Food For Thought Cafe

I’m pretty sure none of the employees have ever taken a shower, or even know what one is, but they’re the only place on campus with vegan cream cheese so I’m forced to look at dirty people doing food prep. Icky.

I have mixed feelings about this place.
Pros: They have the cheapest d*mn lattes ever! They don’t charge you for milk alternatives. I can have a hazelnut milk latte for the same price as a regular latte. Yes! Their food is pretty good and it’s a veggie safe space. Also there is a lot of room for studying.
Cons: My mixed feelings come from how rude the staff can be. There is definitely an ‘in-​crowd’. I guess somebody forgot to tell them this isn’t high school. How you are treated definitely depends on whether or not you look like them and are their ‘besties’ or something. Sorry I don’t fit your description of awesome. I’m just trying to get my coffee and some food. I don’t need to be over looked or talked to in a monotone voice only to find that you’re super peppy, kind and helpful to some hipster kid behind me. Rude, much?
All in all, I like the coffee and the food enough to keep going there. I figure if I continue being nice they’ll treat me nice someday.

My boyfriend and I go here several times a week and hope to go here even after we’ve left psu. They always have something new and tasty for a good price :) And they’re soups are awesome.

Great café with lots of vegetarian/​vegan options! Their day old baked goods are just as good for being day old. Tried their lavender lemon macaroons and OMG so moist (day olds)!
Their coffee is ok, not the best, but for the price you’re getting, it’s good enough. They have other dishes that I’d love to try. My friend frequents this establishment often and really enjoys their Eco bowls and other vegan baked goods. Their chai latte is also pretty yummy.
They accept card, but there’s a $ 2.50 minimum, which is not that hard to meet.

If PSU were high school, food for thought would be the cool kids table. This place is really awesome in theory, a student run collective with a very friendly menu for our friends with food intolerances. However, I have found that it is extremely hit or miss. One day the staff will be on point and the food will be so delicious and creative. The next day the counterperson ignores you for eternities (all the while chatting up their bestie (who also works there) and blasting shitty music) only to tell you twenty minutes after you order that they are «completely out of everything.» A lot of the time the food tastes like it has been cooked three or four times already, especially the homies. No, those potatoes are not your friends! But inevitably, being a poor vegetarian coffeeholic, I keep coming back.

I think I was expecting too much.
I bet FFTC s awesome for PSU students. Heck, I wish my undergrad had a place like this.
But for me, from across town, there are many spots I would pick from over this one that have (which FFTC did not) easy parking, little to no line, tasty food, and a window I can look through, for the same $ 10 I spent.

Love it here, the food and coffee is outstanding. I am an alumni and always try to bring my friends here for a laid back sustainable meal. We are never disappointed.
Only down side is try not to come close to lunch/​breakfast time mad rush of students and lines. Other is parking, so take your time to take the trolley from the square up or bus, otherwise be prepared to pay to park if you can find a spot!

The food is vegetarian and whole foods based. I want to give a better review since I worked there but I just can’t. Not being bitter, only being honest. If I could erase this review I would.

I understand that when showing up within the first few minutes of opening that some things won’t be ready, but almost every time I’m in there their home fries aren’t ready, their coffee isn’t ready, they don’t have the change to break a ten (not a twenty! Not a fifty! Just a ten should be easy right?)… To me it seems like if you’re ready to be open you should have everything you sell at least mostly ready!
Abysmal service 90% of the time. Today I ordered eggs and toast (cuz there were no home fries), waited fifteen minutes, then I watched my eggs sit on the counter for five minutes after kitchen called order up because the guy at the counter was too busy making himself an espresso. Only after the order after mine came up did he notice the food and then set it on the counter and mumbled my name and walked away. I ate my lukewarm over medium congealed eggs in silent sadness because I didn’t have time to wait for a new batch nor didn’t want to disturb the counter guy from his angsty wall-​slouching…
Tried saying thank you on the way out, got stared at and ignored because texting is more important than customer service.
Only saving grace is $ 1 really good coffee. I actually like Trailhead better than stumptown now (apparently blasphemous but hey). Really good coffee. Only reason i keep coming back here. Cheap breakfast that if you get it when it’s still hot is pretty good.

There was a live Maggot in my sandwich…
I’ve been in here a few times to study and eat, and yesterday I ordered the buffalo tofu sandwich (Tofu, Lettuce, Carrots, Cucumbers, and Tomatoes with Cashew Cream). The sandwich itself was really tasty, but with a full bite in my mouth I looked down only to see a little maggot inching its way through my food. Not a satisfying site to say the least.
I told the girl behind the counter and she apologized, but no refund was offered. In my opinion, if you find a creepy crawly that eats rotting things in your food then you should be issued a refund.
I have worked in the restaurant industry for 10 years and have even worked in a place that had a lot of flies hanging around, and I have never seen maggots in food. Maggots=rotten protein or produce, which is never a good thing to be eating. Despite that, my sandwich looked fresh, so I am not sure what the issue is, perhaps the produce just needs to be washed more diligently.

