While decent sandwich shops are in shockingly short supply in downtown Santa Monica, should you find yourself in the Montana neighborhood around midday and are in need of an urgent solution to an empty stomach, you have yet another option to consider, B&T’s.
Situated in a gorgeous building at 912 Montana Ave, the very tastefully decorated sandwich shop is still only at a soft opening stage, but a more extensive menu will be on offer very soon along with longer opening times. In fact, the doors were only opened to the paying public for the very first time on Tuesday.
"It went incredibly well and the neighborhood was very welcoming to us," beamed Terrence Caldwell, co-founder and the "T" in the outlet’s identity. "Right now we’re doing limited hours and a limited menu, but we had a nice little line ready to come in when we opened at 11 a.m. And we had a steady drumbeat of customers until we ran out of breath at 2 p.m. So yeah, very good day."
According to Terrence, the shop offers 10 signature sandwiches all of which have their own flavor profile and everything is 100% plant based. "All the ingredients that we use are organic and locally sourced. We avoid fake imitation meat, so every sandwich has a main component, call it like the meat replacement," Terrence says.
"For instance, one of our main sandwiches uses a marinated eggplant as its main component and it has a very nice meaty texture, it almost looks like a roast beef. So every sandwich has that main component that’s made using vegetables that are marinated in a way that really brings out the natural flavors," he says.
"We also offer condiments like aioli sauces that are made using fresh organic ingredients like a cucumber aioli, plus a chimichurri of balsamic vinegar, again all using organic and locally sourced ingredients," says Terrence, adding that other flavors include jalapeno, cilantro and green peppercorns. However, everything on the menu is suitable for vegans, but some items do contain nuts.
The other half of B&T is Brittany Caldwell and they met while they both worked in the tech industry in San Francisco. Terrence originally hails from Colorado, but attended college in Los Angeles, so he was already familiar with the area. "It was an easy transition, so that really helped," he says.
"This is our first restaurant and Britt and I began adopting more of a plant-based diet just a couple of years ago. The impetus was largely just to improve our mental and physical well being. And we really saw improvements because of it," says Terrence, adding that the store’s slogan is "This is for sandwich lovers" because they want the emphasis to be on the flavors, regardless of whether it happens to be vegan-based.
This sentiment is also echoed on the shop’s website. "Our goal is to bring plant-based options to sandwich lovers. B&T’s is not for the strictly vegan — we use ingredients that everyone knows and loves … instead of confusing and fake meat imitations that turn people off from incorporating plant-based items into their routine. We show the plant-based-curious that you’re not relegating yourself to a lifetime of tofu and hummus."
As such the store describes itself as where "Bay Cities meets Erewhon." For the next few days, the limited menu will still be in place and hours are 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. every day except Sunday and Monday, but the aim is to soon be open to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday.
