Thrive Sauce and Bowls

To preface my review, I’m not a big rice bowl person. That being said, I finished my Japanese bowl with chicken unbelievably unsatisfied. The chicken and veggies were cooked well but I just found the meal kind of «blah», uninspiring, and something I could have easily made at home. To top it off it’s really expensive for what you get — $ 9 for a little tiny bowl is not worth it, but then again I’m not one who is willing to pay a premium for organic or sustainable food. Healthy, yes, but very mediocre (at best) on flavor and very poor on value. Glad I tried it but I won’t be coming back.

I am so excited that Thrive is in the neighborhood. Such clean, healthy, tasty food! I got the this bowl with tempeh. The tempeh is the best I have had. The bowl is a lot of food! My partner got the argentine bowl and was very satisfied. We got a hot toddy which was the perfect for this weather! I would highly recommend this place!

Had lunch here today and I have to
Say, it fell a tad short for my personal
taste. I left full, but not satisfied.
The Mexican Bowl ~
Pros~ Organic veggies. Portions
Cons~ Brown rice seemed overcooked/​heavy,
not enough cilantro, no lime wedge,
tomatillo salsa can use more garlic and
heat like a roasted hatch chili or anaheim.
This bowl can be much better.
Cost was 7 bucks, add chicken 3 bucks.
All and All it didn’t have enough Latin/​Mexican
ingredients to justify it’s name.
They serve Nat’s Hard Cider, very nice choice.
it’s my new fav.
Service~ It’s «bus your own table» place which,
I understand the business decision
as far as cost, but I’m not a fan of this trend.
The lady taking the orders is very nice and professional.
I would return here and try another bowl.

Great healthy bowls! I had the Thai bowl with chicken for lunch, it had a variety of vegetables. The sauce was so flavorful! Only downfall was my chicken was tough and not the greatest cut of meat. Staff was very friendly and helpful. Cute interior decorating. Would recommend to friends and would come again!

Super yummy FRESH bowls. So glad they landed on Fremont. Really good ingredients and it doesn’t taste like cardboard healthy that you have to force yourself to eat. This is delicious food! And the service is really friendly!

I really wanted to like this place. However, I cant.
Dinner for 2 before tip, $ 30.00, waaaaaay too much for what you are being served.
My wife and I went to thrive on a Wednesday for an early dinner. I understood the concept of pay first then wait for the food. So no big deal there. No real ambiance (music, lighting, etc,) just a large dining room with 2 bus tubs for clearing your own table (some were dirty and the place was empty when we arrived).
She ordered the Thai bowl with steelhead and I went for the Mexican bowl with steak. Each ordered 1 of their house made sodas: citrus lemongrass and spiced apple. The POS system had a glitch and my payment did not go through, so that had to happen later in the experience, no worries here.
Our $ 4 sodas were delivered somewhat quickly. My shock was the size of the glass used. Best guess the glasses used were 10 maybe 12 ounces. $.40 per ounce is what I am used to paying for a nice IPA at happy hour, 16 ounces. The spiced apple tasted like watered down apple sauce and my wife’s was so syrupy sweet that it and to be remade, no big deal — –but if these are the signature hand made drinks, the staff may want to bone up on the recipes.
Next the food. Two 16 ounce bowls arrived at the table. Small diameter and somewhat tall. This cute little bowl is hard to eat out of without make a mess. There was absolutely nothing Mexican about my bowl: no lime wedge, no cilantro, no taste of Mexican or other spices and not much else. The veggies were not inform in size so some were crunchy (not al dente, yes I know the difference) some were totally overcooked. The steak was smothered in some sort of avocado salsa so much so that if the steak had been seasoned I would not ave been able to enjoy it. I did eat the whole thing, I was that hungry.
My wife liked the steelhead but said her bowl had nothing in it that resembled Thai anything.
I heard a lot of items that were ordered by other guests that were out and the cashier did not know. This caused a great deal of confusion amongst the other diners and slowed the kitchen down.
Final thoughts: I was born here, I live 1 mile from my childhood home. My Portland has lost its culinary way. There a lot of interesting food options and some really creative chefs. However, wrapping an establishment in the cloak of local farms, organic (?), etc and not deliver a top notch experience is a recipe to fail. I hope thrive figures it out.

What is it w/​Portland and its hard seats? I got the Mexican bowl with chicken. Yummy! It could come in a bigger bowl, because I had to be very careful at the beginning when I was eating so stuff wouldn’t fall out of the bowl. We also had the Asian bowl with albacore. That was good as well, except that the noodles were definitely overcooked.

I had the Eastern European off the bigger bites menu, and it was delicious. Especially liked the dill. I will be back for sure!

This review is for the restaurant not the food truck. I’m in love with the food. Everything I’ve had has been delicious — Mexican bowl, Northwest salad, fried polenta, celery soup, flatbread. All so fresh, clean, delicious — so Portland! But the atmosphere is what I’m not sold on quite yet: (1) If the place is full, there is very little room to move back and forth from front to back — which you have to do to get your own silverware, water, napkins and do it again when you’re all done to take your dishes to the far back corner. Not a good setup. (2) The «bus your own table» thing is a little weird being that you have to reach the far back corner with all of your dishes, kneel down to floor level, and then put in the dishes. It took me 4 trips to get the table cleaned up… again a bad setup. (3) I’m afraid that this place isn’t quite sure if it’s a food truck or a restaurant. I’d hate for it to get lost. Again, great food, nice folks working there, but the back and forth in a very crowded place isn’t my game. I promise to keep on going and update if things get a little more smoothed out.

