Asian Rose Cafe

Even if I’m 300 miles away, my asian heart and soul is with you, Asian Rose Café.

Seriously my favorite place ever! I miss the old location it was super casual. The best food ever! I just wish the lunch hours were longer. I never make it downtown in time to catch lunch. My favorite lunch is the salad with added Tempe La LA. There is a chocolate almond drink i love too! the spring rolls are excellent I don’t know if they are even still on the menu but the almond dipping sauce is one I have tried to recreate on several occasions. So yummy.
To all the people who say the staff is grumpy…
«I’m not mad I just look like this» or sheesh give the guys a break they have been working since the 90’s feeding an unending crowd of picky and sometimes crass vegans and vegetarians.

The food here is excellent but the service sucks. We’ve tried several times because we like the food, one time we were waiting half hour because they forgot about us, it was so bad we had to laugh ! Worth a try but not one of our regulars because of the poor service

Been going to Asian Rose for more than 20 years… Amazingly, it hasn’t changed too much. Still the same brother-​owned business in their own unique friendly but reserved style. Asian Rose carves out a culinary niche in Santa Cruz dining like no other. The menu does change occasionally, but creative combinations remain.
Atmosphere at the new digs on Front St is quite nice, although loud at times. The sun can beat in late in the day and chairs can get uncomfortable after a while. However, the décor is nice and there is plenty of space to have a private leisurely meal.
Service is leisurely, like it or not. I don’t know of any case where items arrived quickly. Don’t go if you’re in a hurry! Had to ask for a refill on our water during the meal.
Food is unique and delicious. Many fine soups, salads, curries, and koftas! All vegetarian! Latest dining there, the warm spinach salad was too salty as was one of our other main dishes. Hopefully, this is not a new trend. Haven’t tried the pasta dishes.
Prices are reasonable considering, plus fresh organic ingredients often come from our local wednesday farmers’ market.
If you’ve never been, you owe it to yourself to give it a try. It may become your new favorite restaurant in santa cruz, or just a tasty option for a meatless monday.

As of April 2013, this place is closed. Located right next to Malabar, it’s an empty store front.

I have never once met a person who has eaten here and not loved it. For many locals, it is their favorite. Healthy and clean ingredients, creative recipes and fresh takes on traditional foods. Fusion, for sure. The drinks are also delightful. Gogi berries, ginger and ginseng? Yes please. I have a lot of dietary restrictions, and they have, multiple times, gone out of their way — without my asking — to make adjustments to food so I can eat it. The service is always friendly.
I don’t know if they do this anymore, but Sundays used to be sliding scale, four course dinners. The profits went to local community projects. Amazing. These are good people.
And don’t leave without trying the raw vegan ice cream. Yeah, that’s right. You know you want it…

I’ve eaten at most restaurants in Santa Cruz but since I’ve discovered Asian Rose, it has the privilege of receiving all of my dining dollars. For lunch, one can choose one or three entrees and pay only 6 – 7 dollars! The food is amazing and fresh tasting, with locally sourced ingredients. My wife and I eat here a few times a week for lunch because the cost of food and the quality makes it an appealing choice.
Asian Rose’s dinner menu is diverse and if you enjoy good food, there will be something for you. One can find made-​fresh-​daily ravioli, stuffed with mushrooms or squash and laden in rich sauces. Or a Dosa (eggplant being my favorite), which is most like vegetables stuffed in a thick, crispy crêpe like thing. The presentation of the food is something the chef takes pride in; the dosa comes with four different sauces, arranged symmetrically, each on a piece of paper thin zucchini.
I spoke of eggplant and Asian Rose cooks the vegetable eggplant with a high degree of expertise. Order Tahu Javu and you will find eggplant among a variety of delicious nuts and vegetables, sauteed in a green, sticky, Javanese basil sauce. The eggplant will remain in its form, cubed and seared, but upon contact with your tongue, will melt eagerly in rich creamy goodness.
I could talk more about why to go here, but I will just say this: Everything at Asian Rose is quality. The décor is simple and elegant. The food is… phenomenal and amazingly, it is cheap, rice is even included with meal prices. The staff, while not the most extroverted people, are good people. It is a family business and you can feel a real sense of commitment from everyone working there. Asian Rose is a restaurant I want more people to experience.

