A Mostly Vegetarian Restaurant Describing Itself With Lots of Trendy Phrases Is Opening Downtown

Downtown Boston is getting a new fast-casual restaurant this summer: Mighty Love Food will open at 155 Milk St., per Boston Restaurant Talk, and its growing online presence makes a few promises.

“We’re in the kitchen workin’ on something good,” the restaurant’s website reads in big block letters, directing visitors to its profiles on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and yes, Pinterest as well. Though these pages provide few hints about potential menu items, they offer some vague hints about the vibe Mighty Love Food is trying to achieve.

Describing itself as a “chef-driven,” “plant-based” restaurant serving “flavor-driven” food, Mighty Love Food makes three strikes against Eater’s style guide; all three phrases are avoided on this site due to their jargon-y nature. In other words: What do they really mean? (“Plant-based” is generally used to mean “vegan” without scaring off non-vegans, but in this case, a rep told Eater that the menu is neither vegan nor raw, but vegetables — in particular, New England produce — are “the foundation of the menu.”)

Chef Jerome Picca has signed on to, well, drive a menu “that’ll keep your hustle mighty,” working with Cameron Grob, who brings to the project years of experience in Boston restaurants, including Serafina and Bastille Kitchen. Picca’s resume includes decades of restaurant and catering work, including opening a now-shuttered tapas restaurant called Small Plates in Harvard Square a little over a decade ago. Most recently, Picca was consulting director of culinary operations for the International Golf Club & Resort in Bolton.

The goal at Mighty Love Food is to use cooking methods that balance preserving nutrients with bringing out flavors — think steaming, baking, and slow-roasting.

Expect to find ingredients such as goat’s milk yogurt; cage-free eggs; sea vegetables harvested from Maine, such as Irish moss and spirulina; bee pollen; and spices such as sumac, cumin, and turmeric. There will also be an option to add Cajun spice shrimp or rosemary pulled chicken to any salad or bowl, the rep noted.

Here are a few potential menu items:

• What the Health ($10.50): Korean barbecue tempeh, butterhead lettuce, roast red onion, shaved fennel, kimchi (vegan, dairy-free, and nut-free)
• Eats Shoots & Peas ($10.75): Sweet pea jalfrezi with curried eggplant, greens, za’atar chickpeas, curried yogurt dressing, and micro shoots (vegetarian, dairy-free, gluten-free, nut-free, and soy-free)
• Strength Beets Basil ($10.25): Vegan mozzarella, basil, tomatoes, whiskey smoke-salted beets, olive oil, baby romaine, basil spinach pistou (vegetarian, gluten-free, nut-free, soy-free)

Mighty Love Food plans to be open from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., serving breakfast and lunch, and the team is aiming for a mid-summer opening. The space will be “bright and bold,” designed by Stephanie Rossi of Spazio Rosso Interior Design.

Update, April 16, 2018: This story has been updated throughout to clarify that the restaurant will not be vegan (but will feature vegetables) and to add new details regarding the menu, opening timeline, and design, based on an email from a representative of the restaurant.

• Mighty Love Food [Official Site]
• Mighty Love Food [FB]
• Mighty Love Food to Open in Boston’s Financial District [BRT]