Juliano's Raw In Santa Monica - Restaurant

[Merika]

Hi,

So here is my very mixed review for Juliano's Raw Food in Santa Monica, CA. I'd read about this place a yera or two ago. It's a raw foods restaurant, that happens to also be gluten free!!! Well, tonight I found myself down in Santa Monica and thought I'd check it out. It's on 6th & Broadway.

very nice place, very $$, and kinda tricky to know what you're ordering (everything has wacky names and the waitstaff is a little vague and the "cooks" are all spanish). But as I was reassured it was all gluten-free, I didn't worry too much. Figured my 45 other allergies could somehow contain themselves for the evening if I stayed away from the big ones.

I got a fresh coconut to drink and 2 appetizers. Would've tried a yummy sounding "pizza" but it was heavily avocado which I have to avoid right now

Got home and dug in. Mmmmmmmmmmm, it was sooooooo good. I'm not into the whole raw foods movement, though I am vegetarian, and everything there is vegan It was soooo nice to eat something besides rice and cheese and beans (my daily life for the last 18 months, lol).

however, one of the items was really really rich, and I made myself eat it all because the meal wasn't quite enough food and I wanted to see how an all-raw meal sat all by itself. Ummm....well, about an hour later, felt kinda gaggy but not too bad, then cramps then D. (sigh) D is not usually one of my problems. So now I am up typing to see if I'm going to get sicker or if I can go to bed, lol. (sorry for tmi)

Seeing on how I am tomorrow, I may check out the restaurant's cookbook. the first thing I ate was a yummy faux "fried" wonton thing where the wrapping was dehydrated butternut squash and the filling was some nut thing, and the sauce was just delicious. I usuallly do not rave about food! And food that made me slightly sick too, lol!

So far, I'm ok - this is the first restaurant food I've eaten in over a year, so I guess it's not too suprising my body is in shock, lol.

Has anyone else here tried the place? What did you think?

Merika

[Merika]

Ok, so I slept great and the next day was great, and I'm getting the cookbook, lol

Merika

[wheatfree-meatfree]

I ate there last year with my wife and some friends. It was our first raw meal, and we had a similar ordering experience, but knowing that it was all vegan we went for it. What a great dinner! Since then we've bought their 'uncook book' and use it a couple times a month. Whenever we have someone over for a raw meal I let them know that they will probably experience, what I like to call "Rapid Digestion."

The tummy starts rumbling and you process your food rather quickly. It must be all the enzymes (that were never cooked out of the food) aiding in digestion.

Raw meals are the only gluten-free meals that energize us, right after eating and through the following day.

Our favorites are the fettucine alfredo and the nut loaf ('not' meatloaf).

The desserts are fantastic. I made the coconut fudge cookies a few weeks ago and I was very pleased.

Just this weekend I stopped in to see the newest Whole Foods, south of Denver, CO. They don't have as much gluten-free foods as my local WF but I was very suprized to see that they were preparing some Raw Vegan foods for eat-in and take out. I didn't tried them (because I was on my way to try Wholly Tomato - YUM! ) but the finished product looked like some of Juliano's recipes.

I hope more WF's stores start doing that.

I like the idea of eating out more.

[Merika]

Yeah, so I've made several things out of the cook book and they have all been DELICIOUS And, I did NOT have any er rapid digestion (LOL, great term), but possibly because I ate it as part of a meal or a snack.

The cookbook is not 100% gluten-free (like the restaurant) but it's mostly gluten-free.

Yea, gluten-free!

Merika