Eve’s Garden: Every dish is a wonder

Charlotte Malakoff

Eve’s Garden Eco Café, within the recently opened Centre for Healthy Living in Hurworth Road, Highlands, offers delicious breakfasts, teas and light lunches six days a week. Occupying the wide verandah and a cosy inside room of a tastefully restored golden oldie, the café is surrounded by a park-like garden of lush green lawns, tree ferns, lavender and white Iceberg roses.
Tables and chairs are Malawi cane painted in Brunswick green. I sat in a sunny corner of the verandah, and admired the white tablecloth and table napkins embroidered with the Eve’s Garden logo.
Although I had intended to have a cappuccino and a slice of cake, the light lunch menu looked so tempting that I opted for an early lunch instead. At Eve’s Garden, the emphasis is on healthy eating, with the occasional exceptions, such as luscious chocolate, coffee and carrot cakes.
Lunchtime options include warm cous cous salad, chickpea, coriander and lime salad, baked potato served with yogurt, mint and garden greens, and soup of the day. For those requiring more substantial fare, Arrabiata and pesto tagliatelle with homemade pasta are delicious options.
A Thai beef salad or satay chicken with peanut sauce, served on brown rice should satisfy meat eaters, while those who believe that eating fish is the key to eternal youth, will enjoy steamed oriental fish with Thai vegetables, ginger, garlic and lime.
Heavenly sounding desserts such as Grecian Delight, with layers of yoghurt, toasted almonds and honey, vie with mango mousse or baked stuffed apples served with cashew nut cream.
Because I love the vegetables, pulses and grains so popular in the Middle East, and because these foods are low in fat, high in fibre and protein and have no cholesterol, I ordered Chickpea Veggie Burger, described as a vegetarian’s delight, served with garden greens and sweet chilli sauce.
The burgers were soft, mild comfort food, with the chilli sauce providing contrasting zing and zest. The salad of rocket, cucumber, carrot, tomato and finely sliced radish was fresh and crisp. A light salad dressing was available; also on hand were individual bottles of olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Homemade bread rolls, baked with sesame seeds and garnished with a sprig of dill, provided the bun for my burger.
Instead of an espresso coffee, I ended my meal with a ‘Carrot and Apple Kick-start liver reviver’, served in an elegant long glass. The advantage of an energy-enhancing meal of this kind is that instead of sinking into a somnolent post-lunch state, one actually does feel fired up and capable of achieving amazing things. In point of fact, all I did was chat to Louise Loades, resident chef of Eve’s Garden, and tour the Centre for Healthy Living.
Louise is a young Zimbabwean, who has just returned from a rigorous eighteen-month cookery course at the renowned Prue Leith Chefs Academy, in Centurion, Gauteng. Like Prue Leith, Louise loves every aspect of good food, from its preparation to serving and eating it. From small beginnings in London the 60s, South African-born Prue Leith gained a huge reputation as a chef and restaurateur and was recently one of three judges on the popular Master Chef TV series. There is every reason to expect that Louise will make a similar name for herself.
Just off the cosy sitting room of Eve’s Garden, a passage leads to the consulting rooms of a variety of health professionals. Two leading dieticians can offer you individualised programmes on ways to eat, and show you how to become healthy, well muscled and beautiful.
A massage and beauty therapist offers a variety of life-enhancing treatments and an acupuncturist will soon be available to offer ancient Chinese remedies for all aches and pains.
As I paid my bill and prepared to leave, tables on the verandah were filling up and the waitress was serving delicious looking meals garnished with delicate bean sprouts. I heard more than one diner order the carrot and apple kick-start liver reviver.
The great thing about going vegetarian at least once a week is that you can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the world’s livestock. So Eve’s Garden Eco Café is not only providing healthy, energising meals; it is also, in its own way, reducing global warming!
Eve’s Garden Eco Café
5 Hurworth Road
Highlands
Harare
Monday-Friday:7.30am- 3.30pm
Saturday: 7.30am – 12 noon
Tel: 497888, 481689
Email:ecofoodcafe@gmail.com/mailto:ecofoodcafe@gmail.com
– Comments to: cmalakoff@gmail.com