If you're strolling along the Kamogawa River in Kxyoto and looking for a spot that combines delicious vegan food with a commitment to zero waste, tu casa is the place to be. This cozy café and guesthouse offers more than just great coffee and meals—it’s a space where sustainability and taste come together seamlessly.
About TU CASA
Tu Casa is special because it operates completely zero-waste, and all the food and drinks are entirely vegan. Furthermore, the building is powered by solar energy. I personally find that super inspiring and I would love to have a café like that myself. I personally have only been to the café part, but they do operate a guest-house as well. I'd love to try it out someday!
Inside the café, they offer zero waste bulk shopping as well as plastic-free and up cycled goods and they don’t use any singe-use plastic items.
According to their menu, the mostly organic ingredients are locally sourced and everything is vegan as well as free of white sugar. Furthermore, what I find amazing is that 1 % of all sales goes to donations, and customers can choose if they want it to go to the environment, to society or to animals. If they don’t choose, it will be evenly distributed.
When you enter the cafe, you are greeted by a relaxing atmosphere with wooden furniture, lots of plants, and good music. The staff is very friendly, making it a cozy stay. However, please plan in plenty of time as it might take a while to get seated if the cafe is busy.
The dishes are Korean style, and they offer for example bibimbap, kimpap, or black bean noodles. Depending on the dish, you can decrease or increase the amount of rice depending on your appetite, making sure less food is wasted. You can also choose additional toppings and side dishes if you feel extra hungry or want to try more foods.
TU CASA offers some desserts as well as a good variety of drinks.
Dishes I tried
Black Bean Noodle
I chose the black bean noodles for dinner. It is a noodle dish from Korea topped off with a thick fermented soybean paste sauce, minced soy meat and veggies. You can also choose additional toppings and side menus, such as soup, kimchi, seasonal veggies and soy meat BBQ. I chose kimchi.
The noodles were soft and chewy, while the paste was slightly sweet and not to salty. The dish was topped of with fresh and crispy cucumber and carrot, as well as soft minced soy meat. I saw this kind of dish many times in Korean dramas and always wanted to try it! It was just as delicious as I imagined it to be! The kimchi was sour, spicy and not very sweet. It was made from cabbage and cucumber. Yummy!
Hazelnut Chocolate Tart
The tart consisted of a bottom with a cookie-like texture, a layer of sweet caramel cream and hazelnut as well as some dark chocolate. It had the perfect amount of sweetness and a good mix of textures. Loved it!
Organic White Masala
The white masala was caffein-less and super yummy! It was quite strong with lots of spices, especially ginger and cardamom and it was sweet. I loved how it was topped off with milk foam.
All in all, I definitely recommend checking out this cozy café! The atmosphere is relaxing and the food tastes amazing. I believe this is a good way to bring down ones own environmental impact when traveling a bit.
Details
Price span
500¥-1580¥
Hours
Please check their official instagram.
Address
4-414-Miyagasuji8, Higashiyama ward, Kyoto city, Japan
Homepage
Tel.
070-5438-1488
Other Useful Information
What is Zero Waste?
Zero waste is a philosophy that encourages the redesign of resource life cycles so that all products are reused, aiming to eliminate waste sent to landfills, incinerators, or the environment. Important principles for that are the 5Rs: refuse (for example single-use items), reduce (buy only what you really need and choose long-lasting high-quality items), reuse (for example glass jars), recycle and rot everything you couldn’t refuse, reduce or reuse.
The aim of zero waste is to reduce ones environmental impact by reducing waste and saving resources.
Source: Wikipedia
What is Veganism?
"Veganism is a philosophy and way of living which seeks to exclude—as far as is possible and practicable—all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose; and by extension, promotes the development and use of animal-free alternatives for the benefit of animals, humans and the environment. In dietary terms it denotes the practice of dispensing with all products derived wholly or partly from animals.“
- The Vegan Society
Reasons to choose vegan alternatives:
Protect animals from suffering horrendously and getting killed
A whole-food plant-based vegan diet has the least environmental impact
A whole-food plant-based vegan diet is extremely healthy and can help reversing various diseases like type 2 diabetes or heart diseases.
For people, as a vegan diet requires only one third of the land needed to support a meat and dairy diet.
PLANT-BASED: A Guide to a more Sustainable Lifestyle
Check out my Kyoto Sightseeing x Vegan Food Guides
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