St Petersburg (Tampa), FL

The Cider Press Cafe

Recently I was on tour with Caleb again, and although most of the places I was with him didn't have anything GF specific nearby, a surprising turn in Florida meant we had a great meal! Florida is, although somewhere I avoid in the summer (don't even bring up the humidity), a special place for Caleb & I, because it is where we first ever met, six and a half years ago!

As I waited for Caleb to finish soundcheck I did a local check to see what was in walking distance that I could eat. When on tour I do have tendencies to eat badly if I can't find anything helpful / no juice bars, but, to my surprise, St Petersburg was actually flush with indie places to eat for the both of us (caleb has been Vegan for a while).







Anyway, I found The Cider Press Cafe, which I guess was initially "raw" vegan for a while, but had recently started offering warm food too - still all fully vegan. Now, I like to eat veggie and even vegan, but to find somewhere that offers well done GF vegan food is so rare, so we walked straight down there!

Caleb was excited at the menu and to begin with ordered Buffalo Bites (cauliflower in house made buffalo sauce). They were tasty, but I'm not a huge fan of buffalo sauce, so I only had a couple of pieces. For our main Caleb ordered cold Pad Thai and I ordered the BBQ Jack Fruit Sandwich. It's not currently on their website menu (probably because it's been added recently) but it was BBQ flavored Jack Fruit with Coleslaw on a GF toasted bun. I also added avocado, because I add avocado to pretty much everything I eat, if I can. For those who don't know, Jack Fruit is a fruit that has a texture similar to "pulled" meat, so is often flavoured with savoury tastes, like BBQ sauce. Vegans love to eat it as a replacement to this type of meal. And, as a fruit, it is obviously GF (depending on what is added to it), so I'm always very happy when I find it on a menu.

Well, mine was DELICIOUS. I couldn't eat it fast enough. I love coleslaw on bbq and the avocado absolutely made it. I was just SO happy at finding somewhere that offered GF buns that I honestly polished off my whole plate and not slowly! Caleb enjoyed his too, but didn't eat much of it when we were there as he tries not to eat a lot before he plays a show. I've never been a big fan of pad thai, so I'm not sure I would have liked it, but he absolutely loves those type of dishes.





As we were finishing up we were told that ALL the desserts were GF & although I was stuffed we ordered a slice of Chocolate Tart and a slice of Salted Caramel Cheesecake to go for later. They were actually given to us on the house as a member of staff was a fan of Caleb's band & paid for them! So that was doubly great!

The Chocolate Tart was my choice and was very tasty indeed. I couldn't believe that it was vegan & GF. I wish I had, had something like Cool Whip to eat with it as the dark chocolate taste was very strong, but it was melt in the mouth good. The Cheesecake (Caleb's choice) unfortunately wasn't as good. It tasted like cheesecake (no idea how they achieved that being vegan) but the salted caramel was very salty and a bit overbearing for me. I wish I could have tried all their desserts, it would have been a glorious day!

Whenever I find myself in St Petersburg again, I will be sure to visit here again. And you should too.