Jump to: Reviews | Our Common Roots in the Fertile Crescent
For $15, today’s Groupon brings local vivacity to your plate with $30 worth of fresh food and drink from Common Roots Cafe, a restaurant that serves up fresh tastes from local farms. Tempt your stomach with earth’s natural bounty wonderfully portrayed through savory culinary practices and habits.
Good food starts with good ingredients taking a good journey from good soil to the table. Peek just west of Common Roots’ cafe area to see the Common Roots garden, whose fertile rows of loam produced more than 1,500 pounds of produce in 2009. The Cafe’s seasonal and locally inspired dishes ornament its constantly rotating menu. December flavors include seared polenta (with mushroom pate and sundried-tomato pesto, $6.50), potato latkes ($5.75), bison stroganoff (with crimini mushrooms and house-made pappardelle, $14), eggplant curry (over brown basmati rice, $12), and more. Complement your feast with any of Common Roots’ eight local beers fresh on tap.
Common Roots, which is dedicated to lovingly prepared local grub and strictly upheld environmental policies, will fill your tum and rub the earth’s tum with its commitment to green-friendly actions—the restaurant has composted more than 120,000 pounds since 2007. Remember your manners because you’ll be eating in the prestigious company of Mother Earth, who is the daughter of Father Sun and the niece of Cousin Oak Tree.
Reviews
City Pages awarded Common Roots Cafe Minneapolis’s Best Bagels, Citysearchers give Common Roots four stars, and the Star Tribune delivers high praise:
- Locavore-to-the-max mentality, yes. Pounding that do-gooder message into its customers' brains with the heel of a well-worn Birkenstock sandal, no. – Rick Nelson, Star Tribune
- I regularly go here for oatmeal on the go in the morning, and a sandwich for dinner with friends. Very friendly service and the food is quite good. They've got a great selection of veggie food and teas. – thegreendeath, Citysearch
- I love this place. It's a wonderful spot to hang out with friends. – Mary21, Citysearch
Our Common Roots in the Fertile Crescent
Every society has common roots in the Fertile Crescent, the cradle of civilization in which society first bloomed. What made the Fertile Crescent such a perfect location for cultures to grow?
- Fertile soil allowed the perfection of farming techniques such as planting seeds and using dinosaurs to work the fields.
- Flora and fauna diversity allowed hunter-gatherer societies to replace less effective "hoping winter never comes" societies.
- Numerous rivers were filled with numerous magic swords and numerous destiny-foretelling nymphs.
- Geographical diversity allowed the region to include mountains, deserts, and several teen centers that were constantly threatened by land developers and sandstorms.
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Common Roots Cafe
The culinary team at Common Roots Cafe believes that the best way to create a welcoming restaurant is to fully embrace local flavor in every sense of the word. Even the interior speaks to this mission—reclaimed barn wood makes up the dining room's floorboards and tabletops, the counter is composed of recycled cardboard, and the air is one-hundred percent Minnesotan. The overall effect is one of casual warmth, an atmosphere that makes the cafe an ideal spot for guests to chew on eclectic, yet accessible, cuisine and relax with a choice of 10 local craft beers.
The menu itself also bursts with hometown pride, highlighting local organic and sustainable ingredients. As much as half of the restaurant's food comes from farms located within 250 miles of Minneapolis, while some produce is picked right outside the door at the cafe's urban garden. And since the selection of ingredients alters with the seasons, the chefs adapt their dishes each month to showcase their fresh flavors. Previous offerings have included redfish tacos with jicama slaw, mac 'n' cheese with local cheddar, and house-made tagliatelle pasta topped with a hearty bison bolognese sauce. Bites are complemented with sips from a drink list featuring wines—many made from organic grapes—and local beers. The kids menu also features a variety of offerings, from grilled cheese and grass-fed patty melts to falafel and tzatziki. And, in the unlikely event that diners leave any food on their plates, the scraps are carefully composted to continue the cafe's green production cycle.