On My New Found Love of Acai Bowls and Douchery
Echo Park in the early aughts was a booming community and home to sidewalk fruit vendors, but were we ready for açaí bowls?
8/26/2022 - Dan B.
I moved to Echo Park in the early 2000s, it was early enough into its phase of gentrification that outsiders would ask me if I was living in the dangerous barrio whereas my peers, who were now locals as well, scoffed at the idea. The reality was, it was a bit of both. Record stores, cafes, indie rock clubs were already in place with new ones and yoga studios primed to open their doors in the coming years – and still, drive bys, muggings and assault were re-occurences to the dismay of the neighborhood's generally peaceful residents.
Twenty years later, it's an affluent neighborhood and has been one for some time. Rents soared, as did property values, the dodgers became a good team backed by a lot of cash. The pandemic forced some of these business to close their doors, and yet new ones sprouted up in little time. The city finally decided to repave the roads so the new douches wouldn't be bummed about anything looking janky, and at some point between then and now, açaí bowls reared their heads.
Didn't understand what an açaí bowl was the first time I heard about it, didn't care. I cooked at home, saved money, and ignored food trends or smoothie culture altogether. A decade or so passed until much to my surprise, I discovered it's basically a bowl of lower-sugar (sometimes) sorbet topped with chopped fruit and granola drizzled in honey or agave. Suddenly, it clicked for me: the açaí bowl is actually damned good.
Personal, family related reasons prompted me to leave LA for just shy of two years and it was on the east coast, just blocks away from The Schroeder's old P.O. box that I became familiar with a local açaí bowl chain that would change my perspective on not only fruit in a bowl, but myself, forever.
During that stressful period, with the second wave of covid roaring, and being a stranger in a once familiar land, I found myself more often than not buying these açaí bowls nightly. I would clasp this little bowl of “evening respite” and savor every bite of banana, chopped mango, blueberries, strawberries, granola, and frozen açaí puree with a honey drizzle. Rinse and repeat.
However, if one were to examine the economics of açaí bowl spending, extending this treat that I deemed “necessary for my sanity” out an entire year on a daily basis would result in roughly $4000 spent on açaí bowls annually. Consequently, the routine pre-made açaí bowl had to go. Then came the occasional Trader Joe's microwavable one, and pureeing the açaí and dicing the fruit in the kitchen.
When I finally returned to Echo Park, I squinted my eyes through the blinding, cloudless sky and navigated a walk through the park where palm trees again felt like exotic and mystical bits of scenery dispersed throughout dying sub-tropical grass.
I figured that açaí bowls must by now be to Southern California what the cheesesteak is to Philly and I was undoubtedly now in their mecca. Ended up trying about five places in my neighborhood back to back, one bowl a day, with mixed results that also came with an understanding that I had a lot of options out here.
As I waited to adjust back to life in SoCal, I did so with a thawing açaí bowl clutched in my hands, and accepted the fact that I am not only now, but was always, one of the douches. It turns out, being a douche tastes good.