Some restaurants are destinations.
Others become part of your routine.
And then there are restaurants that become part of your identity.
I felt something I never expected to feel about a national restaurant chain this morning when the trade magazine Nation's Restaurant News reported that True Food Kitchen filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Not because I was worried about where to get lunch.
Because I was worried about what it said about us.
True Food isn't just a place to eat. It was among the first restaurants to persuade Americans that healthy food could feel indulgent, social and even stylish.
Despite closing 12 restaurants, the company says 34 locations will remain open including Boca Raton and West Palm Beach.
Before wellness became an industrial complex
Long before influencers started
posting photos of green juice and protein bowls, Dr. Andrew Weil, the renowned integrative-medicine physician whose work I've followed since 2001, built an eating philosophy around anti-inflammatory foods.
In 2008, he partnered with restaurateur Sam Fox to create True Food Kitchen, where healthy eating wasn't presented as punishment.
Weil's role wasn't simply endorsement. The menu is built around the anti-inflammatory food pyramid he developed, making him founder, culinary philosopher and spiritual godfather all rolled into one.
Every Tory mom wants a table
True Food occupies a strange and wonderful space between aspiration and price-point practicality.
In Naples at Waterside Shops, the dining room during lunch mid-week was usually full of women carrying designer handbags and discussing school fundraisers over kale salads.
Yet it was also where families escaped resort town pricing for breakfast.
When my cousins stayed at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort and weren't eager to spend $120 before noon, we met at True Food.
As the Naples Daily News' former restaurant critic JLB, I rarely returned to restaurants on my own dime.
True Food was one of five exceptions.
My weakness remains pizza selections, specifically buffalo sausage with sweet potato and kale, a combo that sounds like a dare but somehow tastes like common sense.
The irony of modern dining
What makes this bankruptcy filing so surprising is that the culture finally caught up with the restaurant.
Everybody talks about anti-inflammatory eating now.
Everybody reads ingredient labels.
Everybody suddenly has strong opinions about seed oils.
In theory, this should be True Food's moment.
Instead, the company cited financial challenges and is seeking a buyer through a court-supervised sale process.
A hopeful second act
The good news is that Palm Beach County restaurant goers aren't losing their favorite harvest bowls, pizzas or brunch reservations.
After all, True Food Kitchen was never really selling salads.
It sells the fantasy that we can be the kind of people who order responsibly, live forever, enjoy a glass of wine and still have room for dessert.
Frankly, that's a fantasy worth saving.
Local residents have already seen once-buzzy wellness brands like Planta disappear. The prospect of losing True Food feels different, perhaps because for many of us, it’s not a healthy-eating destination so much as part of a weekly routine.
Two locations: 700 S. Rosemary Ave. at CityPlace, West Palm Beach, 561-345-2155 and 6000 Glades Road at Boca Town Center, 561-419-8105; truefoodkitchen.com
Diana Biederman is the Palm Beach Post's food & restaurant writer. Care to share news tips about the local dining scene? Please send them to dbiederman@pbpost.com. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Palm Beach County spared in latest chain restaurant bankruptcy
