It’s the end of an era for Sage Regenerative Kitchen & Brewery, and some folks couldn’t be happier about it. The beloved California vegan restaurant chain announced it will close its doors on Sunday after 14 years, and vegans across the state are practically throwing confetti at the news.
The closure comes after a rocky year of financial woes and a controversial menu change that left long-time customers fuming. In May 2024, Sage decided to add meat and cheese—yes, real meat and cheese!—to its vegan menu in a bid to draw in new patrons. The bison burgers and dairy offerings were touted as environmentally friendly, using regenerative farming methods, but for many vegans, this was an unforgivable betrayal.
Owner Mollie Engelhart hoped the move would marry her passions for sustainable agriculture and delicious dining, but it seems not everyone was on board. Long-time fans of the restaurant were incensed, with review sites like Yelp lighting up with one-star reviews faster than you can say “grass-fed bison.”
One Yelp reviewer raged, “Disgraceful. I’ll never eat here again now that they serve meat.” Another lamented, “You’ve turned on your core roots and the animals in a way that’s so disappointing.”
But the final blow came when Sage took to Instagram to announce its closure. Instead of mourning the loss, vegans celebrated what they saw as a moral victory. PETA led the charge with a biting comment: “Serving humane-washed meat, dairy, and eggs under the sham of ‘regenerative farming’ betrayed animals, the planet, and kind customers. Good riddance.”
Another commenter piled on: “This is a great day for animals. One less butcher shop pretending to be a restaurant.”
So, as Sage bids farewell, it seems the vegans who once adored it are raising their kombucha glasses to toast its demise. It’s not every day you see a restaurant’s closure met with such gleeful satisfaction—but then again, Sage’s journey from vegan haven to bison burger bistro was anything but ordinary. Cheers!
1 Comment
Well … yeah. They worked out that you can’t make money as a vegan restaurant, and their business from that point on was simply a lifeless sham, like when you finally understand that your wife o longer loves you. The vegans are celebrating because veganism is a religion, and religious people just hate it when one of their own works out that their religion is nonsense.