Not all plant-based meals are found in plant-based or vegan only restaurants. So don’t let the big picture of bacon on their website deter you from having a good meal at this local chain.
Restaurant: First Watch in Altamonte Springs, near Orlando, Florida
Dish: Brilliant Beet Toast with no egg, no cheese, and seasoned potatoes
Reading: The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan
Sometimes eating plant-based or vegan – or with any dietary differences – requires creativity and substitutions. Some people don’t like making requests. But if you want a little more variety, you’ll need to customize your order.
And breakfast is one of the easiest meals for making substitutions. Most breakfast menus allow for specific requests – how to cook the eggs, which meats or cheeses, what kind of toast. It’s not that much more difficult for diners, servers, and cooks go all in and handle requests for no egg, no dairy, or no meat.
First Watch is open for breakfast and lunch and does have a few vegan options on the menu. And with just a few changes, you can make some of the other offerings plant-based, too.
On this visit, I had planned to get the avocado toast, which I know is good. But something new caught my eye: Brilliant Beet Toast. This was avocado toast taken up a notch.
The menu listed this seasonal item as served with eggs and goat cheese. When I told the server to please hold those two items, she suggested other foods I could get instead. I chose the Seasoned Potatoes.
The potatoes smelled like what they were – fresh grilled potatoes hot off the griddle. They were tender without being mushy. And they were certainly seasoned as the name suggested. I tasted garlic, black pepper, and maybe onion powder with maybe a dash of cayenne.
However they were cooked, they were served with little crispy semi-burnt bits, which added a little more intense flavor. I have a low tolerance for heat, so while they were good, they tasted better with ketchup. It cut the heat a little bit.
For the toast, the artisan bread was thick and both crispy and chewy, the way you want toast to be. It was sturdy enough to hold up under all of the toppings. Those were beet hummus, avocado chunks, diced beets, lemon dressed arugula, and pickled onions.
The flavors were nicely balanced and a tasty mix. The hummus was a smooth blend of sweet beet and tangy tahini. The avocado was creamy, then the arugula had a slight bite and more tang. The cubed beets were slightly chilled with the same texture as cooked cubed carrots. And the pickled onions added crunch and another layer of tartness.
Though I would have liked more avocado, the whole dish had a light fresh flavor. I really liked it. And the potatoes were a good balance to the tart flavors.
While the serving was a single piece of thick toast and was filling with the potatoes, I wouldn’t say no to a second piece.
Fresh Market is a modern diner with a slight farmhouse vibe. I was seated at a two top and faced the window, for better light for taking photos. It was busy, getting busier, and there was probably music playing, though I didn’t notice.
I was seated in pretty close quarters to other diners and could have easily joined in on what sounded like a weekend job interview taking place at the table right next to me. Other than that, it has plenty of small booths and two top tables where solo diners can feel comfortable.
Could I make this at home? Yes. The biggest unknown to me is that I don’t know what the dressing on the arugula is made of. The menu said “lemon dressed” but I think there was also olive oil on the arugula. The other ingredients aren’t too hard to find, though beet hummus is unusual. But there are beet hummus recipes online. Or you could just mash beets and add some flavoring if you don’t have tahini. I think canned or jarred beets would be easiest to use. Cooking beets takes more time.
The potatoes are harder to make, I think. These are home fries, and you can buy those frozen or make your own from scratch. When I’ve made them at home, they always have too much oil. The ones at First Watch were not oily at all.
So just go to First Watch and order them there.
