Vegetarian Ventures: Harvest Seasonal Grill
Choosing a restaurant for dinner during Family Weekend proved to be an exceedingly difficult task. After much deliberation, I selected Harvest Seasonal Grill, located at 200 South 40th Street. Harvest is dedicated to serving seasonal, locally grown, organic, and healthy food. Everything from their recycled glass countertops to their menus made from post consumer paper is sustainable, and the long list of local family farms on the menu ensures customers that TLC goes into the making of every dish. Since I was with my parents, I had the luxury of sampling a variety of dishes.
We started with the Butternut Squash Soup, Roasted Local Beet Salad, Harvest Flatbread, and Harvest Salad (assuming that anything with the name of the restaurant in its name must be good). The Harvest Flatbread was thin, crunchy, and slightly tangy due to the combination of spices and Asiago cheese–much more like a cracker than a bread. The Harvest Salad was vibrantly colored and fresh tasting, and the roasted soybeans added a nice crunch.
The Butternut Squash soup, sweetened with organic honey and sprinkled with toasted pumpkin seeds, was by far the best appetizer. It tasted like Fall and warmed me up from the inside out. The Roasted Beet Salad was also delicious and aesthetically pleasing, a parade of crimson and golden beets laced with dollops of goat cheese and candied pecans.
For my entreé, I ordered the Brick Oven Roasted Acorn Squash. Stuffed with quinoa, topped with toasted almond slices and drizzled with brown sugar glaze, it was an extremely satisfying combination of flavors and textures. There was a slight mystery: According to the menu it was supposed to have dates and figs, but I couldn’t see or taste them.
My dad chose the Spicy Tofu Stir Fry, a flavor-bursting medley of vegetables, pineapple cubes and tofu that was sautéed to perfection, served over a bed of hearty brown rice. He was originally ambivalent about ordering this dish due to its slightly alarming name (“Spicy” is the first word), but the sweet and syrupy pineapple balanced out the spiciness of the tofu just as our waiter assured us it would.
Unfortunately, we ran out of room for dessert, but I will definitely be trying the Chocolate & Salted Caramel Mousse sometime soon.
-Sophie Litwin
Harvest Seasonal Grill
200 South 40th Street
215.662.1100