Sitting on Berkman Drive in Windsor Park, a bright blue house with a ‘60s diner-style interior with multiple stylized rooms — one full of owl paintings and statues — serves up vegan food to all Austinites. Counter Culture, a vegan restaurant owned by Susan Davis, reopened this September at a new location after being closed for several years, just in time for World Vegan Month.
When Davis moved back to Austin in 2009, she wanted to give Austin better vegan options, leading her to open vegan restaurant Counter Culture on Caesar Chavez in 2012.
Counter Culture features a diverse, fully vegan menu. For starters, the Asian BBQ seitan skewers come served over slaw. The seitan, a common meat substitute made of wheat gluten, felt rubbery and dense with a heavy wheat aftertaste. Despite the savory marinade for the seitan, the oven preparation and underlying wheat flavor did not make for a great combination.
The buffalo mac balls hit the mark. The crispy panko coating surrounds the mac and cheese, drizzled with their Buffalo sauce. A side of the ranch made from blended tofu and soy milk comes together to create a rich, creamy and tangy bite that rivals any other dairy-based recipes.
For the mains, the Philly seitan “cheezesteak” sandwich comes out hot, crammed full with seitan, onions, peppers and their house steak sauce all covered with cheese sauce on a soft hoagie. While the restaurant succeeds in replicating the texture of a Philly cheesesteak, the seitan flavor again detracts from the overall taste with the cheese sauce adding only saltiness, lacking in flavor depth.
Counter Culture also offers a BQQ jackfruit quesadilla with kidney beans, cashew cheese, kale, onion and pickles topped with their avocado lime sauce. The jackfruit offers a smokey and salty tang balanced out by the bright, acidic avocado lime sauce and pickles. Despite the absence of a traditional quesadilla cheese pull, their jackfruit quesadillas capture the quintessential flavors.
The dessert options come in strong with a buttermilk pie topped with strawberry sauce and turtle cashew “cheezecake.” While the buttermilk pie does not give the flavor of a traditional slice, it achieves its own version from coconut milk and blended tofu that makes for a silky, light and sweet bite. The strawberry sauce anchors the dish and helps cut through the dense crust. The turtle cashew cheesecake stood out, made from coconut milk and sweetened with dates. A chocolate slice topped with cashews and a chocolate drizzle gives an indulgent, classic dessert last bite.
While certain dishes struggle flavor-wise in terms of preparing and incorporating the flavor of the meat substitutes, Counter Culture serves dishes that provide a simple, truly satisfying food experience for everyone, vegan or not.
3½ stars out of 5
