Kindle Café
Back To Restaurants >Kindle Café is a “pop-up” eatery specializing in organic, locally sourced, plant-based cuisine. Lacking a permanent location of its own, Kindle Cafe transforms vacant spaces in the Lambertville, NJ, area into a restaurant for a night. Every other Monday Kindle Cafe prepares food for Soupҫon Salon, a collaboration between Manon restaurant in Lambertville and local artist Shawn Ellis. On Friday nights Kindle serves a four course, prix fixe menu at Rojo’s Roastery, also in Lambertville. In the true Supper Club spirit, the eatery also hosts events in homes and businesses.
Kindle approaches food with health in mind, using Ayurveda, the Indian “science of life,” as its model. According to Ayurveda, health depends largely on Agni, or “digestive fire,” and the restaurant’s goal is to kindle that flame. In Ayurveda, all foods are classified as either “light” or “heavy” for digestion. In general, meats are heavier than vegetables, beans or grains. Raw food is heavier than cooked. And preserved food is heavier than fresh. Kindle Cafe serves predominantly “light” foods and therefore predominantly vegetarian fare. Most food is, in fact, vegan. Occasionally Kindle finishes a dish with an animal product like ghee, butter or cheese, but more frequently uses a vegetable-based fat like coconut or olive oil. Eggs are served at brunch and occasionally used in dressings or desserts. Though Kindles uses honey, it uses sugar sparingly. Flavor profiles depend on the ingredients used and the inspiration behind the dish, and favorite styles include Californian, Thai, Indian, Italian and Southwestern U.S. cuisine.
Kindle Café was conceived in the belly of San Francisco’s gourmet ghetto, the Tenderloin. There, amidst the city’s most authentic ethnic restaurants, Kindle Cafe was born in a tiny studio overlooking the southern skyline. Chef Vincent Peterson, inspired by a single visit to a “blind pig” in Sebastapol, CA, transformed his home into a “secret cafe” in December, 2005, and invitations for four-course vegetarian meals on Monday nights were issued to a handful of colleagues and friends. News of a “speakeasy” or a “supper-club” spreads like honey among adventurous epicures, who march toward them like ants to a picnic. As Vince’s invitation list grew, musicians began to compliment the scene, and the transformation was complete – Kindle Café was counted among the phenomenon of “underground restaurants.”
When the business outgrew its original location, Kindle Café began to operate in several new locations throughout the Bay Area. In May, 2009, Chef Vince relocated with his wife, Carolyn Cohen, to his hometown of Lambertville. On October 5, 2009, Kindle Cafe hosted its first Supper Club in Lambertville and has since hosted over 100 events in the area.
Chef Bio: Vincent Peterson, head chef/owner
Vincent Peterson found the flavors of the Indian-owned Creative Vegetarian Café in Boulder, CO, so sublime he applied for a cooking position despite having no experience. Cooking, though, was in his blood. His grandmother was the personal chef to a doctor’s family in Trenton. His sister Peg was the chef/owner of The Cafe at Rosemont in New Jersey, where Vince worked through high school – mostly washing dishes.
At 26 Vince enrolled at the Italian Culinary Institute for Foreigners and completed its masters program after serving as an apprentice at Ristorante La Corte in Lurago d’Erba, Italy in 1998. After Italy, Vince moved to San Francisco and joined the world-renowned vegetarian eatery Millennium Restaurant, serving as lead line cook (1999 and 2000) and then sous chef (2003 and 2004) for Chef Eric Tucker.
During a break from Millennium in 2001 Vince spent a year as dinner chef at Headlands Center for the Arts in Sausalito, California. He spent 2002 traveling throughout Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos learning everything he could about South East Asian cuisine. Upon returning to the U.S., Millenium invited Vince to join their team again. The opening of its new location in the Union Square district required an expanded concept and Vince and Eric collaborated on every aspect of running Eric’s kitchen.
In 2003 Vince temporarily bid farewell to restaurants when he began work as executive chef and chef de cuisine for Back to Earth Organic Catering, a company started by Eric Fenster and Ari Derfel, who would later own and operate the Berkley, CA, restaurant Gather. Vince guided the yearly business of Back to Earth Kitchen from $86,000 to $1.3 million – all organic.
By 2005 Vince missed restaurants, so he started Kindle Café – a monthly supper club in downtown San Francisco. The name Kindle Café comes from the ancient Indian science of well-being, called Ayurveda. In Ayurveda, your health depends largely on your Agni, or “fire.” To process food properly, we must have a good fires going in our bodies.
This is the mission of Kindle Café – to kindle good fires.
A sister science of Ayurveda is yoga, which is also an important part of Vince’s life. His practice began in 1998 with Ester Myers’ book Yoga and You. He became a certified to teach Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga at It’s Yoga of San Francisco in 2003 and the dynamic hybrid practice Acroyoga in 2008. His additional study has included multiple, 10-day Vipassana meditation seminars with teacher S.N. Goenka and Kriya Yoga with Maharishi Arvind at his ashrams in Maharastra, India.
various locations in and around Lambertville, NJ
vp@kindlecafe.com
908-432-4584
www.kindlecafe.com
