Adam & Eats: Molly’s Eggrolls & Smoothies

Editor’s note: Adam Brandt is a graduate from the Cobra Kai School of Culinary Callousness, where he received their highest award, the Red Apron of Merciless Eating. Aside from eating and talking about eating, he makes pots, paintings, prints, books, photographs, and generally, a big mess. He has been the studio assistant at Mudpuppy Pottery for 10 years and is attending a local university in a desperate attempt to earn a biology degree.

This week’s food adventure takes us back into the world of the seemingly bizarre. What we find once we get there is that the restaurant is not as weird, and quite a bit more awesome, than we had originally expected.

Located on Historic Main Street in downtown Van Buren, in what was until recently Carol’s Café, is the new home of Molly’s Eggrolls & Smoothies. Yes, the name makes the place sound weird, but in reality it is quite normal.

Simple booths line the walls of a long hallway type room. The room itself is painted black, white, and red. Simple cherry blossom decorated paper lanterns hang above each table. For all intents and purposes, it looks and feels like a modern, hip Asian café.

Guess what. It kind of is one.

It is a relatively new venture and they are still working out a few kinks, but for the most part the place rocks. It is my humble opinion that they are a breath of fresh air in the downtown area. It is nice to see a vibrant, energetic restaurant among the antique shops.

Food wise, they serve the normal Americanized Asian fare. This is not bad seeing as how they do it really, really well. I have yet to try anything disappointing on their menu. The crab wontons are rocking the cream cheesy deliciousness all the way to the bank. Since they have eggrolls in their name, you’d expect theirs to be excellent, but you’d be wrong. Excellent is too sissy a word. They are friggin’ phenomenal. I think it was the peas in them that give it the extra oomph. Whatever it is kids, keep doing it.

If you appreciate crispy skin, try the wingettes. The crisp on those little suckers is to die for. Also, the egg drop soup is some of the best around. If you are watching your spending and just happen to be an indecisive menu gazer, like myself, get one of the lunch combos. I recommend #2. You get a giant helping of veggie lo mein, an eggroll, and a crab wonton. For a little under 5 bucks you’ll get enough food for two meals. Or one meal and a sizeable nap.

If you came to a place with a weird name in order to get something off of the beaten path, there are two dishes I recommend. The first is the Hawaiian fried rice. It consists of rice fried with egg, peas, carrots, and pineapple. It is bright and slightly sweet. The other dish is the James’ Special. It is made up of sliced beef, mussels (spelled muscles on the menu), shrimp, and quail eggs that have been stir fried in a spicy curry with baby carrots, mushrooms, and yellow onion. Dump that sexy mess on top of a bed of fluffy jasmine rice and you’re good to go on a wild flavor ride.

Now that we’ve talked about half of their namesake dishes, let’s deal with the other half, the smoothies. These creamy drinks are made from the recipes of the dwellers of Olympus. Long and short of it, the beverages of the Gods.

Personally, my favorite is the honey dew, but if I were to make a suggestion, to recommend only one of the many flavors, I would say that you have to have to have to try the taro. Taro, if you are unfamiliar with it by this name, is a slightly sweet tuber or root vegetable. You more than likely know the green part of it that grows above ground as an “elephant ear.” I know what you are thinking right now. Well, stop it. This smoothie tastes amazing. It sort of tastes like the holidays, actually. Not just the winter ones, but all of them. Fourth of July included. If you have nothing else while you are there, be sure to try the taro smoothie. It will change your life.

If you haven’t been by Molly’s Eggrolls & Smoothies yet, get off your lazy butt and go. This little shop is definitely worth keeping around and they need customers for that to happen. To the crew at Molly’s, keep up the good work. I expect many more great things from you.

Until next week, good eating to you and yours.

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When he’s not beating his eggs, Adam makes time to respond to e-mails that get past his hard-ass spam filter. You can try to reach him at [email protected]

Adam also has this thing called Sandwich Control.