I was down on Melrose to photograph some street art which of course lent itself as the perfect excuse for lunch at M Café de Chaya. But really, who needs an excuse when food this good is just a hop, skip and a jump away?

What we have here is the “Carolina-Style Barbequed Seitan Sandwich” consisting of “thinly sliced grilled seitan basted with our own zesty barbeque sauce and piled high on a house-baked whole heat bun with grilled onions, pickles, and creamy (vegan) coleslaw”. I got it with out the onions, natch, and had the peanuty kale salad on the side.

Maybe I was just really hungry after all the walking I’d just done (Highland to Fairfax thru the Melrose alleys then back up thru the alleys across the street). but everything about this meal was phenomenal. The delicious seitan was chewy and meaty, the texture reminding me a bit of Chinese restaurant-style BBQ pork (you know, the kind that’s usually some ungodly shade of florescent pink). The BBQ sauce was excellent, more on the sweet side than the spicy side but still with a nice, peppery kick to it. The bun was perfectly fresh, nicely toasted and had that wholesome goodness flavor to it. The salad was lovely too, the flavors of kale and peanut playing very well together.

I have yet to taste anything at M Café de Chaya that isn’t amazing. May that day never come.

I took an out-of-town friend by Pure Luck today, he was as excited to hear about their microbrews on tap as I am about their bbq jackfruit. Sadly they were still closed for the holidays. So instead we bucked up our chins and headed west down Melrose towards M Café de Chaya.

This yummy hunk of yum is the “Melrose Avenue Muffaletta” with: “grilled seitan, spicy seitan ‘salami’, miso-cured tofu cheese, roasted red peppers, sun-dried tomatoes, carrots, arugula & olive spread, in a sourdough boule… served by the wedge”. It was every bit as good as it sounds and looks. Very action packed!

The delicious side dish is the ‘Maple Veggies and Brussels Sprouts with Chestnuts”. I’m pretty sure that the other stuff going on in there involved eggplant, yams and adzuki beans.

This place is super trendy, expensive, and trying to find parking nearby pretty much sucks, but I love it all the same.

Mmmm… mmmm… M Cafe de Chaya. “Contemporary Macrobiotic Cuisine featuring balanced, nutritious, creative cooking … prepared fresh daily, using only the finest ingredients without any refined sugars, eggs, dairy, red meat or poultry” never tasted soooo good.

This here is the Seitan Katsu Bowl: “crispy seitan cutlet, tangy katsu sauce, shredded cabbage salad & steamed vegetables”. Very good, there’s lots of broccoli, carrots, cauliflower and brown rice underneath the cutlet.

Why resist? Inari Sushi made with brown rice and topped with Kinpira Gobo (a Japanese salad of burdock and carrot).

This was my first visit to M Café de Chaya in Hollywood and I really enjoyed it. They serve organic “Contemporary Macrobiotic Cuisine”. Rather hoity-toity and very California, I know, but don’t knock it till you try it. Everything on the menu sounded excellent, and everything I saw on other people’s plates looked lovely.

I decided to try the ‘Bi-Bim Bop’ rice bowl: “Pan-fried tofu, Korean-style vegetables, spicy miso sauce & house-made kim chee”. It was great. The different veggie toppings included kinpira gobo (a Japanese burdock root and carrot salad) as well as a pickled cucumber salad, a mushroom salad, bok choi and a number of other goodies you can’t see under all that which I can’t really identify. The spicy miso was very tasty, similar to Korean style bbq sauce.

Along with my entree I also had a carafe of iced barley tea (yum, I wish I had more with me right now)…

…and to top it all off, a flax seed and currant scone.

M Café de Chaya is not an exclusively vegetarian restaurant, but the vegetarian/vegan items do seem to be their specialties. I’d be happy to eat there again sometime, being especially intrigued by their Gado Gado with tempeh (an Indonesian salad with peanuts) as well as their Madras Tempeh Wrap which involves masala-baked tempeh and soy yogurt. If you’re doing the hipster thing and happen to find yourself hanging out down on the trendy side of Melrose (it’s just before La Brea), be sure to give this place a try.