AMAZING FOOD! Had the artichoke curry — one of the tastiest dishes I’ve ever had. I’m in town from Michigan — thanks to Unilocal I found this place. I’LL BE BACK!

I really did not like this joint at all. The only good part about it was the fact that it was a lunch date with my lovely. The service was horrid. My cup and my fork were dirty. The food was lackluster at best. People on Unilocal seem to really dig this joint though, so maybe we hit them up on an off day. Maybe not.

Raj!!! We’ve known each other since 97 when I went to cabrillo college. Now we are in GV, we dont get to Malibar as often as possible. They have a different approach, more laid back and wait for enjoyable food. No rush here. The tempeh la goreng is amazing!!! great drinks too. Don’t forget about karma night on sunday. this is where you pay what you feel you’ve gotten in return. I always make a point to pay for more than the dish is asking for, why? because you can’t get this anywhere else… RAJ!!!

YES, THEY ARE OPEN AGAIN! Located in the same space as Malabar, Asian Rose is open for lunch six days a week. Although the set up has changed from the way they operated when they were next to the old Kelly’s Bakery at the top of Pacific Avenue, many of the menu items are the same, meaning you have the opportunity to return to Asian Rose and have some of the delicious dishes you used to get at the old location.
In their current incarnation, you still have the choice of one, two, or three items with your choice of rice, but now you don’t see those items in a display case before you order. When you arrive, you go up to the central counter where you are shown a menu. You choose your meal (there are a variety of options besides the 1, 2, or 3 plus rice) and pay. Then seat yourself and wait for the food to be brought to your table. The food is still delicious with some of my old favorites like the Basil Eggplant, Cauliflower Spinach, and the Kale Coconut Salad. What a treat to experience these again. I had thought they were gone forever.
They are not nearly as busy as they were when they were at the old location (when a line out the door was common). i suspect this may change as the word gets out that they are back in business. I did notice a number of people coming in to order food to go.
The atmosphere, as mentioned by others, is a bit strange. The staff are the same as work at Malabar in the evening. They are not very communicative or extroverted, but they are polite and efficient. The space can seem very cavernous when not busy and there is little in the way of decoration and there is no music which could help the atmosphere a bit.
I hope people give them a try. Their food is unique, sort of Asian Fusion, very good flavors, very healthy, and reasonably priced. Check them out!

Ever seen «Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares»? The premise is that tough-​talking Scottish master-​chef Gordon Ramsay spends a week at a restaurant which is well-​meaning but under-​achieving. At the end of the show (it’s rather compelling actually), there have been tantrums and tears and often a few people have left, but the restaurant is five times better.
Asian Rose reminded me of that show. Great people, really talented chef, excellent ingredients, but terrible teamwork translates to terrible service. I was so excited by the idea of vegetarian Indian food, but it took two hours for us to get fed, which is too long. The food was mostly pretty good, but one dish was slightly burned and one was cold. The rice was also overcooked (kind of dried out).
They don’t sell beer. That’s a bit of a show-​stopper for me. Was it for spiritual reasons? Philosophical ones? Too tight with cash to get a license? We weren’t told, just a curt «no».
Get Ramsay (or somebody) in to turn this place around; it has such potential but it isn’t fulfilling it at present.

I used to *love* Malabar. And I really used to love taking my Korean girlfriend there because the owner thought she was hot or something so he’d always give us free appetizers. Several years and several girlfriends later I attempted the same trick with a Vietnamese girl. No dice. Damn that guy’s picky!
But anyway, yeah, the service is marginal, but short of driving over the hill or paying too much at Pearl of The Sea, or eating the same 3 dishes over and over again at Dharma’s this is the best vegetarian option this side of the hill. I usually get the 3-​dish combo and hope for the best. I haven’t gone wrong yet and I’m usually in a good enough mood to get one of their exotic drinks to wash it down.

