The city of Berry Hill is home to a delightful array of small businesses and specialty shops. At less than one square mile, the tiny city has everything you never knew you needed — from beads and healing crystals to scuba gear, dollhouse furniture and birdhouses. You can make a day of prowling around independently owned shops. Once you work up an appetite, head down Azalea Street to a plant-based eatery that’s become a dependable mainstay for Nashville vegetarians.
The menu at Sunflower Cafe is 100 percent vegan — although you can add dairy cheese to any dish you like. I’ll be honest: I’ve been a vegetarian (with intermittent stretches of being a mere pescatarian, don’t judge) for nearly 20 years, and I know as well as anyone that not all vegan dishes are created equal. Often, the best meals don’t try to imitate chicken or beef, but rather stick to their veggie guns with pride. That’s why I love the burger bowl at Sunflower. It starts with tender, plump grains of yellow rice. What makes this rice so good? The staff member I asked claimed ignorance. (I love a mystery.) Next comes kale, which some might consider the most overrated vegetable out there. But at Sunflower, it’s lightly sautéed — never stringy, always easy to chew — and tossed with sesame seeds. Then comes the burger, which is where things get real. I loathe a smushy veggie burger. If it’s in a bun, it should maintain its form, but sadly, many a tasty burger fails this test. Sunflower’s ingenious solution? They put the burger — which is packed full of zucchini, beets, carrots, sticky purple rice and other veggies (but no beans!) — atop the bed of rice and kale. Cut it up into bits, people!
You can choose from nine (!) sets of multiple toppings — make it hearty with sautéed onions and mushrooms, go tropical with sweet-chili-pineapple, etc. I always order the Traditional Sunflower style: tangy sun-dried tomato spread, bright tomato slices and garlic aioli. (I ask them to leave off the red onion. It’s your funeral on that front.) Friends, by the time I reach the bottom of my bowl, I feel as wholesome as Berry Hill itself.
