Elegant vegan dining at the Cafe Ambrosia
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Years ago, when we lived in Ohio, my husband and I would combine a winter walk with dinner at our neighborhood vegetarian restaurant. It was a funky, one-room affair with steamy windows, a disorganized kitchen and communal tables. We dined on nut burgers and bused our dishes into plastic tubs.
How times have changed. There are places in Seattle that remind us of our old neighborhood hangout - no-frills vegetarian mainstays like the Still Life in Fremont and Sunlight Cafe on Roosevelt. But now there's also a handful of more elegant spots that emphasize gourmet meals prepared with organic ingredients.
Cafe Ambrosia, a vegan (no meat, poultry, seafood or dairy products) restaurant in the old Carina Bar & Grill on Lake Union, is the latest in a growing list of Seattle restaurants pushing the envelope on healthy eating, atmosphere, presentation, and, yes, prices.
Open since October, this is an ambitious endeavor given its narrow niche, with a huge dining room and lofty prices. The tab for two with a glass of wine, appetizer, salads and dessert can easily hit $100. Nearby houseboat residents and still-feeling-rich dot-commers will be elated with the white tablecloths, candlelight, attentive service and interesting list of domestic and imported organic wines; starving artists might best stick with the Still Life.
Husband and wife team Francis and Carol Janes, committed vegetarians, have honed the dinner menu to a trio each of salads and appetizers and four entrees. Changes and an expanded menu are planned in mid-January along with special events such as nutrition workshops and cooking demonstrations.
It would have been easy to fill up on wedges of whole-wheat focaccia, surprisingly light and fine by itself without oil or butter. With the rest of the meal in mind, we passed on an herbed polenta appetizer ($7.25). The cornmeal dish seemed heavy as a starter, considering the addition of sauteed mushrooms, pine nuts and fried leeks. Better were the baked spring rolls ($7.50), four rice-flour crepes, bulging with slivers of cabbage, shiitake mushrooms and carrots, moistened with a homemade sweet and sour sauce.
Cafe Ambrosia makes much of presentation, treating each plate like a blank canvas, using basil and beet oils for color and leaning on fruits, nuts, greens and beans for textures and flavors. The red and green pear salad ($7.25) was as artful as it was tasty. Crisp Belgian endive, radicchio and baby lettuce arrived surrounded by thin slices of pears, crunchy caramelized pecans and bright red pomegranate seeds. Carrot soup ($6) was bright orange and velvety with a touch of ginger.
Thin sheets of baked whole-wheat phyllo are the building blocks for the Mediterranean Napoleon, ($18.50), a medley of grilled zucchini, red pepper, onions and eggplant served with pesto risotto, tomato sauce and a white bean pate. Deconstructed, the combo of beans and rice turned somewhat mushy, spoiling the appearance and changing the texture, but not affecting the flavor. A lighter choice was the Grilled Polenta Safari ($15.50), triangles of polenta arranged between fingers of portabellos, beans, toasted almonds and mixed greens.
As our waitress whisked away wine glasses and ran her silver crumb scraper over the table, we wondered about dessert sans dairy products. A fat and cholesterol-free Lemon Tease Cake ($7), made with millet and fresh lemon juice and sweetened with maple syrup, was a tad tart. Closer to the mark was the chocolate cake ($7) topped with a currant-cassis sauce.
Cafe Ambrosia never wavers from its vegan principles, and anyone dining here should be prepared for liberal use of soy products, including a soy creamer for coffee, Chai tea made from soy milk and a brunch menu that touts tofu scrambles and veggie sausage links. French Toast ($8) is prepared dipped in a cinnamon-flax seed-applesauce butter and topped with a warm compote of diced apples and pears.