Awful service, good food, great menu and clean bathroom
Awful service: Plenty of servers, but we were ignored at every opportunity. We were seated (server pointed to free table) without menus. Waited for several minutes before being handed menus. In the meantime a server deposited some naan on the table in passing, then came back to take it away as we hadn’t ordered it (still no menus). Finally we got menus and a few minutes later our orders for drinks, appetizer, and entrees were taken. One drink (mine) arrived, and the server was leaving before we could even ask which drink it was. It was more than 5 min later that my spouse’s drink arrived. Then we waited kind of a long time for the appetizer (granted this isn’t the servers but the kitchen, most likely). When the appetizer arrived, we had long finished our drinks, so the server took our glasses, without ever asking if we wanted more. We drank our waters, and no one refilled them. One entrée arrived. We split it and finished it. Then a bit later the second entrée arrived, so we split that too. No one refilled the waters, no one asked how was anything, no one asked if we wanted to order anything else, and the servers delivered everything while passing by, without really stopping. We were ready for the check, and no one came, so finally my spouse gave a little wave, and they came over and refilled our water. Thanks for doing that after we had empty waters for our meal and now we’re ready to leave. Part of the problem might be that servers were not assigned to tables — it was always a different person coming by.
Good food, not great: Our little curry fried potato roti appetizers were good, though tiny portion. Our butternut squash ravioli had excellent filling, but not much of the filling, or the food in general, and the pasta seemed stale. The mango/​plantain curry was excellent, but the brown rice it came with was so hard and gross I was worried it would hurt my teeth.
Great menu: All vegetarian, mostly vegan, everything sounded really interesting and unique, lots of great non-​alcoholic beverages to choose from, really made me want to try everything.
Clean bathroom. ‘nuf said.
I would go back, given the menu and the food potential. But if the service is as bad the second time, would not chance it a third, as it ruins the meal.

As far as lunch: It’s ok. Order the combo and get several things for a slightly more reasonable price.
What’s up with the two names? Asian Rose café during the day for lunch and Malabar for the evening. Nothing really changes, crap just gets more expensive and mushy from what I can tell.
At dinner you can get burned badly like I did with tempe meatless balls. BTW, forget about telling your server what you want and getting a good sugestion, dude couldn’t speak english well enough. I was served four tiny meatless balls with a bit of sauce in a huge bowl for 14 bucks. OMFG, paaaaaaalease!
It seems like everything was the same stuff as lunch that had been sitting in the pots all day and was now molten overcooked mush.

One of my very favorite places. Good for a quick lunch too, because the food comes out fast (I assume it is premade).
The thing to order: Basil Eggplant. SO SO GOOD and I don’t even like egg plant either!
I can eat a good nutritious lunch for under 10 bucks! Amazing.

Junior year of college, my friend Lindsay and I developed a saying: «You can’t resist the Rose.»
I have since graduated and moved back to LA but whenever i visit SC i must go to Asian Rose. Oh man this place is absolute heaven for vegans and vegetarians (which i am not). Every once in a while i find myself craving the basil eggplant — it rocks my world.

i can see why a lot of people like this place but I have not been back since the last time I was there. This was a long time ago as it was in their now defunct boarded up location, but it always bugged me because the old location did not actually have a kitchen. They served food and microwaved it before serving. Whats up with that? Is there some health code violations that have been broken?
The food was okay, nothing stellar, but if you are vegetarian you may love it because that is what they specialize in. I will have to check out the new location maybe they have a kitchen and my food is cooked fresh.

I love this place. Their lunch special is affordable and healthy and delicious. I highly recommend the beet curry and the pineapple tempeh… and the yams… and the gado gado. The drinks are a little pricey but a great treat. Really, I can’t recommend this place enough.
It moved to front street, so for those who remember them at their previous locations, don’t fret, they’re just down the street!

A little bit of a wait is worth it on a busy, hot day, because nothing pleases my tounge more than tasty bites from Asian Rose. I had been frequenting this place since it was in that little alley by the old Oswalds location. It turns into Malabar at night, which is reminiscent of a butterfly turning into a giant golden eagle at night. (that means it gets better).
The menus for Malabar and Asian rose share some similar items but it truely is its own contained yin and yang one stop meal shop.
Great food, beautiful arangement of space and tables inside a kind of industrial chic looking /​high valuted ceelings room.
Asian rose’s prices are good, no they are great… so much food for so little green, unfortunately they are often out of the popular items since things are not made to order.
List of things once must have here:
Tempeh La La
Mango Lhassi
The Kale and Coconut
everything else is always good too like the red potatoes, or the leeks and curried potatoes.
Did I mention that this is bar none, one of the best Begitarian (bomb-​ass vegitarian) restaurants ever?