While in line, the fur coat-clad women discussed one of Life Alive’s mantras -- “To share love, joy, beauty and pleasure; to help people tap into infinite vitality” -- painted above wheatgrass plants in window boxes.
The restaurant asserts on its website, "Our mission is to feed the vitality of the world. We do this by providing healthy fantastic food for people on the go, while honoring and protecting our environment." Offering items for people with a variety of specialty diets (vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, macrobiotic, raw, etc.). Life Alive prides itself on its commitment to using quality, locally sourced organic ingredients and composting and utilizing recyclable materials to be as eco-friendly as possible.
Life Alive is certainly not an oasis; it is often difficult to find a table, and the Thursday night live music makes conversation difficult.
Its shtick may also seem tiresome, from wheatgrass shots to rooms with different chakras, yet these apparent negatives all add to the unique Life Alive experience. At Life Alive’s Cambridge location (there are sister restaurants in Lowell and Salem) the food is genuinely good and relatively cheap, the staff is quick and attentive and it’s hard to leave feeling dissatisfied.
On a Thursday evening around 8 p.m., open seats could be found in the basement, though most were at shared tables with two or more couples. A musician named “Manni Festo,” a young man in an entirely denim outfit, was performing loudly on a stage-cum-children’s-play-area in a corner.
About ten minutes after we ordered, the food and drinks arrived. Life Alive’s menu offers whimsically named combinations of vegetables, grains and house-made sauces in bowl or wrap form. I ordered “The Lover” in a bowl, which consisted of shiitake mushrooms, carrots, beets, kale and broccoli with a “Ginger Nama Shoyu” sauce over brown rice. My friend ordered “The Emperor,” a bowl of sweet corn, sundried tomatoes, kale and sun-sprouts with a miso sauce over brown rice, in a smaller “demi” size. For mid-February, the vegetables in both dishes tasted extremely fresh, and the sauces were excellent. We also ordered the “Harverst Alive” smoothie, which contains kale, avocado, lemon juice, banana, chia, dates and almond milk and basically tastes like each of its ingredients.
Later in the evening, after the live music ends and the crowd thins out, Life Alive adopts a much more relaxed atmosphere. People-watching and eavesdropping, fantastic and key elements of any visit to Life Alive, are best at this time. Some customers chat, drinking beer and wine (Life Alive offers a limited alcohol menu), while others sample the “Dandi-Blend Coffee,” which claims to taste “like delicious coffee, but [is] actually great for you and detoxifying!” Around 10 p.m., the staff begins to clear tables and turn over chairs, yet few of the customers seem ready to leave, still lingering over their kombucha (offered on tap) and kale, trying to postpone the bitter February cold.
Life Alive is located at 765 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, Mass., open Monday-Saturday 8 a.m.-10 p.m., and Sunday 11 a.m.-8 p.m. The Lowell and Salem locations have different hours, available on their website. Bowls and wraps are $9.25-$9.95 (with demi-size portions priced at $5.95); smoothies range from $6.25-$7.95.
