Happy birthday, Lisa & A Review of Vegetate Restaurant

Last night a few of us went out for my friend Lisa's birthday. We started at a restaurant called Vegetate, over on 9th Street. My rating is one and a half thumbs up, and the half down is because of the service.

The restaurant is a converted rowhouse, sparingly decorated. I liked the simplicity, but the lighting could have been more romantic. I'm sure they probably use really low-wattage light bulbs because of their eco-friendly attitude, but unfortunately those bulbs aren't quite there yet when it comes to throwing really pleasing light.

Anyway, we went upstairs and had a drink at the bar before our table was ready. Their drinks were expensive, but really extraordinary. They use herbs and roots and fresh-squeezed juices in all of their specialty cocktails. I got the Gin & Ginger with real fresh ginger and it was amazing. Other drinks were a thyme and lemon martini, homemade ginger ale, stuff like that. While it actually didn't take all that long to prepare the drinks, it took the guy FOREVER to take our order (even though we were the only ones at the bar), so that was the beginning of the sub par service.

Even though the reservation was for 8:30, they didn't seat us until almost 9:30, which did not please the birthday girl, and again, I found a little ridiculous considering the place wasn't even that crowded and we were only a party of seven. But we did get the top floor room to ourselves, which was fun. The music was waaaaay too loud, oh well.

We ordered appetizers and main courses and all were delicious. The entire party ordered all vegan and trust me, you didn't feel like you missed out because there was no meat. The food was excellently flavored and presented in a really pretty way. I had wild rice cakes with cabbage and mushroom ragout with sautéed winter greens. But what I would really recommend would be the crispy risotto croquettes, they were fantastic.

Our waiter was really pushy trying to get us to order more (he actually shamed Debra into ordering some soup by laughing at her and saying her choice was way too small) and calling it a pathetic birthday party because we didn't order dessert. When we'd ask for things like our missing accompaniments or more water, he'd freak out and be like, "It's coming, everything's coming, just wait a second!" and flail around. It just wasn't polite.

But all around, it was really great, Lisa's friends were SO cool and funny. We all shared our food so we could try everything, the conversation was excellent, I had a great time. Which is a good thing considering the whiny baby mood I was in just prior! I love love love meeting new people so it was just the ticket, and it was so nice being with Lisa on her day.