Dining on a budget: Something Healthy in Monrovia

By Lafayette C. Hight Jr.

Something Healthy does something simple in Monrovia.

The most expensive menu item is $7 and their fare can be summed into five groups: Panini sandwiches, wraps, soup, salad and fruit.

Located in a shopping center on Shamrock Avenue that seems to share the healthy-living philosophy - with a gym and health-food store (ignore that fried chicken place on the corner) - Something Healthy is a 10-table restaurant where everything is handmade.

On my first visit to the restaurant I decided to try a $7 tuna melt on whole wheat bread (sourdough is the second option). 

I'll admit that I didn't read the fine print on the menu, so it came as a surprise when I tasted the very powerful flavor of rosemary. 

While unexpected, it wasn't a bad addition to to the fish. Generally I'm used to the herb on poultry potatoes and other meats, but don't think I've ever had it on tuna. On this sandwich, however, it was the perfect ingredient. 

And of course, as I looked closely at the menu, I noticed "smoky rosemary aioli" listed in the description.

I made my sandwich a combo by adding potato chips and homemade iced tea and it was then that I noticed that all of the chips available were baked varieties of popular brands. And the iced tea offered - that day the choices were Mango Lassi, Cherry Raspberry and Blood Orange - are bottomless, and served sweetened or unsweetened.

I had this fear that unsweetened tea from a healthy food place was the equivalent of water, with three drops of flavor, but I'm happy to say that I was proven wrong.

The Cherry Raspberry was my first pick - and probably my new favorite tea - and I had to try a second on the refill, which was the blood orange. Both were flavored very well, and though I ordered them sweetened, it wasn't at all over sugared.

With each sandwich or wrap comes a side salad and it turned out to be a real salad - none of that non-nutritional iceberg stuff here - and dressing made from scratch.

The next dish I tried was the southwestern turkey wrap, which contained lettuce, onion, corn, tomato, hummus and salsa.

The salsa was only slightly spicy in my opinion (to me it felt like 400 Scoville units) but there are some lightweights who might actually feel the burn. I did find myself wishing that there was less lettuce and more turkey, but that could be because I was hungry that day.

Next time I'll have to try one of the soups. They were advertising some sort of southwestern chowder and I hope they have it the next time I visit.

Something Healthy is at 1014 S. Shamrock Ave. in Monrovia.