Cafe Cultura- MoFo Post Four

Post #4 for Vegan MoFo 2013.  

   

Latte con leche

Welcome to day four of Vegan MoFo 2013! Today I would like to share more of my Puerto Rico vacation, which inspired my Latin cuisine theme for this year for MoFo. When we started planning for our trip, we began by looking for restaurant options. Many places had menus with both vegan and gluten free options. John's sister recommended a place called Cafe Cultura. She described it as having organic food and local ingredients. We took their recommendation with a grain of salt as they are not vegan or gluten free. I assumed there would be nothing for us to consume and passed the place off as a fruitless suggestion.  

I am not sure what made us think about it again, but John decided to call and see what options they had for us. We were unable to locate a website, so a phone call was our only option. I expected his call would be a dead end and we would continue our search elsewhere. Luckily, I was in for a surprise. The person he spoke to on the phone indicated that there were options for us and listed off some options. 

On our first morning we decided we would give it a try. We were unsure if they would be able to accommodate us for breakfast, but wanted to try it out for a cup of coffee. We had a back up plan if we were unable to find something satisfying for breakfast. When we walked in, the following sign greeted our entrance. I began to have a good feeling about this place. 

We choose to sit outside and our waiter was so friendly and helpful. He pointed out to us all of the vegan and gluten free selections on the menu and informed us that we were not restricted to the breakfast menu. We ordered a latte con leche and a tofu dish from the lunch menu. The plate interested me because it had sauteed fresh vegetables, a small salad, and tofu with a homemade spicy jelly. On the table was a bottle of homemade hot sauce. We would come to learn that most restaurants make their own hot sauce. Is this my kind of city or what?!?! One taste of this hot sauce and I was in heaven. If I would have been a shot glass, I imagine I would have done hot sauce shots to wake me up as opposed to coffee.

Our latte came out first and it was delightful. I was greeted with a design in my soy milk foam. The coffee was rich and creamy. It was a nice start to breakfast. Our meals came soon after and we both enjoyed our plates. John and I ordered the same thing, but he opted not to have the raspberry jelly and ordered his flavored with olive oil. His plate was delicious, but I was happy with my decision to get the jelly. The spicy jelly went well with the sauteed tofu. The vegetables were lightly cooked and crisp. The meal was a nice start to our day and filled us up as we got on the road to venture to our next location. Stay tuned for more on that....

I was so glad that we spent the time to explore this suggestion as it proved to be a delicious choice for breakfast!