A Guest Post: Cafe Agri

I heard about a new restaurant recently, and after checking out their website, realized I need a bit more meat and/or dairy that they offer. But Jen, from Painted Fish Studio, is a vegetarian, and she was generous enough to try it out and offer the following review. Enjoy! (Oh, and I love the logo).

Jenn recommended I try Café Agri (http://cafeagri.com/), a local organic
café that focuses preparing food grown locally, using sustainable means.
When I checked out the menu and saw that all items were vegetarian, my
interest was piqued, as was my sis who is also a vegetarian. We made plans
to meet after work

Sis rode her bike, while I contributed to my carbon footprint by driving. I
found her sitting outside, on the sunny, but traffic-heavy corner. When we
have what feels like 3 months of summer a year, we deal with noisy traffic
to sit outside! The first thing we noticed: no wine list. Café Agri does not
have its liquor license yet, it should be arriving in the beginning of July.

Regardless, we started with baked yam chips as an appetizer. They were
served with kalamata avocado dip, and it was a great start. The baked yam
chips are very addicting!

On to our entrées. I have been craving Masterpiece BBQ flavored potato chips
for the last few days (yeah, I have no idea what that’s about either), so I
decided to try the BBQ la Pina: caraway barbeque sauce from scratch,
pineapple, peppers, red onion, seasonal legume, and heirloom rice. When I
read legume, I pictured lentils in my head, and that would be my protein for
the evening. But the legumes were seasonal, and ended up being soy beans
(edamame), and not quite what I had hoped for. The sauce was sweet and
tangy, with lots (and lots) of peppers. The rice was cooked perfectly. It
was a good meal, but it really felt like a side dish, and I wasn’t
completely satisfied.

Sis had the Fennel-Ginger Tempeh with Sauteed Leek Tops: fresh-squeezed
orange juice & coconut water, macadamia, seasonal berry sauce, and red
quinoa. Impressive! And she said it was good, and she felt great having such
a healthy meal. But she probably wouldn’t be craving it in the future.

We opted not to have desert — we were more focused on trying to remember
the name of the café up the street where we could have the much needed
after-work drink. We even asked the waitress for the name. We paid our bill,
then went a few blocks north to Gigi’s Café (http://www.gigisuptown.com/).

Ahhhhh, a glass of wine. We both had a glass of Gazela Vinho Verde, a cheap,
fizzy, light white wine. And we shared a piece of coconut cake with lime
icing, to offset our healthy meal.

I would definitely go back to Café Agri, when in the mood to have something
healthy for me (and great for local farmers/the environment). However, sis
and I both agreed that the guys in our life would be disappointed by the
lack of meat, cheese, gluten, and dairy.