NY: GustOrganics - restaurant, baby food and bar

GustOrganics has opened its doors in New York’s Greenwich Village as the city’s first certified organic restaurant and the first restaurant to promise 100 % USDA certified organic ingredients in the USA. GustOrganics offers three meals a day in a bright, airy, organic and green space featuring a clean and rustic décor. The restaurant serves Latin-influenced dishes reflecting native Argentine owner Alberto Gonzalez’s general view: food should be tasty first and organic second. GustOrganics also started delivering organic baby food throughout Manhattan and opened the first USDA certified organic bar. 

The airy restaurant is open for breakfast, lunch, brunch and dinner which can be enjoyed for take out, delivery, or dining in. The dinner menu changes daily based on local produce offerings. It includes flat-bread pizza, empanadas, pastas and open-flame grilled steaks. Gonzalez believes in grilling as the ideal preparation method for most of the food since it is cooked very quickly, so that it doesn’t lose its nutrients. Other offerings including traditional Argentinean breakfast pastries called Media lunas, a house-made dulce de leche ice cream and fresh, all-natural smoothies that are the typical Argentines’ way of starting off the day with a boost of energy and vitamins. Mr. Gonzalez, who holds two business degrees, conceived of this idea almost a decade ago as he was frequently travelling to New York on business. (Picture: Grilled Vegetables Piadina)
 

GustOrganics is the first and only restaurant in the nation to claim 100 % of their ingredients as USDA certified organic. The only ingredients in the restaurant that are not certified organic are substances that the USDA doesn’t certify as organic —salt and water. To compensate, Mr Gonzalez uses pure sun dried sea salt, and puts his water through a rigorous purification process: New York tap water is run through a complex water purification machine to extract metals and then run under a UV light to remove any remaining bacteria. The result is a pure and clean-tasting drinking water that is served gratis at the table, and used in all of their cooking (picture). A carbonated version is also made in-house and offered on the menu. Of course, the restaurant composts and recycles everything.
 

The restaurant’s warm décor is a reflection of Latin-reminiscent organic simplicity—cream-washed sustainable concrete walls subtly display Argentinean hand-painted tiles and loom-woven fabrics, rugged high-back recycled wood chairs add drama, and a row of bamboo plants lines the wall behind a large communal table seating ten. The restaurant’s motto “Changing the world one meal at a time” influences everything from its ingredients to the light bulbs. The kitchen equipment is all energy efficient, the cleaning supplies all-natural, packaging is all biodegradable within 90 days, lighting is solar and from low-consumption LED bulbs, furniture is constructed from recycled and reclaimed wood from old regional barns, and energy will even be run via wind power through a new ConEd conservation project. GustOrganics is organic certified by NOFA-NY certified organic LLC and green certified by the Green Restaurant Association. NOFA-NY is an organization of consumers, gardeners and farmers creating a sustainable regional food system which is ecologically sound and economically viable.
 

“When I used to stay in New York, I found myself gaining weight, lacking energy. That was when I decided to open a restaurant like this,” Mr Gonzalez says. He did market research by stopping people on the street offering them $ 5 for 5 minutes of their time, during which he asked them about everything from organic food to what they wanted in a restaurant. All of the feedback went into the creation of GustOrganics. “I developed this concept with New Yorkers.” He continues that he doesn’t mind the higher expense for this sustainable restaurant, because he is so committed to his vision of bringing organics into the main steam and doing it in a green business way. He also encourages other restaurant owners to follow his footsteps. “I hope my concept will be copied. I encourage and help other business owners to go green and would give another restaurant my sources. I have nothing to hide. The only competition I see are companies who don’t care about people’s health and the environment.” Gonzalez welcomes the organic revolution and states that he hopes to run the restaurant 24 hours if the demand is there, and to aggressively expand to other locations in New York this year. (Picture: Penne Primavera)
 

In October 2008, GustOrganics announced that it has begun delivering organic gourmet baby meals throughout Manhattan. Each meal is created with 100 % USDA certified organic ingredients just the food served in the restaurant. Delivery of the meals is ideal for health-conscious parents who are also short on time. All baby meals arrive via a carbon-free footprint delivery to the customer’s home or business. When ordering, customers can choose between two options - the 7 day or 4 day GustOrganics baby meal supply. Based upon their order option, customers will receive one entree and one dessert daily, each one packaged individually in a biodegradable container to help preserve the environment. To guarantee that babies are eating in the freshest, most nutritious way, all meals are cooked daily and GustOrganics delivers a fresh meal to the customer’s address every single day.

The menu choices for the baby entrees include homemade meals such as zucchini, carrot & potato puree; baked squash; tenderloin beef puree; chicken breast; zucchini puree and macaroni with spinach and parmesan cream. The menu also includes baby desserts: apple or peach compota; mango, carrot, apple puree; banana & dulce de leche puree. The meals are created based upon a weekly balanced diet that includes a full variety of nutrients and vitamins. Depending upon the availability of USDA certified organic products, only one or two baby meal options are served daily. Baby meals are cooked on high-quality cookware and the restaurant uses utensils that are exclusively designated for preparing these baby foods. They are also served at the restaurant for dine in or take out.
 

GustOrganics is the first restaurant in the United States to offer and deliver USDA certified organic baby meals every day. Founder and CEO, Alberto Gonzalez, felt that it was important to provide high-quality meals for babies. “Our vision to bring organics and sustainability into the mainstream starts with the babies. My wife just had our second baby and we know organics make a difference in terms of nutrition and good health,” Mr. Gonzalez says. He received positive feedback from mothers who fed their babies GustOrganics baby meals. “Many of the mothers already ate our foods and were happy that their babies could now eat our organic meals also. All of the mothers definitely expressed how excited they were with this new addition.” Gonzalez encourages customers to try any of the restaurant’s available organic baby meals for free by calling first to place an order and then picking up a sample.
 

GustOrganics opened the first USDA certified organic bar in November 2008. The bar features a variety of certified organic standards such as wines and beers and also offers an assortment of certified organic mixed drinks, many of them created exclusively by the GustOrganics Bar. The range includes unique and exotic mixed organic drinks such as: the Dulce de Leche Martini featuring dulce de leche, espresso coffee and vodka; Pura Vida Daiquiri, with strawberries, bananas & rum; fruit drinks like the Fresquito: fresh mangos, fresh squeezed orange juice & vodka; and Rojito which features fresh strawberries, oranges and vodka. Another unique offering are the bar’s specialty fresh organic vegetable drinks such as the Basil Daiquiri, and the Pepino which features fresh cucumbers. GustOrganics Bar uses only USDA certified organic liquors and sweeteners in every drink they serve. 
 
Credits for pictures: GustOrganics, Photographer: Elbert Chu

http://www.gustorganics.com