I’m so glad there’s at least one place on or near campus where I can get a healthy, delicious meal. The eco bowls are almost always delicious, and as a broke student I’m always especially glad to see a $ 3.50 lunch option that won’t leave me still starving. Since they’re on campus and connected to the university, they don’t mind people taking over a table for 4 hours to do homework/​group projects. I wish they had more hours, maybe a dinner option, but they’re primarily a coffee shop, so it is what it is.
The vegan pastries are consistently delicious. I often spend 5 minutes trying to decide which one to get, and when they were without an oven for 6 months this year I really missed them. I especially love the blueberry cornbread muffins, they’re delicious.
Always a good loose-​leaf, self serve tea selection. The earl grey and jasmine green are my standards, but I’ve been meaning to branch out and try some other options. I appreciate the hippie vibe and the compostable everything.

My business teacher and I have a dispute over this place. She thinks it’s a waste of student money, a tragedy which students are supporting.
I think that’s bunk, it’s the healthiest available meal on campus and has a low enough marginal cost per meal that their customers can afford to eat there.
I go in regularly, and there’s a fantastic variety of available meals, each of which is far healthier than I would eat on my own. Sure, I don’t get my daily helpings of salt, sugar, and complex carbohydrates, but I get a tasty, healthy (and sometimes sizable) lunch for less than eight bucks; even the health-​food-​oriented food cart (singular) within six blocks can’t compete with that.

Healthy cheap food? Um… yeah. I can get down with that.
Food For Thought Café sits in the basement of the SMU hall at PSU. Serving up hippie food to the alterna-​students, FFTC is the hip and healthy kids’ alternative to the chain food upstairs on the main floor. The food down here with its wholesome ingredients, conscious composition and green message is much more likely to appeal to a specific demographic, and that’s obviously they crowd you’ll be hanging with when you dine here.
Word has it that this is actually a student club that may be in part subsidized by the University. But if that means creative and innovative vegan and vegetarian food made in-​house and served up fresh and hot for prices in the $ 3-​$ 7 range, then that’s okey dokey with me. The food I sampled was filling and… well, kinda bland, but it was a decent amount for a cheap price, which is something I would be totally enamored with were I still a starving student. Matt D’s dish of 2 tacos was ginormous and it looked downright delicious (which he confirmed it was), so I’m guessing that there’s more to this place than the bean and rice bowl I had. Oh, and my cup of tomato/​coconut bisque was damn good.
I give PSU props for supporting this endeavor and the students get some love for rising to the occasion. This is definitely a place I’ll stop in again to try some more of this good stuff.

I took me two whole years of study at PSU before I found one of the best food spots on campus, and I really wish that I had found it sooner!
Food For Thought is one of Portland’s best kept vegan/​vegetarian secrets. It’s very easy to miss the place as it’s located in the basement of Smith Center, but you’ll never want to leave once you do find it.
The menu at FFT changes every single day depending on the seasonality of ingredients and moods of the chefs. They do have the eco bowl (lentils on rice/​quinoa) every single day, though. Some of the more popular items, like their vegan reuben, will make random returns to the menu.
The other wonderful thing about this place is how cheap it is! Most of the food ranges from $ 3 – 6 for an enormous portion of hearty, healthy food. I’m pretty sure the university helps to subsidize the cost of their ingredients because I don’t understand how they can maintain this price point.

I go here almost every other day. This is a student run café in the basement of one of PSU’s buildings. It would be kind of weird if you went here and weren’t a student, but luckily I am and I would probably still swing by even after I graduate (yeah, one of those awesomely creepy peeps).
Food Food For Thought has the most creative vegan pastries. Here are some of the pastries I’ve had:
lavender raspberry tea cake
peanut butter blondie with cinnamon frosting
earl grey scone
carrot cream cheese muffin
pizza scone
chai bran muffin
You never know what they will have. It’s always a surprise.
I am addicted to their salads as well. The $ 4 large salad with lemon tahini dressing, usually sprinkled with a heavy hand of almond/​hazelnuts and cranberries/​golden raisins is insanely addicting. I can’t say enough good things about this place! In terms of ambiance, there are community tables, a piano (often being played by some badass) and rotating art gallery of PSU students work.

