Hippie restaurants

Eating places for hippies could be found in cities across the country beginning in 1968. They mostly had a short life, but they introduced Americans to a different approach to meals that were not built around meat, emphasizing instead grains and fresh vegetables. They were often places to hear live music as well and to simply hang out. Foods introduced by the hippie restaurants included brown rice, lentils, tofu, tahini, yogurt, and pita bread, among others. According to Warren Belasco in his book Appetite for Change, potato skins were first popularized in hippie restaurants. However, it took some time before these restaurants gained any degree of recognition for their food offerings. Of course not all hippie hangouts served what would later be called “health food.” At the Drogstore Café, a popular spot in the Haight Ashbury area of San Francisco, a hippie was likely to order coffee and a hamburger. Unlike most restaurants, though, it was served on a psychedelic linoleum tabletop.…