New restaurant The Owlery offers vegetarian-only dining to residents

If you’re waiting for your Hogwarts letter and a good meal, Bloomington has the restaurant for you.

The Owlery restaurant, a new all-vegetarian, mostly vegan restaurant in Bloomington, had its grand opening Saturday.

The restaurant opened March 5, but owners Ryan Woods, 34, and Toby Foster, 20, said they wanted an occasion to celebrate their success. They marked it with extra menu specials and a late-night acoustic set.

“After our opening we were much busier than we expected,” Foster said. “We had to stop and think about the amount of food and the amount of staff it would take.”

The Owlery takes its name from the Harry Potter series as well as several pieces of artwork adorning the walls. One was a black-and-white drawing of an owl’s face with its wings spread.

“It’s vaguely a Harry Potter reference and vaguely a reference to having later hours eventually,” Foster said.

As the two talked, Foster ate a vegan mint chocolate ice cream cake slice from the dessert menu.

Head chef Bobb Easterbrook designed the menu with input from Foster and Woods.

“We wanted it to be comfort food and things we grew up eating,” Woods said.

Woods’s favorite dish is the fish and chips (vegetarian, of course). Foster said he enjoys the Reuben sandwich and fish sandwich, both made with tofu.

The most popular menu items so far are the meatball Parmesan sandwich and pierogi. All dishes are made with either tofu or other meat substitute products.

Woods and Foster credit their band background for their business experience. Woods also previously owned Sweet Hickory, a small Bloomington art gallery.

“We do all our merchandise ourselves,” Foster said. “We have experience setting up tours. We’ve managed to do it in a way where we didn’t lose money.”

Since signing their restaurant lease Dec. 1, they’ve installed a kitchen, decorated, developed a system for ordering food and officially opened their doors.

Foster also visited several dairy farms to see the animal rights conditions that supply The Owlery.

Woods and Foster currently work 10 to 12 hours per day every day to make the restaurant a success.

For Foster especially, the process was daunting.

“I definitely thought it was kinda crazy, but I decided to just go for it,” he said.

The Owlery makes the bread for all of the dishes. During summer months, Foster and Woods want to make an effort to buy the restaurant’s produce as locally as possible.

The Chocolate Moose will soon be supplying them with vegan ice cream.

Woods and Foster are considering adding later hours and have applied for a beer license.

The Owlery has extra space, which Woods and Foster hope to use for art shows, acoustic shows and poetry readings.

“It seems silly to have this space and not do that, too,” Woods said.