Simple, Sublime, and Tasty, Too
Simply Sublime on Springs-Fireplace Road in East Hampton has just celebrated its first year in business, with edible offerings that range from cookies to kombucha and customers that range from construction workers to yoginis on a cleanse.
“I like coming to work and helping the community,” said Alison Burke, who owns the cafe with her sister, Juliette Logie. Their original concept was to open a coffee bar, but it became much more.
Clean and simple food and drink for breakfast and lunch is the specialty there. There is coffee and tea and also fresh fruit juices and smoothies. Patrons can take their food to go or eat at outdoor picnic tables and under an exposed-beam roof, where low-key world music plays in the background and there are books and divination tools to peruse.
Those with food restrictions will find comfort there, with such hard-to-find indulgences as gluten-free and vegan brownies and cupcakes.
Standards like wraps and salads include such ingredients as roast vegetables, sun-dried tomato pesto, Brie, and white albacore tuna, and can be wrapped in a gluten-free tortilla for those who cannot eat wheat.
Among the items on the daily specials board last week was kitchari, an Ayurvedic rice and bean dish with ghee and avocado. Customarily a cleansing dish, it was offered with eggs for breakfast, adding something nutritious and different to the usual breakfast fare.
“We couldn’t be happier” with what it turned out to be, Ms. Burke said.
The sisters, originally from Montauk, grew up in the restaurant business. Their mother owned the Fishtales Galley in Montauk, which is now Westlake Clam and Chowder House.
Ms. Burke experimented with vegetarianism from the age of 10, she said. She had such bad eczema when she was younger that she was embarrassed to take her hands out of her pockets. After trying all sorts of things, including “a crazy steroid,” to address the problem, she turned instead to holistic remedies. Two weeks after eliminating dairy from her diet, her eczema cleared up. The experience was an eye-opener and a motivation to help others, she said.
Ms. Logie is a nurse who is also open to natural remedies such as cleansing, juicing, and consuming kombucha mushroom tea for its reputed probiotic-increasing activity. She has learned to make her own kombucha at home. Nadia Ernestus will lead a kombucha workshop at Simply Sublime on Aug. 13 at 6 p.m., and will also talk about making fermented vegetables.
Listening to customers and their needs was likely the reason for Simply Sublime’s first successful South Fork winter, Ms. Burke said. The sisters also took care to order items not found at many other local shops.
Filling the shelves are such things as coconut vinegar, hemp milk, nut butters and milks, and gluten-free pasta, crackers, dressings, cereals, and chips. There are also some skin care products, soap, candles, and incense. There are gluten-free frozen foods, too.
The sisters also take their juicer on the road to the Hayground Farmers Market on Fridays. The shop is open daily from 7:15 a.m. until 4 p.m. and until 6 on Fridays and Saturdays.