Roots Natural Kitchen — Restaurant in Charlottesville

I wish Roots would open another location of the corner. I LOVE getting bowls of goodness from Roots. The employees are always really happy and helpful and the isn't anywhere else in town that I can get as massive bowl of awesomely delicious and actual real food for less than $10.

They have a wonderful variety of options as to what type of bowl you want, they have a great list of signature bowls or you can create your own. You can also customize any of the signature bowls though and swap ingredients or add additional things for like $0.30 or something pretty insignificant (I think adding extra protein might be slightly more but seriously... It's so refreshing to not feel like I'm getting ripped off for adding a small portion of something extra) My go to bowl is a take on their Corner Cobb... base of roots rice, kale, and mixed greens with the charred corn, red onions, cucumbers, avocado, a hard boiled egg, and I swap the sweet potatoes for cherry tomatoes, add black beans & extra chicken, and get the cilantro lime dressing.

This is a lot of food. I always have lunch for the following day 😊

Being a "townie" though, I tend to avoid the corner while the students are in town. Roots can have lines out the door. They move really fast so it doesn't take long to go through the counter and get your food, but I typically go more often in the winter and summer (parking is also easier and more abundant when there are semester breaks).

I've still yet to actually eat there and haven't been upstairs. At some point maybe I'll make it up there and can share what a full Roots experience in house is like, but for now, I am so content being able to pick up my roots bowls to eat at home or out wherever I want!

They have awesome healthy food plus great service and the prices are so pleasantly reasonable. I am so happy that Roots exists and is here in cville so I can enjoy it...

I have had roots 5 times and only 1 time was the order right. Missing items, wrong ingredients, ingredients swapped with my girlfriends food, etc. With food allergies being a problem, sometimes the food is inedible for 1 person or the other. When the food is correct, and I mean when, it’s great! The flavors, the quality, the ingredients, are all top notch. No clue as to why the quality control seems to be missing, but for a restaurant that has really good food this is entirely frustrating. This may be the last time I order from them, which genuinely makes me sad.

Below is my girlfriend and my order. I was supposed to receive chicken and she was to receive BBQ tofu. Both orders are BBQ tofu.

Update 8/25/2020: I was in contact with someone from roots that wanted to fix the problem. They were communicative and very set on fixing the problem. Well when my fiancé and I placed our order through this person, they forgot to add an ingredient, BBQ tofu, to my fiancé’s order. There was also something else missing, but honestly I’m not going to fuss anymore. She apologized when I informed her of the mistake and wanted to fix it again, but it’s more trouble than it’s worth. I appreciated the efforts, but I will move on and eat elsewhere. I genuinely hope that other people have better luck than...

I’m in Charlottesville for a wedding and a group of us stopped at Roots for salads for lunch. We walked to our hotel and began eating when, not 15 minutes in, I bite down on something hard. It was a broken piece of metal. I then sifted through the salad and found a SECOND identical piece of metal. I walked back to the restaurant and alerted the manager and staff. They looked at me puzzled but were not in any way apologetic. I said I don’t want to make a scene but this just happened. They said “we don’t even have utensils like that.” Well news flash, you do and one is broken because the pieces were in my salad. I’m not a litigious person but I went to law school, therefore I am very familiar with lawsuits of this nature. The manager gave me a refund for mine and my Aunt’s salads, but the lack of care is what bothered me the most especially since the staff began making the next meal for the next customer without doing a thorough inspection of their utensils or ingredients. Accidents happen but they can also result in severe injury. I’m lucky I was not severely harmed by this incident but this restaurant...