YUM
Ladies, shallots, and a whole lot of veggies at the Trenton Farmers Market
The farm-to-table movement in restaurant circles is well-tread territory by now. Many dining establishments make a point to acquire some, if not all, of their food from local vendors.
At Lady and the Shallot, however, the farm-to-table movement is a little on the nose.
Located in the Trenton Farmers Market, this plant-based eatery is getting its food from the farms that populate the building. You don’t get more farm-to-table than this. I mean, when the people at Pineland Farms bring their fresh veggies to the market each morning, it’s literally a 3-second walk for the owners of Lady and the Shallot to pick up most of their days selections.
It’s farm-to-table on steroids (minus the steroids, of course. Again, plant-based).
So yeah. Already I hear you, loyal readers: PLANT-BASED?!?!
Yep. Owners Francesca Avitto and Kate Wnek — who are engaged to be married, make sure you congratulate them after you scarfed down one of their portobello paninis — are a plantbased restaurant. No meat. Also no nuts. No dairy. No shellfish. No eggs.
“We do have some dishes with soy,” cautions Avitto.
How did this happen?
“We had a catering company in Princeton for three years, and then our lives started changing,” said Wnek. “We started noticing that people around us getting sick. My mother has Alzheimer’s, her mother is a breast cancer survivor, her father had open heart surgery. So we wanted to take our lives and business and combine it and do something good for everybody. That’s how we decided to be plant-based.”
Their old catering customers — think high-end Princeton — also helped push the duo into the plant food biz, noticing the change in the two once they committed to the lifestyle themselves.
“When we became healthy, a lot of our clients noted we looked and felt better and they wanted us to start cooking them healthier meals,” said Avitto. “And they loved it and they felt good, and that felt good for us. It was a lot more rewarding to give people healthy food. So we were like, let’s just give it to the world.”
And before you can say rainbow tacos — my personal recommendation, a corn tortilla with mashed avocado, roasted veggies and chickpeas purple cabbage and a lemon caper aioli — the meatless mates decided to open up shop at the Farmers Market.
That was less than three months ago. And the results thus far?
“Fantastic,” said Wnek. “We love it here. Love our customers, love the people, love the people that work here. Everybody has been so welcoming.”
Of course, there is still the hump the two need to get over when it comes to their menu.
“We get all kind of reactions,” Wnek admits. “Some people don’t consider this food, it’s not their thing, so we send them down to get some ribs (at the Hambone Opera). But try it. One lunch. We can turn you pretty quick.”
In fact, they turned Avitto’s four “large Italian brothers,” non-vegans who sampled all the menu items before they went live.
I asked what their long-term plans were, and fear not: They have them.
“We’d love to see this in many locations,” Avitto said. “We have high aspirations. Ideally, we would like to have small franchised locations in baseball stadiums, arenas, places like that where there aren’t a lot of healthy options.”
The two are full of energy and bring a tremendous youthful vibe to the market, which has been at its Spruce Street location in Lawrence for 70 years.
“The first day was terrifying. Like the first day of school,” Wnek said. “But at the end of the day, it was cool. We did it. We looked at each other and realized we just started a restaurant.”