WHITEFISH – To bring balance to the body takes self-discipline. To bring The Green Tea House to Whitefish takes about a year.
After a group of investors began paying rent on a downtown property last July with the goal of opening a café geared toward vegans and other specific diets, plans began to fizzle. But Vickie Kelson, who said she “couldn’t see giving up,” made sure business discussions didn’t completely die out.
After some shuffling of investors and a little tweaking of the overall plan, renovation started up and the business concept took shape. Then in late August, Kelson hung the open sign.
“Right when everyone thought it wasn’t going to happen, we threw the doors open,” Kelson said.
Kelson, The Green Tea House’s executive director, said her café specializes in need-specific diets: vegan; gluten-free; several raw food options; all natural and with an emphasis on locally grown vegetables. Aside from a few dishes with cage-free eggs, there are no animal products on the breakfast or lunch menu. The Green Tea House is not open for dinner.
The idea for the café has been a long time in the making, Kelson said. She originally moved to the Flathead Valley in 1999 to help start the Center for Inspired Wisdom, a school that teaches its students ways to achieve a more balanced lifestyle. As part of the center’s philosophy, a balanced and self-aware diet is encouraged. Kelson said people seeking better overall health need to focus on what they eat.
“One of the hardest things for people to change is their diet,” Kelson said.
The Green Tea House doesn’t use garlic or onions, which Kelson said bring too much “fire” to a person’s body. There are no mushrooms either. And while the café has dozens of varieties of green teas, there is no black tea because nothing on the menu is fermented. Caffeine junkies take note: no coffee is served.
“People are creating intolerances in their body because they’re overloading,” Kelson said. “All of the philosophy is from trying to create a balanced human being.”
This is not to say the dishes are boring. Kelson has spent extended time in India and uses that influence at the café. There is also a Tex-Mex scramble on the breakfast menu featuring spicy beans and veggies. Some of the menu’s other offerings are a Delhi wrap with raw hummus, an egg salad sandwich, a veggie bean burger on toasted millet oat bread, curried sweet potatoes and veggies, and homemade granola.
There are a variety of fresh juices and smoothies as well, made from the café’s diverse selection of vegetables and fruits. The veggie and fruit options include kale, celery, beets, carrots, ginger, oranges, apples, grapefruits, coconuts, spinach, parsley, cucumbers, aloe vera, chard, pineapple, bananas, and different kinds of berries. The focus is local, but obviously some of the menu needs to be shipped in. Kelson called the salads “humongous.”
“You can feel like you had a good meal and still be quite healthy,” Kelson said.
For people who want raw foods, there are several options for them at The Green Tea House, which Kelson said is hard to find at most restaurants. Also, she said her café is completely gluten-free – even the in-house baked bread. And though some dishes offer spice and zesty flavors, many meals have very little seasoning and rely more on the natural taste of the vegetables.
“We want to go back to the flavor of food, rather than flavor our food,” Kelson said.
The Green Tea House has been “very busy,” particularly at lunch, Kelson said. Customers have also been coming in for afternoon smoothies and juices. In the future, Kelson envisions activities in the morning to draw in a bigger breakfast crowd, including yoga sessions and a book club.
“There’s a much bigger crowd than I thought we were catering to in the beginning,” Kelson said.
The Green Tea House is located at 415 Second Avenue East in downtown Whitefish. It is open daily from 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., and can be reached at (406) 862-5050.