A formerly vegan restaurant with two L.A. area locations that added animal products to its menu had its last day over the weekend after heavy backlash from customers.
Sage Regenerative Kitchen & Brewery had been operating for 14 years as a vegan establishment, but the owner, Mollie Engelhart, decided to launch a new menu featuring meat, dairy and eggs last year.
The restaurant, which had locations in Pasadena and L.A.’s Echo Park neighborhood as well as one in Austin, Texas, used regenerative agriculture methods to source their food; regenerative agriculture is the practice of farming and grazing in ways that reverse climate change by rebuilding soil organic matter and restoring degraded soil biodiversity, according to Regeneration International.
The Echo Park location also housed a brewpub that produced beer and kombuchas.
Engelhart shared video showing the May 28, 2024, staff meeting where employees were notified of the menu change; a post to Instagram published the following day officially announced the new items to the public.
Also included in the video was footage of people protesting inside the restaurant about two weeks later, banging drums, holding signs and yelling into megaphones. Signs held by the demonstrators read “Sage turned its back on animals” and “Meat is murder.”
Protesters could be heard chanting: “Chef Mollie has blood on her hands,” and a different angle of the demonstration depicts a woman declaring the group was there “on behalf of the animals that Sage [slaughtered] for profit.”
She also could be heard saying “regenerative agriculture is a lie” before hurling several expletives as restaurant workers tried to do their jobs during the demonstration.
Another part of the video, which was taken on Monday, shows an employee packing up the bar and a closed sign in front of the Pasadena location.
On Jan. 1, the restaurant published a social media post that stated Engelhart and her husband, fellow chef Elias Sosa, were “[closing] the chapter on Sage with a heavy heart.”
The post went on to say that the couple sold their home after facing “tremendous challenges” in 2024 and tried to “breathe new life” into Sage, but the restaurant’s concept shift led them to “the same predicament” they found themselves in last year. According to Eater Los Angeles, the business was behind on rent and taxes in late 2023, which caused Engelhart and Sosa to close their Agoura location and their “cloud kitchen” in Culver City.
Most of the comments on the post announcing the closure seemed to celebrate it; however, some expressed sadness over the fact that the restaurant was shutting down for good.
“This is a great day for animals. One less butcher shop posting as a restaurant in town,” one user said.
“This is so sad, but thank you so much for being a powerful voice for regenerative agriculture,” another user chimed in.
Sage Regenerative Kitchen & Brewery’s last day of service was Jan. 5, but their website remained active as of Tuesday morning.
That said, their online menu states that they are “closed from Jan. 5 to Dec. 31.”
