Beans & Barley
Restaurant, Grocery/Bakery/Deli, General Store
Profile
$ - inexpensive
American
Veg-friendly restaurant, deli and grocery store
A neighborhood "specialty" grocery store for the East Side and greater Milwaukee, where you can find everything you need — from fresh produce to "fresh" greeting cards, imported shortbread to organic frozen dinners, and from wine to fresh-squeezed carrot juice!
An "all-homemade" deli, whose soups, desserts and vegetarian specialties (consistent award-winners) — are waiting to be taken home to dinner, seven days a week.
It's a health food store with hundreds of products — vitamins, supplements and food products, bath and body-care items, homeopathies, books — and a staff of people that can help you find what you need.
The restaurant seats eighty people, serving breakfast, lunch and dinner seven days a week, with a menu of good, healthy homemade food — including vegetarian and non-vegetarian specialties, beer and wine
Near the corner of North and Oakland Avenues.
- (Mostly) Organic
- Brunch
- Kid-Friendly
- Outdoor Seating
Added by jessica namaste on Jun 9 04 (updated Aug 10 07)
Reviews
I'm not too big on this place. The food is decent but it's nothing spectacular. Also, they haven't changed their menu in like 6 years so I'm SO sick of the food. Someone else's comment was right on when they said that this place is for meat eaters who want to pat themselves on the back for eating vegetarian (or for eating chicken in a veg-friendly restaurant). Lame.
However, the grocery does carry a lot of vegetarian and vegan options and you can get East Side Ovens fresh vegan bakery there.
I think the food is really bland the atmosphere tends to be a bit obnoxious (a bunch of rich people trying to feel better about eating fancy organic or vegetarian leaning options and consuming ethically so they can sleep at night). This place makes me want to vomit.
Beans and Barley consistently gets picked as Milwaukee's best restaurant for vegetarians by readers in just about every newspaper. Honestly, I don't know why. There's a few of other places in town that I think should take the title hands down. The menu is pretty vegetarian-heavy, but as a vegan, I don't even really notice those menu items that contain eggs and/or cheese. Don't get me wrong, the vegan items that they do offer are good; the TLT (tempeh, lettuce and tomato) and the black bean burrito are favorites. They are just not plentiful.
If you're looking for a quick snack, however, you can always count on the deli to have something for any type of vegetarian.
I like this place and the neighborhood. I can't say too much, only having been here a couple of times, but I have had only positive experiences.
I can recommend their vegan biscuits and gravy-- it looks nothing like traditional biscuits and gravy, but it tastes better: very light, but satisfying.
As for lunch / dinner, the vegetarian chili is so-so, kind of bland, but I like spicy foods, so that might be my bias. Their black bean burritos are more my style.
Oh, yeah, if you're a coffee fan, be sure to have a cup of Alterra coffee.
They have some vegan options. I've only been there twice. I had a vegan black bean burrito, and another time had some soup that i don't remember. The food and service is fine from what i remember, but it's kind of upscale and bourgeois. The food isn't that expensive and they have a little market to the right side of the entrance that you can do a little grocery shopping as well.
I agree with what the other people said on here about the atmosphere. The lunch/dinner menu is really lacking, but I have to say, they have the best tofu scramble in the city! Your best bet though is either getting something from the deli case or ordering off of the carry-out menu.