Food for Thought… where to start. This place is terrible. They, however, have a monopoly on decent beans on campus. Unless you want Starbucks or Portland Roasting, you are pretty much doomed to come
here. The food is awful and the service is absolutely terrible.
It gets one star for having Stumptown, and one star for being a minute away from my 8 a.m. class. Next term it might go down to just one.

Every vegan baked good I have had from here is delicious, even the ones i dont think are going to be that good!
I have had brownies,
a peanut butter cookie,
a chocolate cookie filled with peanut butter (described by non-​vegan classmates as «everything you wish a reese’s was…») ‚
an almond rosewater cookie (rosewater… ewwwww! but not this cookie!) an oatmeal raisin cookie (which I am usually not a fan of),
and I am sure something else.

I spend ludicrous amounts of time at Food for Thought. I’m a big fan of kinda crappy basements and the whole post-​apocalyptic business model, but that’s why I find certain places equally aggravating and fitting. Best thing about Food for Thought is the total cheapness. Where are you getting 2 giant pancakes for $ 2.50 downtown? seriously, if you find anywhere else, Let me know.
Coffee is Stumptown and good, they’re super vegan friendly, and some pretty awesome people. Plus, I love the piano and all the lovely humans who give it regular use. Usually to café-​wide applause at the finish.
Yeah, they really don’t care if you bring your own food either, just hang out, it’s joyous. They have some computers, too, if you didn’t bring your own.
Their hours make me want to punch a kitten. Average day isn’t too bad, usually 8 to 6 or so, but weird pseudo-​hours on fridays and closed saturday through sunday (and I have a big problem with weekend closers…). They get crazy wonky in the summer, too. I just can’t understand how the abundant, bored PSU business majors haven’t stepped in on the running of some of their stuff.
Rehash:
~ CHEAP! and Tasty
~ Piano!
~ Good coffee!
~ Computers for those in need
~ Trademark Co-​op sucky hours

Having FFT right down the hall from my office is kind of like having stoned roommate that fancies themselves a cook.
The place is crazy unorganized and probably a terrible abuse of my tuition money, and the staff is mainly there to hang out but doesn’t mind serving the occassional scone or bowl of whatever grain and protein combo they have that day.
The food is nothing you can’t make at home, and it’s not really anything special. Sometimes they do crazy things like put raisins on a salad. But where else on campus can I get a decent sized portion of black beans and brown rice with a variety of hot sauces to dress it up, and high quality loose leaf teas and agave (I like to pretend agave is the syrup form of tequila) to put in it for under $ 5? No where. Definitely not upstairs from any of the PSU sponsered Aramark vendors. And if I can get an A for my senior capstone for simply writing a 2 page book report, FFT can get 4 stars for that.

One would think that with the universally known epithet «broke college student,» there would be numerous places around Portland State with cheap food options. And one would be wrong.
From the $ 7 burritos at Chipotle in the Broadway dorms, to the over-​priced Aramark cafetorium in the Smith Student Union, for those that live on campus in kitchenless dorms, eating 3 square meals comes out to about $ 15-​$ 21-​at least– each day. Unless you want to throw health to the winds and live off of dollar menus and Hot Pockets during your university career, your low-​cost food options are few and far between.
Enter Food For Thought, the student-​run vegetarian food co-​op. FFT serves up delicious, filling, and HEALTHY foods, many items for under $ 5, to students who find their way to the basement of the Smith building.
The GOOD:
*Awesome drip coffee priced at $ 1 if you bring in your own mug
*Really good brownies that are pretty much impossible to finish in one go.
*Yummy breakfast foods
The NOT-​SO-​GOOD:
**Someone please, please, please get these kids some practice at steaming milk. Every latte I’ve ever had here has been flat and foamless and somehow even though I always get them unflavored, I can never taste the coffee in them. Aside from the Starbucks also in Smith, FFT’s lattes are the worst I’ve had in Portland.
**Also, mac’n’cheese? Should not have the consistency of oiled noodles, and it should also ideally actually TASTE like something.
For the newly initiated, the vibe here is very relaxed and self-​service. If you’ve got exact change for your coffee, you can skip the long line at the cash register and drop your buck into the cash pot and help yourself. You can also use their toaster bar to get your bagel just the way you like it before slathering it with jam or cream cheese.
The dining area is spacious and somehow cozy at the same time — a great place to study before class or write some inspired bad poetry or meet up with friends. My only gripe is that they close at 2:30pm on Fridays and are not open on weekends.
(Edit: see Zosia’s post for hours they are open during the scholastic year; during the summer they have a sign on their door saying they are open outside, but I have no idea what their hours are going to be).