Sunday brunches at Radical Eats are a sensationally mad affair. It's $12 for an all-you-can-eat buffet of vegan and gluten-free food — which is normally quite pricy in restaurants and stores — and the crush of people happy to have their gluten-free cake and eat it too is a sight to behold.
The small space off Fulton housing Radical Eats used to be a popular taqueria. And on mornings like this, it's easy to see that the spirit of the taqueria still thrives: Migas are scooped in bright yellow spoonfuls from one chafing dish, while plump tamales are doled out from another. Neither contains actual eggs or lard, but they're wolfed down by diners as if they were the real thing. In fact, one of Radical Eats's unofficial slogans is: "Don't tell anyone it's vegan."
And you'd be hard-pressed here to tell, as most of the dishes celebrate their vegetable-based origins instead of trying to mimic meat. As a result, the food is deliciously vibrant — it's easy to taste the spinach, the mushrooms, the Hatch chiles, the avocados, the okra and the other farmers' market-fresh ingredients that Radical Eats uses in its cooking, because they aren't masked by an excess of textured-vegetable protein or other meat substitutes.
My dining companion that morning was a recovering vegetarian, one who's firmly back aboard the Omnivore Express, and he wasn't too thrilled that I'd taken him to a vegan/gluten-free restaurant for brunch.
"I bet they won't even have pancakes," he muttered in the car as we pulled up. As fate would have it, Radical Eats didn't only have pancakes, it had chocolate chip pancakes. And, as a special surprise (and the only gluten-based item on the menu that day), it had excellent French toast as well, made with Slow Dough bread and served with bright agave syup. My dining partner was gobsmacked.
I get the sense that most people who see the vast brunch buffet and taste Radical Eats's food are similarly surprised by the breadth and depth of its offerings. People piled crazily on top of one another at the buffet table that morning, filling their plates over and over again until the food was gone.
The restaurant often runs out of food by 1 p.m., and suggests you get there early. I would heed this advice, as it gets busy fast. We piled atop one another in the restaurant, too: The small space still has the same layout as it did when it was a taqueria, but it lends the dining room a homespun vibe and the sense that you're eating with your extended family, or chowing down in the mess hall at camp.
In fact, being at Radical Eats feels a little like you've escaped Houston for the day — even though it's two exits north of downtown off I-45 — with its plain-Jane vegetable garden out back and dusty, bumpy roads that lead you to its welcoming front door.
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"I can't believe this. I just can't believe this," my friend Jody kept repeating as we walked into Radical Eats one sunny Wednesday afternoon. The cafe was unusually quiet, and owner Staci Davis — whose bright presence usually greets guests — was nowhere to be seen. It was the first day of the new season of Urban Harvest's City Hall Farmers Market, and Davis was revisiting her roots back at the market. For a very long time, you could only get Radical Eats's famous vegan tamales at Urban Harvest markets, which is where Davis first got her start.
That's also how most people, including my friend, know Davis. To be able to finally eat Davis's food in an actual sit-down restaurant is a thing of awe for many, Jody among them. She was surprised to learn that Radical Eats had a storefront, and that the menu has been vastly expanded to include a whole host of other vegan and gluten-free offerings. We launched straight into the menu, as Jody — who specializes in vegan and gluten-free baked goods — cheerfully examined all of the offerings.
Minutes later, we were sitting at a shockingly pink table slurping freshly-made aguas frescas from wide-mouthed Bell jars. Jody had poured herself a watermelon from the selection of bottomless drinks that sit, iced down, on the counter near the cash register. I was contentedly slurping up a lemonade that wasn't quite as sweet as previous incarnations here, but was refreshing nevertheless. The drinks are always bottomless here, and if you bring champagne during brunch, Radical Eats will even do a set-up for you. The place is in the process of obtaining a liquor license, though, and hopes to add a full biergarten out back alongside its garden in the fall months.
