Category Archives: Iowa

Vegan Eating in Des Moines: Fresh Cafe & Market

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Earlier this week I visited a vegetarian café in Des Moines, Iowa called Fresh Café & Market.  Most of the menu is vegan, and the vegetarian items have a vegan option (i.e. Daiya instead of cow’s milk cheese).  Fresh Café & Market is easy to miss, as it’s tucked on a side street in West Des Moines in a building that looks more like an office building or dentist’s office than a restaurant.  It shares the building with the School of Classical Ballet & Dance.  Once inside, though, the space is cute and well lit with that wonderful, tell tale smell of raw restaurants.  The scent of smoothies and wheatgrass fills the air like fresh cut grass on a sticky, summer day.

There’s a small bar with 50’s diner-style chairs and several tables for group dining.   The menu options of salads, soups, sandwiches, juices, and smoothies are clearly labeled vegetarian, vegan, raw, soy-free, and wheat-free.  As an added bonus, any salad can be a wrap or vice versa.  Patrons order at the counter and then meals are brought to the tables.

Their soups are always vegan, and when I was there broccoli cheddar was the offering of the day.  The cup of soup was a light starter to the meal, with large chunks of broccoli.   The soup was thinner than I’d typically expect with a strong flavor of nutritional yeast.  Luckily, I’m a big fan of nutritional yeast, and so that wasn’t a negative.  I think adding some pureed potato or cauliflower would give the soup a pleasant added oomph and body.

Raw pasta - $7.50

For the entrée I had their raw pasta made with spiralized zucchini in a tomato sauce topped with a pesto of basil, mixed raw nuts, nutritional yeast, garlic and olive oil.  The zucchini-based pasta is served on a large bed of spinach.  Finding a dish like this in the middle of Iowa is such a boon.  Surprising as it may sound, I rarely order salads at non-vegetarian restaurants.  It seems that in meat-centric restaurants, they count on flesh or animal-based cheese to be the highlight of the salads.  The actual vegetables can be on the meager side with iceberg or romaine lettuce, a few shreds of carrot, and maybe a couple of cucumber slices.  This raw meal was the opposite of that.  The flavors were fresh and vibrant, and twirling zucchini around my fork gave the meal body.  I liked how the spinach wilted in the sauce as I ate it, breaking it down, and soaking it in flavor.

Roasted Sweet Potato & Wild Rice –$8.50

My husband ordered the Roasted Sweet Potato & Wild Rice salad and had them make it as a wrap.  Large, roasted chunks of sweet potatoes and wild rice were tossed in spices and served with spinach in a tortilla.  My husband was surprised that the roasted sweet potatoes and rice were served cold since they are cooked ingredients, but enjoyed it otherwise.  (They mention in the menu that all wraps can be toasted upon request, and that would probably warm those cold ingredients.)  Although it wasn’t mentioned in the menu, they added hummus to the wrap, which he liked a lot and felt it unified the wrap in terms of flavor.

I’m sure we’ll be back to Fresh Café & Market on a future trip to Des Moines.  In the middle of Iowa, it’s exciting to find this kind of truly healthy fare.  True to its name, the vegetables popped.  That said, if you’re in a rush, be aware that everything is made to order, and there can be a bit of a wait.

Fresh Café & Market is located at 1721 Twenty Fifth Street Suite 110, West Des Moines, Iowa.  Their hours are Monday-Thursday 11-7, Friday 11-5, and Saturday 11-3.

Happy birthday, Red Avocado!

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It’s hard to believe that 12 years have gone by since The Red Avocado, the lone vegan restaurant in the state of Iowa, opened its doors.  12 years.  I remember my twelfth birthday.  The year was 1987.  We were in the midst of the Iran Contra Affair and Jim Bakker scandal, Some Kind of Wonderful hit the silver screen, and my favorite t-shirt was bright purple and emblazoned with an image of Macho Man Randy Savage.  (Catch phrase: Oh, yeah…)  It was the year that Baby Jessica was rescued from the well (President Reagan’s favorite catch phrase…  Get it?  Well?  Let’s move on.)  That is to say, there was a lot of stuff happening in the world.  But time flies faster than Princess Bride quotes at a Ren Fair.  Now that cozy yet sophisticated bearer of plant-based cuisine is reaching the end of its tween-years.  (It almost makes you want to squeeze its dimpled cheeks and coo, “I remember you when you were this big…”)

In many ways the Red Avocado exemplifies the best parts of Iowa City – its setting in a comfortable old house and a menu that focuses on what is seasonal and organic.  The menu evolves throughout the year.  It’s not unusual to see scapes or oyster mushrooms at the farmers market only to walk a block up the street and see it listed on their specials menu for the day.  However, it’s also a unique gift to the area, because a person would have to make a four hour drive to reach another entirely vegan restaurant.  But as luck would have it, the Red Avocado isn’t just Iowa’s best vegan restaurant by default.  It is also a wonderful restaurant in its own right.  Their hours change depending on the time of year, but it’s a great place to go for a meal – day or night.

Sailor’s Plate - $10

French toast on the Sailor's Plate

For brunch when it’s too early to start making decisions, I love their sailor’s plate.  It’s a sampling of their brunch items, and it gives the diner an opportunity to find some new favorites for future taste escapades.  There’s the caraway tempeh and pickled cabbage from their reuben, tofu scramble, black beans and barley from their breakfast burrito, home fries, and as breakfast for dessert, mouthwatering French toast.  The preserves that adorn the top take this crisp-on-the-outside and soft-on-the-inside treat to the next level.

