left off or on the side. The basmati rice used in bowls and plates doesn’t have a published ingredient breakdown for its cooking liquid, so ask if you avoid meat-based stock. Baklava is made with honey and butter, so it’s vegetarian but not vegan.
Nick the Greek’s own FAQ page states the kitchen handles dairy, eggs, wheat, soy, nuts, and sesame, and that it “cannot guarantee that any menu item is completely free from allergens.” If cross-contact is a concern, ask the counter staff how the grill and prep stations are shared between meat and vegetarian items. The chain also runs a nutrition calculator on its site for anyone who wants to check a specific build before ordering, though it doesn’t break out rennet or broth sourcing on its own.
Tips for Vegetarians at Nick the Greek
- Build the Mediterranean Bowl yourself: falafel, rice, kale, hummus, toum, and harissa, no tzatziki sauce.
- Ask for tzatziki sauce on the side or left off completely if you want a pita or bowl to be vegan.
- Skip the feta cheese on the Greek, Chopped, or Prasini Salad if you’re avoiding dairy, it comes standard on all three.
- Order the Tahini Crunch Salad if you want something vegan with zero substitutions.
- Ask about the rice’s cooking liquid if you’re strict about broth, the chain doesn’t publish that detail.
- Choose Fresh Cut Fries over Greek Fries or Nick’s Fries if you want them vegan, both of those come with feta cheese.
- Ask staff about shared grill and prep space if cross-contact with meat matters to you.
Conclusion
Nick the Greek isn’t built around vegetarian eating, but the menu gives you real choices if you order with a little intention. Skip the default tzatziki sauce and feta cheese, lean on falafel and hummus, and the Mediterranean Bowl turns into one of the better fast-casual vegan meals you’ll find at a Greek chain this size.
For more on eating vegetarian at restaurants generally, see the master guide to eating vegetarian and vegan at restaurants. Browse every restaurant guide on the site, or check out what’s vegetarian at CAVA, Taziki’s Mediterranean Cafe, and Pita Pit for more Mediterranean and fast-casual picks.
