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| Camille Lamb |
| Alex Cuevas, owner of Choices Café, enjoys Phase 2 of his grand-opening party in the garden of neighboring One World Lifestyle. |
Saturday night is usually a time for counterbalancing all the healthful food you ate during the workweek by dumping large amounts of alcohol and greasy restaurant food into your system. This past Saturday, though, more than 300 people made alternative "choices" by popping nutritious vegan hors d'oeuvres and sipping organic green juices at the three-phase grand-opening party of
Choices Vegan Café off Brickell.
Choices held a soft opening in September, but after taking customer feedback and tinkering with the menu, owners Alex and Jorge Cuevas decided it was time for a big unveiling. The restaurant partnered with two neighboring, like-minded businesses to throw the three-stop migrating bash: One World Lifestyle -- a soon-to-open Eastern imports store (in a beautiful defunct church) -- and
Brickell Hot Yoga.
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| Kerry McLaney |
| The crowd spills out onto the street at Choices' grand opening. |
The party started at 7 p.m. at the café. Having gotten word through Facebook, Meetup.com, online newspapers, and word of mouth, the crowd spilled into the street and munched on morsel after morsel of Choices' proudest menu items.
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| Camille Lamb |
| Jenny Silveira (second from right) and friends at Brickell Hot Yoga |
"I tried the chipotle wrap, the mock tuna, the jícama salad, quinoa and black bean salads, and some raw date bars," said Jenny Silveira, a Miami vegan who was introduced to Choices when she attended a recent pancake brunch at the restaurant. She added that the jícama salad was her favorite of the night. "It's awesome that people are supporting the vegan community... The scene [in Miami] has been pretty lackluster, but it seems to be gaining more momentum. There are more options now," she said, carefully avoiding abuse of the word
choices.
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| Camille Lamb |
| Patricia Olesen (far right), owner of local artisan shop Under the Mango Tree, has a laugh at Choices' grand opening. |
Around 8:30, the party migrated to the church garden next door, a serene space lit by large torches and lanterns, illuminating life-size Buddhas, snaking green plants, and a pebble-lined walkway that quickly filled with guests. The peaceful partiers dipped into buckets of sangria and sampled raw organic desserts while a drum circle broke out under a tent.
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