Breakfast Burrito - $7.25

When I’m more willing to commit, their filling breakfast burrito in a whole wheat tortilla and packed with tofu, vegetables, black beans, salsa, and cilantro fits the bill nicely.  It’s spicy without having too much of a kick for the morning.

When the clock hits noon, I like to start with a cup of their soup of the day.  (In this case it was asparagus dill.)  With their focus on what is local and seasonal, it means the soup is ever-changing.  It tastes fresh and vibrant, as if it was made at home with items fresh out of the garden.

Iowa BBQ Tofu Platter - $8.50

For the entrée I like their Iowa BBQ Tofu platter with lightly fried tofu covered in a savory barbecue sauce and placed on corn cakes with a chipotle slaw.  The barbecue sauce is not too sweet and balances the flavor of corn cakes.

White Bean Paté - $4.75 small (pictured) | $9 large

For dinner, their white bean pate made with cilantro and lime juice and served with delicate pita triangles makes for a tasty starter that sates the appetite temporarily without being overly filling.

Smoky Sunset - $18

To my mind the star of the dinner menu is the Smoky Sunset.  Succulent tempeh in a cilantro-lime sauce is served on a bed of greens with oven-roasted sweet potato fries.  The fries are covered in a chipotle aioli that is so good it could be slathered on a shoe and would make for a pretty good meal.  (But I’d advise going with the fries instead.  You’ll need your shoes on the walk home.  The snow can get deep in Iowa.)

Up for a celebration?  If you’re in the area, they’re having a party tonight with live music, complimentary chips and salsa, iced tea, and chocolate cake.  Full details are on their Facebook page.  So here’s to Red Avocado on their twelfth birthday.  If they’re anything like I was, they’re probably asking for CD’s of Belinda Carlisle and Debbie Gibson….  Consider this a birthday gift.

Steamed White Seitan and a Giveaway!

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Find out how you can win this halter-style tank top at the bottom of this post.

I’m proud to announce that I recently received a long sought after vegan merit badge.  What?  You haven’t heard of vegan merit badges?  Oh, yes, it’s just like the Girl Scouts, but without the cute little uniforms and cookie drives.  There’s a badge for pressing tofu and for flaxseed prowess.  There’s a badge for excellence in kale steaming, cookbook collecting, and obstacle course badges for braving hills and subways to retrieve vegan cupcakes.  There’s even a companion animal-caretaker award, which I received for dutifully providing nutritional yeast flakes to my cats.  But it wasn’t until this week that I finally completed the final badge on the list: the seitan-making badge.  While I’ve used vital wheat gluten (the protein-rich flour that is essential for easy-to-make seitan) in chickpea cutlets and veggie burgers, I had never made my own traditional seitan.

For those of you who might be unfamiliar with seitan, it is chewy wheat-meat that can be used in stews, pot pies, sandwiches, stir-fries…   Really, the possibilities are endless.  It’s soy-free (unless soy sauce is used to flavor the wheat meat), and it has a really satisfying, dense texture.  I’d heard consistently good things about the steamed white seitan in Viva Vegan, and I decided it would be the perfect recipe for my maiden seitan voyage.

First, I had to make dough using vital wheat gluten flour (available in most natural grocery stores), vegetable broth, garlic, and spices.  Then I broke it into four loaves and wrapped the loaves in aluminum foil.  I steamed the loaves for a half an hour and let them rest in the refrigerator until the next day for maximum chewiness.  At that point, the seitan could be used in any way that tickled my fancy.

Steaming the seitan loaves

I marinated half of the seitan for arroz con seitan from Viva Vegan, which Terry Hope Romero refers to as “a veggie tribute to the enduring Hispanic dish (arroz con pollo) that lets the chicken cross the road for yet another day.”  I changed up some of the vegetables for the dish, based on what I already had in my refrigerator.  This filling dish was fantastic with lots of delicious spices, and I’ll definitely make it again.  FYI, it also reheated well the next day for lunch.

Later on in the week, I used the second half for some decadent comfort food – an improvised recipe for battered and fried seitan with mashed potatoes and greens.  The seitan held up well for frying, and this would be a good dish to make for non-vegetarians in your life who want a crispy centerpiece on their plate.

Making this seitan was easy and fool-proof.  I will certainly make it again, even if it turns out that there aren’t any “vegan badges” after all…

A spicy black bean scramble from The Red Avocado

Since today is the final day of Vegan MoFo, I’m having a giveaway on my blog for a halter-style tank top from Iowa’s lone vegan restaurant, The Red Avocado.  I wrote about The Red Avocado last December in an Iowa City travel post.  The Red Avocado offers delicious dinners that are perfect for a relaxing evening out with a glass of wine and the kind of quality food you’d expect to find in a much larger city.  However, as good as their dinners are, my favorite meals there are brunches.  Their specials are always unique and full of flavor.  They have scrumptious crepes, scrambles, soups, sandwiches, and more.

This new halter is pale blue and a size medium.  (Although, it runs small.)  This giveaway is international.  To win, just leave a comment on this post before Saturday, December 4th at midnight.  I’ll announce the winner on Sunday.  Check back to see if you’ve won!

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