105 Degrees

Dear nature goddesses, sprites, fairies, organic hippie chefs, and pretentious smoothie makers: I'm still hungry. I know it's not entirely nice to levy ad hominem attacks at raw food chefs or the types of personalities I associate them with (I lump them in with nymphs and elves and other nonsensical, not-reasonably-grounded-in-reality personalities). Today, my parents and I went to 105 Degrees, "Oklahoma's Premiere Raw and Living Foods Destination." For a variety of reasons, it was mediocre to downright disappointing. The prevailing indicator of its mediocrity was the overwhelming ethos of superiority permeating the entire mediocre place. Bad service, poor, pretentious food, badly spiced drinks and dishes. Aesthetically pleasing, yes, but not remotely substantive or creatively or capably crafted food.

Despite my equating the craft of raw food production with Lord of the Rings mythology and card games adolescent boys play for hours, I admire it. Two of my most memorable meals in San Francisco were at either raw food or vegetarian establishments. There, the food, not the restaurant was virtuous.

My dad and I first ordered bloody mary's made of tomato, horseradish, fresh cracked pepper, and sake. The premise was irresistible, but the execution was elementary. The drinks were complemented with caraway seeds but there were so many, it tasted like a tomato juice/caraway seed smoothie. I was already a bit grumpy and had the gall to ask the waiter why my dad and I didn't get the fancy flourish of the celery greenery in our drinks like the lady at the table over did. Classic childishness, but the tone had been set.

We ordered the red corn nachos, with salsa, guacamole, red pepper cheese, and micro cilantro as an appetizer. Micro herbs aside, it was good. The "chips" were thin crackers and were served among a very delicious guacamole and pico de gallo (not salsa) and spreadable cheese. I didn't let the irony of its similarity to Easy Cheese occupy my thoughts for too long, for my own sanity.

I got my entree, which was ridiculous. A place that serves both micro herbs and foam as an accompaniment ceases to be useful or rational to me. My entree, the Macro, had neither micro herbs or foam but instead featured (and none of the waiters could properly explain the composition): wilted sesame spinach (with sesame oil and seeds), sweet "coconut rice" (coconut meat and jicama), hijiki (seaweed with a tahini dressing), "kimchee," tofu pieces, and tamari almonds.

It was beautiful and the tofu, almonds, and spinach were delicious, but those would be hard to mess up as they are essentially their basic essence. The "rice" was dry. The "kimchee" was just pickled red cabbage. That's like calling cool whip on instant pudding a souffle. It had none of the complexity of kimchee, a Korean dish of fermented cabbage with varying proportions of garlic, onion, ginger, and sometimes cucumber. The seaweed was not interesting. I ate only half of my not-very-full dish and my waiter was not curious why.

My dad ordered the Asian Chopped Salad, with Napa cabbage, watercress, mango, chili, ginger, and sesame sticks. It was beautiful but heavy on the cabbage.

My mom ordered the Tropical Fruit Crepe with mango, pineapple, bananas, agave, and mint. Her's was in fact delicious.

But probably not as the delicious Sonic Chili Dogs that will comprise lunch #2 later today.