la.foodblogging

I haven’t ever really “live blogged” a meal before, but I am here at the Bergamot Cafe with my laptop and a meal, so why not?

The Bergamot Cafe is in Bergamot Station, at the end of Michigan Avenue in Santa Monica. I was tipped off to the cafe by my mom who ate here one one of her trips to an art exhibit.

I got here just before the lunch rush, before noon and didn’t have to wait in line. It’s counter service, you order at the register and get a table number for them to bring out the food. I’m a big fan of this format for casual lunches. I don’t always like to have full waiter service and also don’t like to have to wait at a window for my number to be called. Yes, I know that this style of service exists all over, isn’t new and is not really special, but I though I would mention it.

I ordered a turkey meatloaf sandwich and a cup of winter squash soup (of course). The food actually got here before I had time to boot up my laptop, so I’m sipping soup between keystrokes. I’m also a chronic eavesdropper on conversations around me, and there are some good ones in an environment like this. Not only are there professional artists and office workers from the studios around the neighborhood, but the cafe has a large patio where I think people are comfortable projecting their conversations across the space.

The soup is gone, I finished it. The winter squash wash clearly butternut. It is spiced with a little cinnamon and maybe some clove? It was delicious and great on a rainy day, although butternut squash seems to by the default soup around this time of year. It used to seem so decadent and now everyone, myself included, whips up a batch when the temperature drops below 70 in southern California. The other option was a lentil soup, which I generally like, but is also rather pedestrian.

On to my turkey meatloaf sandwich, which I am a good eight bites in to. The sandwich is sizable, good thing I only had some yogurt for breakfast. Wow, this is some good turkey meatloaf. Moist and thick in the sandwich with a nice aoli spread. What the heck is this? Why bother with a tomato if it’s mostly green and crunchy, there’s already lettuce in the sandwich to take care of that end of things. Tomatoes are so far out of season, I would understand if they aren’t on the menu. Oh well, easy problem to fix and the sandwich is great, one of the better turkey meatloafs I have had. Yum, red onions too, I like those.

The sandwich comes with a side salad with a slightly creamy balsamic dressing. There are lots of “yuppie greens” as my wife calls them. I must be a yuppie because they agree with me, even the bitter red stuff. I’m a cup of soup and half a sandwich in, debating if I should pretend to be on a New Year’s diet, of just push through and stuff myself and go home and nap. It’s turkey, thats like eating vitamins, right? I just dropped a piece of lettuce into the napkin on my lap and picked it up and ate it, how’s that for some mundane detail?

Sounds like some Yahoo folks are here. OK, I just started the second half and I was wrong, the tomatoes aren’t totally green, they are pretty white in places too. Still doesn’t ruin the sandwich. This would be a great place to come on a sunny day, the patio is huge and there is lots of seating. They have some awnings to shield the rain, although one just dumped a waterfall on the uncovered seats.

So, how was your New Year’s? Mine was good, fairly mellow with a trip to LACMA to see the Dali exhibit before it shuts down this weekend. This is what you and I would be talking about if you were sitting here.

The meal is winding down, I don’t think I’m going to finish, there will be a few bites of the sandwich left behind. For about $10.50 I would say that it’s a good value. Good ingredients, great meatloaf and I like that they have some home made soups available. One more thing to mention, the soup wasn’t too salty, big plus. I hate salty soup for salty soup’s sake.

I took a picture of my sandwich, but don’t have the card reader to upload it. Photographic evidence later.

Bergamot Cafe
2525 Michigan A3
Santa Monica, CA 90404
310.828.4001

By Jonah (see more of his posts). Jonah is the founder of la.foodblogging and also created Digesty, a food blog aggregator and Cheww.com, a spam free foodblog search engine.