Eat & Drink: Healthy Summer Dining

By Rick Dakan

Downtown Sarasota continues to bloom with new restaurants, but it has also seen some established eateries undergo significant shifts. Many of the changes lean into the current trend of healthier eating, with more plant-based dishes for those of us who want to cut back on the cholesterol and do our part for the environment by consuming less meat. More and more of my own diet veers vegan these days, so I’m excited to have some tasty new options.

Lemon Tree Kitchen

1289 N Palm Ave, Sarasota

(941) 552-9688

Sunday – Thursday: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Friday & Saturday: 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Sunday Brunch: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

I’d only eaten at Louie’s Modern a few times, an expensive fine dining restaurant with lovely modern decor but which never topped my list of special occasion dining. Then I recently drove by the Palm Avenue location and noticed that, seemingly overnight, Louie’s was gone and Lemon Tree Kitchen had taken its place. I was confused, sure that I’d just walked by Louie’s a few weeks earlier. Was I seeing things? How could a whole new restaurant open so quickly? I needed answers.   

“We closed Louie’s on a Sunday, brought in the whole team, and eight days later we opened Lemon Tree Kitchen,” Joe Seidensticker, CEO of Tableside Restaurant Group, explained to me. 

The company had been looking for somewhere to open a healthy dining concept for a while. “It’s a part of my lifestyle and what our group stands for. Eat well, eat right, know what you’re eating. Know your food sources. We love what’s happening in downtown and we didn’t want to have to search when it was right there for us.”

The Lemon Tree crew only started on the menu a few weeks before the remodel, and were developing dishes in the kitchen at the same time the restaurant was getting its miraculously fast facelift. “It’s all built around what we like and what we like to eat,” Seidensticker explains. “A restaurant that addresses the needs of all our guests and their diet restrictions: gluten, different diets, vegan, vegetarian, paleo. We built a menu that made everyone feel comfortable to come in to eat.”

The healthy, plant-based menu at Lemon Tree Kitchen isn’t just accommodating to different diets, it’s inventive and fun. The vegan bedeviled eggs are a visually playful twist on deviled eggs, substituting turnips for the egg white and tofu for the yolk. My favorite vegan dish was the vegan pizza, which I had with a cauliflower crust (wheat is also available of course). I was skeptical, but the cashew cream, shaved pear, balsamic vinegar and truffle toppings were as rich and delicious as any pizza, and the crust perfectly crispy. 

It’s not all vegan, and there’s something here for everyone, just as Seidensticker promised. Louie’s lives on with Louie’s Tribute Burger (Brasstown grass-fed beef, fontina/manchego, onion crisps, beef booster sauce, toasted brioche bun, and french fries). There’s Steak Frites for the carnivore and Wood-Grilled Cauliflower Steak with chimichurri sauce for the vegetarians. There’s a small brunch menu and a delicious-looking dessert list. Open for lunch and dinner, and still evolving, I look forward to trying many more of this new restaurant’s intriguing dishes.

State Street 

1533 State St, Sarasota

(941) 951-1533

Tuesday – Saturday: Lunch 11:30 am to 2:30 pm  

Dinner 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

Saturday & Sunday Brunch: 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.

State Street has undergone a constant evolution since it opened several years ago, and I’ve always enjoyed my meals there. Their latest menu embraces a host of healthy options, and the kind of mix and match featured bowls that are a bit trendy right now. The State Street menu’s graphic design isn’t doing their delicious food any favors, as it’s not clear at all that diners are meant to combine a “Protein Preference” (fresh catch, salmon, steak, pork belly, chicken, octopus, mushrooms, or tofu) with one of more than a dozen interesting “Chef’s Special Garden Selections.” Half of the garden selections are vegan, and include inventive combinations like curried calabaza squash with sticky rice, and brussels sprouts hash with Japanese mayo and duck egg. The “create your own bowls” aren’t the only option, and old State Street favorites, like the burger of the week and the decadent baked lobster mac n’ cheese, are still on the menu. And of course there’s the added appeal of the delicious and finely wrought craft cocktails, which are always a treat. After all, not everything needs to be healthy!