5 stars for food and great service. Erika contacted me promptly and fixed all of my concerns. Great spot.

WONDERFUL new restaraunt — I’ve always thought for a foodie town three aren’t enough healthy and fresh options in Portland… This is the perfect answer! Affordable delicious and super good body fuel :)

The idea is great, but the flavors are seriously lacking. I’ve tried the Kashmir, Thai, and Japanese bowls and each time was left wanting more.
The thai bowl I had today was very bland in flavor, and without salt. There was no tanginess, no spice, no sweetness, not even warmth.
I absolutely love the emphasis on healthy, organic, and using lots of vegetables and serving brown rice (even though I prefer white rice and am not concerned with weight loss – white rice is easier to digest than brown), but you have to make the food taste good.
I don’t know why there is such little flavor for me, maybe I just cook decently well and am accustomed to good food, but that only means my review is more valuable because I can hold people to higher standards.
Perhaps there is too much oil and water to spices and flavor that make the bowls so weak. I only ate here because that’s all there was at school but three out of three times I’ve been dissatisfied and that’s pretty rare for me.
The flavors are just objectively at a ⁰⁄₅. I give one star for the organic chicken and decent amount of vegetables but a 0 for flavor so one star overall considering the prices. $ 9 for a chicken bowl.
There was NO hint of galangal, kaffir lime, cardamom, basil, or any other spice in my «thai» bowl. I noticed the same thing with the Kashmir curry a while back. Absolutely insulting to asian cuisines. The japanese teriyaki bowl had a hint of teriyaki but I still noticed the watered and oiled down consistency of the sauce. My classmate also noticed there was a lot of oil.
This place sucks! Please improve your flavors and get people to test it. My taste buds are normal and intact and I seriously have never ordered food with such little flavor. Raw carrots have more flavor than what I ate today. I couldn’t finish my bowl because it was so bland.

Cute remodel but the wine was 9.00 and a small pour, the bowl was good but a small portion for $ 10. Overall, the food was ok but the drink prices are too high for what you get ! There are many options on Fremont and I don’t think I’ll be back. Also, it is basically a self serve and the staff was not overly friendly

This food is the amazing!!! I got the Japanese rice noodles with pork belly. Sooooooo good.

What a fantastic new spot. The cheesy eggplant fritters are one of the best things I have ever had!!! Must try! We shared thy the special Cuban bowl today. Super tender pork shoulder and delicious Flavors all around. Top notch service too. This is gonna be a busy place Fremont!

This review is for Thrive, the restaurant not the cart! We were the very first customers ever! We had the Thai Bowl with Pork Belly and Zucchini Frites small bites! DELICIOUS with a capital «D»!
Can’t wait to try other dishes!
Welcome to the neighborhood! We predict that not only will you succeed, you will THRIVE!

I love Wednesdays because those are the days that this food cart sits outside our office. It’s like comfort food but without the guilt. The brown rice and veggies are always tasty and well seasoned. I almost always get the 16oz Thai bowl with tempeh and have never been disappointed. It keeps me full all afternoon without feeling bogged down. It’s about $ 9 for this combo which is a bit steep, and why I only get it maybe every couple weeks. You could get the 12oz and no meat/​protein and save a few bucks but then it just seems like you’re missing out.
I have tried the Japanese bowl with Tempeh and wasn’t a big fan — it might be because the tempeh really soaks up seasoning easily but it was just a little overpowering for my tastes. Might have to try it again with chicken or steak. Next time I might be bold and give the Argentinian bowl a go.

I enjoyed this roaming food truck at its tent at the OHSU farmers market (seriously, this makes me look forward to going on campus on Tuesdays!). i loved the smells wafting from it, and so I had to try it.
I got the veggie Kashmir bowl with the special protein (steelhead).
Pros: yummy, perfectly seasoned, and the steelhead was super tasty (I probably should have skipped eating the skin, but it was still so good and slightly crispy!)
Cons: it’s kind of pricey for the amount of food. although my belly would be quite happy, my wallet would be crying if I frequented this place.

The Japanese Bowl just didn’t do it for me, one of the vegetables (maybe water chestnut) just didn’t belong. The $ 3 Fish extra was good, but this cart doesn’t scream value. The Homemade sauces were a nice alternative from boring regular options at most places.
So here’s what really turned me off, a little serving of unsolicited Business 101: the young, fit guy making my bowl was wearing a tank top on a rainy day. So it was difficult for me to anticipate a savory experience as all I see is 10 minutes of armpit hair! How about ramping-​up the professionalism just a bit? I normally give such an experience Two Stars, but the owner was very nice. Yes, I suppose it’s about the food and not ambiance at a cart, but I couldn’t get past the visual.

Absolutely love this cart. This is a cart after AB’s own heart.
Five options for super healthy bowls (available 12 or 16 oz size) include: Thai, Kashmir, Mexican, Argentinian, and Japanese. You really cannot go wrong with any style, which contain all of my favorite foods in one lil bowl: seasonal veggies (always including some kind of greens, usually kale), brown rice, and choice of either tempeh, chicken, or beef (all organic, free range, and grassfed, of course).
The sauces are where you can really get crazy if you want to. You’re no sheep. You march to the beat of your own drum. You want the Indian Curry Sauce on the Thai Bowl? NO PROBLEM. While the pairings on the menu are perfect already, I recommend to try an extra sauce, too, and they all go really well together. Check ‘em out here:

I’ve visited these folks on the street, at various events, and worked with them for a party I was involved with for work, too, and it was nothing but 100% positively delicious every time. Check their website, The Twitters, or Ye Olde Facespace for updates to locations and schedules.