Plum Cafe Serves Fresh, Local Food

When you order a sandwich or salad from Plum Café, you can be certain the food was made that morning. There's also a good chance that you’re getting a family recipe.

It might be the gnocchi, handed down from Italian grandparents, or chicken salad on focaccia that comes from the owner’s mother. Or berry cassata, a custard, with lady fingers, soaked in raspberries.

Owner and chef Monica Bolsoni is making these dishes at Plum Café, which she opened in March to offer locals food made without preservatives or antibiotics. The beef is grass-fed, the chicken is humanely raised and you can order gluten-free bread. The cups, straws, soup containers and takeout boxes are compostable. And everything is made by hand each day, right down to the mango juice and fresh-squeezed lemonade.

“The secret is we slice everything fresh in the kitchen and that makes a difference,” she told Roswell Patch.

Located in Plum Village off Canton Street, the restaurant is billed as “a socially responsible café,” They are open for lunch – offering soups, salads and sandwiches - as well as .

While this is her first restaurant, Bolsoni has been a chef for 12 years. Most recently, she owned Samba Catering and previously worked for Fire of Brazil and A Legendary Event. But her most formative experience, she said, was growing up in Brazil. She spent her vacations picking coffee beans for fun on her grandparents’ farm and later volunteered with priests, who taught her how to plant and take care of chickens. And while volunteering at a hospital, she saw many patients who were ill because they couldn’t afford to eat right, she said.

When she came to U.S., she was just as shocked to see how people ate.

“It broke my heart seeing the kids eating,” she said. “It’s processed food. It’s quantity, not quality.”

As a mother with four grown children and four grandchildren, she said preparing healthy foods is most important to her. These influences have shaped the food she serves in her restaurant, from the handmade coleslaw – with apples, parsley and cabbage – to the salad dressings made from scratch – such as pear, raspberry, parsley mango or basil white balsamic.

On the Kids’ Menu, based on the favorite foods of her grandchildren, you won’t find hot dogs. But you will find baked chicken nuggets made from free-range chicken. And Conor’s “Fancy” Hamburgers is a healthy alternative to fast food, a grass-fed burger containing beets and carrots. It has also been tested and approved by her grandson Conor, she said.

Plum Café is largely a family business. On a recent weekday, Bolsoni’s husband, Brian O’Neill, and daughter-in-law Sarah Cabral were helping out in the kitchen, along with a family friend, Eric Lei.

Because the food comes mostly from local farms, the menu changes according to the season. And Bolsoni brings out traditional recipes once a week, like a Portuguese cod dish on Thursdays and her mother’s lasagna on Wednesdays.

She also recreates dishes from the Sunday dinners of her youth: gnocchi, a potato-filled pasta and berry cassata.

“We like to have variety,” she said. “Every week I add a new [dish]. I use the same ingredients. I just change the recipe a little bit.”

When she takes dishes off the menu, customers request that she bring them back, such as the popular Roasted Bell Pepper & Kumato Panini, which Bolsoni affectionately calls the “Hot Mess.” Made on focaccia with artichoke spread, it has provolone and mozzarella cheeses, and is topped with fresh basil, roasted bell pepper and kumato tomato.

Another customer favorite is the chicken salad panini, a recipe from the chef’s mother. The chicken is slow-cooked in a base of onions, turmeric, bay leaves and olive oil and then shredded. And customers are open to trying dishes such as the quinoa salad – made with beets and carrots, red onion vinaigrette and fresh mint and parsley, Bolsoni said.

Currently, the restaurant is only open for lunch, but Bolsoni is considering staying open for dinner and applying for a license to serve beer and wine.

“I’m surprised because we got really busy, and people come again and again for the food,” Bolsoni said. “I’m overwhelmed with the compliments.”