It's time for the 2025 Twin Cities Vegan Chef Challenge! #tcveganchef
This was the first dish @jonok and I tried. It was cool to check out Umbra for the first time. It looks like they always have a couple vegan options on the menu. It's a somewhat upscale restaurant outside the lobby of the Mill District Canopy hotel by Hilton that specializes in pasta and flatbreads.
Their entry in the Chef Challenge is fresh green cavatelli with garlic scape pistou, heirloom tomato, and pickled garlic scape. The best thing about this fish is definitely the sauce and the pickled garlic scapes. It's really fresh and the pickling gives it a nice zap to the taste buds. The pasta itself had an odd firm but chewy texture. I thought maybe it was because it's gluten free, but that wasn't the case. I'm not sure why they didn't use regular pasta. Maybe their normal pasta has eggs. The color was cool, but maybe whatever green vegetable they added to the pasta imparted the odd texture. I also found it weird that the giant tomato slice that the pasta was served on top of was cold. The tomato itself was delicious, but it's just a bit off-putting when there are clashing temperatures in a pasta dish. I'm glad Umbra tried this year, but it was a miss for me. Hopefully they can fix those issues with their entry next year!
#pasta #garlic #garliclover #garlicscapes #tomato #tomatolover #veganchefchallenge #vegancheese #pistou #finedining
