It has been shut down most of the past two years because of the pandemic but had offered a menu featuring such dishes as black oak acorn bread, venison and mushroom stew, dandelion soup, and manzanita cider. “Having this inclusive space for us, it widens the spectrum of the different celebrations that can take place instead of Thanksgiving,” said Lopez, who does not celebrate Thanksgiving.Ĭafé Ohlone is a restaurant dedicated to reviving the Indigenous food traditions of the Ohlone people of the San Francisco and Monterey Bay regions. Her family has its own native food traditions, including making fry bread. Admission is open to all and is free.Īndrea Lopez, a second-year student at UC Santa Cruz whose family is in the Lakota Tribe, is looking forward to attending.

There will be a conversation and cooking demonstration led by Vincent Medina and Louis Trevino, founders of Café Ohlone, a cultural space and restaurant serving Ohlone cuisine reopening soon in Berkeley. This year, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the event will be held online Nov. IndigeThanx, an annual event sponsored by UC Santa Cruz’s American Indian Resource Center and Cowell Coffee Shop, offers an alternative.

When looking back on the destruction that later came to Indigenous people, some have no desire to honor the colonizers. I wish we’d have more time in Los Angeles (2 weeks is not long enough!) to come back so I could try some other dishes on the menu, as I have noticed that sometimes the best veggie burgers are not found in all-vegan restaurants, and sometimes the best all-vegan restaurants do a lot better on other menu items than the veggie burger.Not everyone wants to celebrate Thanksgiving, a holiday that recalls a 17th-century feast shared by Wampanoag people and English pilgrims. I would love to hear what others liked about it, since I feel like I must be missing something, or maybe my taste is just very different (or I’ve been spoiled by some seriously stellar veggie burgers?).īut my omnivorous boyfriend, cheerfully game for another vegan restaurant adventure with me, absolutely loved the “Humble” Indian Curry Bowl that he ordered – so Café Gratitude must be doing something right to win over an avid-meat-eater like that! It was a decent burger, definitely higher quality than the average veggie burger from a non-vegan restaurant, but I think it was too over-hyped for me. Overall, I was a bit underwhelmed with Café Gratitude’s veggie burger (especially for $13…). And again, like the patty, there were not enough toppings to match the oversized bun! I think the mustard sauce and spicy chipotle ketchup just got absorbed into the mushy patty and bready bun, as I only tasted a hint of them. The pickles were nice, but there weren’t many of them, so I was only able to taste them in a couple bites. The toppings were pretty simple: lettuce, tomato, raw red onion, and pickled cucumbers. I wish it had been larger, as it seemed surprisingly small to be paired with such an oversized bun! It was also a bit mushy, and I thought it would have benefited from a crispier outside or some other texture mixed in. The patty itself was much better – a tasty blend of beans and spices. And it was so filling I could not eat it all, and resorted to eating the second half of my burger as an open-faced sandwich, removing the top half of the bun. This bread was pretty great quality bread, but it was far too large and thick for the size of the patty and toppings! Unfortunately, all I could taste in the first few bites (in most bites, actually) was bread. The burger arrived on a hearty, whole grain bun. The veggie burger is described as “magical” on the menu, which made me smile (all of the menu items get their own creative adjective). I was really excited to try the veggie burger at Café Gratitude, because numerous people had recommended this restaurant to me as one of the best vegan spots in L.A.!

Cafe gratitude santa cruz