Nora Grace-Flood Photo
The Redberry Basil, Fruit Roll-Up, and "Fortitude" smoothies.
The thick, tawny mason jar smoothie I ordered from The Remedy’s Cultured Cafe on State Street looked, smelled and tasted like soft, cinnamon cream — despite the fact that it was filled with liver, pancreas, blood, tongue and heart.
It also had 2.5 mg of THC, a splash of CBD and CBG, maca- and ashwagandha-infused cashew butter, coconut yogurt and banana.
I tried that drink — the so-called “fortitude smoothie” — during a work lunch with my coworkers, who were not so keen on the concept of nose-to-tail consumption as sold by the State Street cafe, which bills itself as “the healthiest place in New Haven.”
One of my colleagues at lunch, arts reporter Karen Ponzio (known around town as KP), had written about the restaurant this time last year, a few months after it had first opened its doors and brought Kratom, Kava, and THC treats out of the shadows of Brooklyn coffee shops and into the light streaming down upon America’s greatest small city.
Though KP had visited the cafe a few times before, two of us, Dereen and Laura, hadn’t been inside the bark-trimmed, kombucha-flooded, string light-saturated cafe. I had been only a handful of times, primarily with a couple of friends who drop by for THC-drenched drinks on their days off.
As we scanned the menu, warnings in hushed voices were exchanged about avoiding foods that could trigger stomach upsets in those with more sensitive digestive systems.
I had told my colleagues in advance that I would test out the raw liver on their behalf in a valiant attempt to extract attention from our readers. When the time came to follow through on that self-declared challenge, I bailed, instead agreeing to try a powderized form of organ meats — by purchasing it as a “nutritional add-on” dubbed the “nose-to-toe blend” for a smoothie I could drink through a straw.
I tossed in a cocktail of cannabinoids, a “Cloud9 add-on” titled “Bliss.” A touch of THC and 10 mg each of cannabidiol and cannabigerol could help compensate for my straight liver cop-out, I figured.
My co-workers, meanwhile, opted for other better-known health-conscious treats: Avocado toast, cinnamon bread, lavender lattes, and fruit smoothies — specifically, the “redberry basil” and “fruit roll-up.”
Despite the common perception of lavender shots and avocado toasts as trendy millennial fare, KP took one swig of her latte and proclaimed it “so good, it tastes like something my grandma would make.”
KP borrowed a mantra from food journalist Michael Pollan: “Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.”
“Oh, I’m so fucked,” my colleague Dereen, whose family is from Kurdistan, said of that rule of thumb.
“The ethos is thinking about what you’re putting in your body,” Laura reflected. The irony there, she noted, was that most of the nutritional remedies touted by Cultured Cafe were new to her. Another message was buried underneath that ostensible ethos, as Laura put it: “You’ve probably never put this in your body, but why don’t you try it?”
Nearly every menu item touted health advantages.
The cinnamon toast, for example, was made with “gut healthy prebiotic sugar.”
What could that possibly mean? we wondered. Luckily, those working at the cafe were happy to offer an explanation.
“It’s xylitol,” chef Vinny Crotta said. “It’s in a lot of sugar-free gum and toothpaste.”
Xylitol didn’t seem like an ingredient my grandmother would’ve been familiar with.
The reason that alternative sweetener has health advantages, Crotta said, is because “it’s like rat poison for bad bacteria in your mouth … The bacteria eat the xylitol first and then they don’t release the acid that makes your teeth decline.”
Despite the presence of xylitol, the toast just tasted like a classic childhood treat: Cinnamon and honey spread over good bread, in this case, Atticus’ multigrain sourdough.
The avocado toast, which came with two slices per order, was also a hit.
“This is probably the most generous amount of avocado I’ve ever seen on an avocado toast,” KP said. The toast included a base avocado spread atop of which were thick slices of avocado, a generous dousing of balsamic vinegar, and pistachio salt.
That vinegar, Laura observed, was in keeping with the central motif of acidity as a key component of the menu, “while a little more of a low key option for the digestively challenged.”
Laura Glesby on the fruit roll-up: Too sour.
The smoothies, on the other hand, proved a bit too tart for some.
Dereen and Laura had selected fruit smoothies blended with water kefir and coconut yogurt.
“I’m not loving the coconut yogurt after-taste. It’s a little too sour,” Laura confessed.
Though I had been nervous about the nose-to-tail, the first sip of my smoothie was a relief. Rich, smooth, and sweet, I could find no hint of organ meat.
“Organ meat is some of the most nutrient dense food you can consume,” Crotta told me. “It’s a little hard to get more people to eat it because it’s strong tasting and a little off-putting.”
The powdered nose-to-tail, he suggested, “is a good way to incorporate organ meats into your diet without the taste.”
Laura, a vegan, refused to taste my meat-laced milkshake. KP, who avoids red meat, also declined the offer.
Dereen was game following my rave review.
But one slurp later, a visceral shudder stretched across her face.
“I taste the animal!” she cried. “I swear, I taste the animal! It’s like a buttery animal.”
While Dereen sought to get the memory of ground-up pancreas out of her mind, the rest of us were enjoying the slate of calming concoctions in front of us.
“This tastes heavenly — like a soft breeze of spring,” KP poeticized about her lavender latte. That prompted Laura to purchase her own latte as an afternoon energy boost.
“I feel so chilled out,” she reported after downing the beverage.
Probably, Dereen pointed out, “because there’s no caffeine in it.” Just lavender and oat milk.
“There’s no caffeine?” This time it was Laura’s turn to cry.
I, in the meantime, found myself slipping into a state of sleepiness. I glanced up and saw a ceiling adorned with string lights, painted stars and cotton clouds. A few drops of CBD and THC tinctures in my smoothie were just enough to make the faux-night sky mesmerizing.
Despite some of our earlier inhibitions, none of us left lunch with an upset stomach. Rather, we departed Cultured Cafe feeling full and nourished — from nose to tail.
Cultured Cafe's avocado and cinnamon toasts.