I’ve been needing to post something lately and tonight had a sudden urge (led by my stomach) to check out a place that I just recently heard about called Garden of Eat’n. This is a salad & wraps place located in the Creekside Town Center across from the Galleria. I headed in at around 5:30 and was the only customer (briefly). I was greeted right away and asked if I had ever been there. Obviously not, as I stopped at the wrong end of the kitchen. I was shown over to the correct end where I now saw the menu displays.
I got strong vibes of Jack’s Urban Eats mixed with a little bit of Chipotle. The ingredients were numerous and looked fresh, although the chicken and some other meats were pre-prepared and kept cold with the rest of the toppings. There was a little conveyor driven oven where they warmed up the chicken for my order. You can choose from house recipe salads and wraps or build your own. I opted for the Spicy Chicken Bacon wrap (lemon-peppered chicken with crisp bacon, grape tomato, romaine, in sriracha ranch)[$8] and added a Mac & Cheese [$5.50], just to try more than one thing. To drink they had bunch of bottled beverages, a watermelon limeade in a self-serve dispenser and Stubborn Sodas on the fountain machine. I had never heard of Stubborn before and tried out the Lemon Berry Açaí [Medium with free refills $2.75]. They us no artificial sweeteners, high fructose corn syrup or dyes.
I picked out the one tortilla flavor that they were out of and ultimately got the Spicy Chipotle. They built my wrap pretty quickly and said they would bring the mac & cheese out to me soon. I set my wrap on a table and snapped a few photos until it came out maybe a minute later.
Both looked pretty good. The wrap was full and almost coming apart so I had to pick it up carefully. It wasn’t heavy though. Most of it was romain and tomatoes, though I did get chicken and bacon in just about every bite. The chicken was decent. I think it could have been a little juicer and definitely could have been much hotter. I think having it pre-prepped and stored cold is the culprit here. I’d be willing to wait longer for fresh chicken. The bacon had good flavor and the tomatoes were nice and ripe. The best thing about this was the sriracha ranch. It was delicious and even had a really nice heat that snuck up on me in the first half of the wrap.
The mac and cheese was unfortunately extremely bland. Texture was about the only thing going for it. The cheese was gooey and the noodles were cooked just right.
Probably my favorite thing about this visit was my discovery of Stubborn Soda. The Lemon Berry Açaí was awesome. I am still sipping it now and enjoying every little bit. The berry flavor is actually pretty dominant, I can barely taste any lemon at all, but it’s fantastic nonetheless. I’m going to be looking for bottles of this to pick up soon (which they do have also).
Ultimately it was a kind of disappointing experience. The meats being re-prepped, I feel, really hurts this place and the prices are a bit high for what you get. Jack’s Urban Eats just mops the floor with the same concept.
Website: http://gardenofeatn.net
Last night I finally made it out to Monsoon Cuisine of India. This Indian restaurant seems to have moved here from downtown Sacramento, taking the place of 
I was greeted within 10 seconds as I meandered up to the front desk/counter area and the host (/manager/owner?) appeared from the middle of the room to seat me. Behind me was the buffet, sitting unused for dinner. They serve it 7 days a week for lunch and, I think, only on Wednesday for dinner. I looked over the menu for a minute, hoping for a saag paneer and maybe butter chicken. Not seeing saag paneer I kind of did a flip flop and picked out a chicken dish with spinach and a paneer dish with a butter masala sauce. These were the Paneer Butter Masala (cottage cheese cooked in butter-infused tomato sauce and dry fenugreek)[$11.95] and Chicken Palak (chicken smothered in creamy spinach sauce)[$11.95]. I got a mango lassi (refreshing mango yogurt drink)[$2.99] and a water to go with these. Rice is not included, so I added some for $2.
The mango lassi took about 7 minutes. It was a very light orangish-yellow color with a thick and creamy consistency. It was more tart than sweet and was also close to room temp, which I think contributed to the tartness. I did not really enjoy this. A couple minutes later I was served a complimentary appetizer of papadum, a crisp, seasoned cracker-like sheet, rolled up in a basket. It was accompanied by green and tamarind chutneys. This was very good on it’s own and even better in both of the chutneys. I tore through this quickly.
From here it was a fairly long wait until the main dishes were brought out. About 30 minutes. There was a large group of 12 or more that were served sometime in the middle of that, so the kitchen may have been backed up with their order. Anyway, once they arrived, my little table was packed with three large bowls and a big plate. I was kind of surprised with the serving size, it was huge. I ended up taking probably 2 more meals home with me.
The paneer butter masala was basically just the cubes of firm cheese (which were in huge supply), swimming in a thin, bight red-orange sauce. While enjoyable for the most part, it was a bit one-dimensional. The sauce just wasn’t very complex. It was a good thing I had the chicken palak to go with it. That was very good. The spinach sauce was delicious and creamy and had a nice texture. The chicken was tender and flavorful itself as well.
One of the servers came by and asked if I was finished, and I asked to take the rest to go and also for an order of the mango crème brûlée (rich mango custard base topped with hard caramel). They had several delicious-sounding desserts that I wanted to try, but I knew I would always wonder about this if I didn’t check it out now.
He came back with some containers and a bag and left them at the table. Admittedly I was a little annoyed that I had to box this up myself. Within another minute or so he returned again with the dessert. I thought that was awfully fast, and I quickly found out why. They don’t torch it when you order it. The whole thing was cold, including the caramelized top which was soft and almost leathery. Instead of a mango flavored custard it was a pretty traditional custard with chunks of mango in it. I was hugely disappointed with this.
Overall the food was very hit and miss. The service was about the same as well. Some interactions were very brief and not fulfilling, although the host/manager was very nice. The whole experience was unfortunately lackluster. Considering we have quite a few good Indian restaurants here in Roseville, including 
For dinner yesterday I was joined by several family members at Fat’s Asia Bistro & Dim Sum Bar, on the corner of Eureka and Rocky Ridge. It’s been quite a long time since I’ve been here, well over 5 years and maybe as many as 10. I remember Fat’s being one of the early nicer restaurants in Roseville as the growth was in full swing. It is part of the Fat’s Family of Restaurants, a collection of four Chinese & American cuisine restaurants in the Sacramento area. This Fat’s has a handful of various Asian dishes but the menu is primarily Chinese.
Eating Through Roseville 