A DISH BEST SERVED COLD: Raw Food
Raw food restaurants win over hippies and hipsters alike.
WORDS BY ANNIE WILNER
Since luxury well-being is the new urban chic, where health and peace of mind are the ultimate status symbols, a sprinkling of vegetarian raw food restaurants have cropped up across the country—from Bryan Au’s restaurant Pa-raw-dise in San Francisco, to Quintessence and Counter Vegetarian in New York and Karyn’s in Chicago.
So what is raw cuisine? Raw cuisine, also called living foods, is any vegetarian meal that is prepared without cooking or heat. “Many people think of raw foods as this outlandish diet,” says Deborah Gavito, owner of Counter Vegetarian in New York. “But a carrot’s a carrot, and an apple’s an apple.” So when eating a salad for lunch, unless you boil your lettuce, you’re eating a “raw” meal.
The public perception of raw foods cuisine, a splinter movement of general vegetarianism, is that it’s a little nutty. Inside our fast food nation, hamburgers, soda and candy are staples of the American diet. Meanwhile, raw foods restaurants abstain from serving meat, fish and dairy products, and generally eschew processed or refined foods.
“Right now is the perfect season for raw foods,” suggests Gavito. “People want to lose a few pounds of weight with fresh fruits and vegetables.
Brian Au
For those who think a life of salad instead of hot dogs is paramount to starvation, there are numerous up front benefits to raw cuisine. Currently, the majority of serious raw cuisine enthusiasts believe heat depletes vegetables of natural enzymes and other nutrients, while many find raw meals enhance their energy level. Raw fruits and vegetables also have the advantage of being low in calories compared to most processed food, and high in vitamins and minerals.
Quintessence
Along with a fine-tuned body comes a fine-tuned mind. According to Colin Spencer’s Vegetarianism: A History, the first vegetarian guru on record was Pythagoras. The Greek mathematician and philosopher ate honeycomb for breakfast and millet bread and raw or cooked vegetables for lunch.
California
Raw food comes with its own set of challenges, which is why new, young chefs are turning to the cuisine for inspiration and sustenance.
Bryan Au, author of Raw in Ten Minutes (Trafford 2005) was trained at the upscale vegetarian restaurant Govinda’s in Los Angeles, and his ultra luxe recipes include vegetarian California rolls wrapped in cucumber and tiramisu. Back in Hollywood, raw cuisine has gained a steady following among health-conscious celebrities. The actress who portrayed the ditzy heroine of Clueless, Alicia Silverstone sends friendly emails to Bryan. And he and Michael Richards, better know as Kramer on “Seinfeld,” sometimes talk health food.
For a glimpse behind the scenes in the kitchen, Au demonstrates how to prepare a raw falafel, consisting of a dense mixture of flax seed. One of the preferred substitutes for bread products in raw foods cuisine is a nut or seed paste of walnuts, almonds, flax seed or pine nuts. Because the base ingredients often begin a little crunchy, behind every good raw chef stands a decent food processor or blender. Into the falafel mixture, Au pours a splash of Fiuggi, Italian mineral water, and tosses in salt gathered from a Jurassic-era lake in Utah for flavor.
Whereas a rich meal, heavy in butter, may settle in a warm, comforting haze in the stomach, the emotional effect of a refreshing light raw entrée feels similar to eating sushi—intensely tranquil, cleansing, and clarifying. His falafel, wrapped in a fresh kale leaf with juicy pineapple chunks is beautifully arranged and easily edible; but the feeling, packed with “superfoods” like algae and moistened with Vatican-worthy H20, is entirely other. For his superb baklava, three layers of delicate, translucent slices of Fuji apple replace the traditional pastry shell, with a coarse filling of pistachios and agave nectar inside. Agave nectar, a sweetener harvested from the agave plant in Central Mexico, or honey stand in for traditional refined sugar.
Along with Bryan’s restaurant in Union Square, Café Gratitude in San Francisco’s bohemian Mission district offers specialties such as the raw live pizza, prepared with delicious cashew crème fraîche, and an organic wine menu. The smoky organic Lodi Syrah proved to be potent and rich, and the raw pecan pie and cheesecake are both superb. Michael Engelhart and his partner Terces opened the restaurant a year and a half ago, with an emphasis on creating a place to eat raw foods, but also as a “sacred space.”
New York
At Deborah Gavito’s Counter Vegetarian in the East Village, the arrangement is slightly counter intuitive. The chef is downstairs, and the garden is upstairs. On their rooftop garden, Gavito and her staff cultivate 12 types of heirloom tomatoes, a teeming herb garden and edible flowers for their raw and cooked vegetarian meals. Chef Chad Sarno, a figurehead behind the gourmet raw movement, has developed a new set of dishes for Counter’s raw summer menu. Someone once compared the restaurant to a “miniature Guggenheim,” with a curved bar, creamy walls and layered curving ceiling.
And for those who like to go out on the town with a splash, the restaurant serves classic cocktails mixed with organic liquors. Unlike its New York competitors like Quintessence or Caravan of Dreams, Counter restaurant doesn’t attempt to mimic cooked dishes like, for example, “raw” pizza. “We try to respect the vegetable for what it is, and make food that’s comfortable,” says Gavito.
She cites her meal at Quintessence a year and a half ago as Counter’s original inspiration for introducing raw dishes into their menu. Quintessence, one of the first living foods restaurants, is the longest standing raw restaurant in the New York area.
Chicago
In the Midwest, Karyn’s Fresh Choice and Gourmet Restaurant remains the stronghold of living foods cuisine for Chicago. Karyn’s is the only raw restaurant in the US that is attached to a multifold spa environment. Not only does Karyn’s feed the stomach with mango soup and seaweed dim sum, but it also cleanses the body with its Inner Beauty Center, providing ozone baths and detox programs.