Cafe Yumm!

Cafe Yumm!, with several locations in Portland, Oregon, serves healthy vegetarian bowls and wraps. I went to their SW Morrison establishment.

After trying and reviewing my experience from The Whole Bowl, a few people mentioned that Cafe Yumm! basically serves the same type of food -- with their own "Original Yumm sauce."

On this day, I ordered a small Hot 'n Jazzy Bowl with no sour cream. My Hot 'n Jazzy came with white Jasmine rice, Original Yumm sauce, organic red beans, Tillamook cheddar cheese, diced tomato, fresh avocado slices, black olives, cilantro, topped with jalapeno sesame salsa.

Hot 'n Jazzy, no sour cream

I liked that any customer can customize his/her own bowl, and in retrospect, I should have asked for brown rice instead of white rice. My bad there.

The bowl was pretty good, but Cafe Yumm's sauce was not as good as The Whole Bowl's secret Tali sauce; the flavor just did not have the same pop Whole Bowl's dish had. I definitely appreciated the fresh ingredients and clean, colorful presentation Cafe Yumm! brought here. I also liked the different texture contrasts (the nutty, floral rice; the creamy avocado, the fresh cilantro, the briny black olives, etc.).

Cafe Yumm! says this bowl is spicy, but I disagree. I detected no spice here. Perhaps my taste buds are just so used to extremely spicy foods by now, but this was not even a 1 on my 1-10 scale. I tossed some sriracha on my food just to get some zip to the meal.

The decor is bright and lively, thanks to a lot of orange paint and glass windows (to allow natural light to penetrate the interior). The cashier was extremely friendly and even asked me how my morning was (trust me, I don't get that from 99 percent of the people that take my order). Overall, a very positive experience here, and I can see myself returning for more flavorful, healthy food! 7.25/10