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• Get Juiced

Biologic with a plus sign is yet another eatery with a confusing name that is difficult to search for on the web. It’s important to know that in several European languages, “biologic” is the root for their words for “organic.” It is more a juice bar and smoothie pit stop than a food café, but still worth your visit. Its new Mystic shop is beautiful and sunny inside, and vast improvement over its original cramped quarters in Stonington which for patrons literally was standing room only. The juices are served same as at Not Only Juice in Willimantic, which is to say presses and blended in the morning and bottled for sale for the rest of the day. Biologic’s blends, too, are quite similar to NOJ’s, with fruits and carrots predominating in order to mask the tartness of the veggies. And Biologic’s nut milks and smoothies, too, are similar. On any one day, Biologic actually serves many of the juices listed on its menu, whereas NOJ serves only one or two. And unlike NOJ, which serves eggs and cheese, Biologic is all vegan. Hurray for Biologic and a plus for vegans! I speak only for myself, but I shun fruit juices, as I prefer to eat fruits whole to thereby avoid the fruit sugar rush. Jolt or not, vegetable juices are far more nourishing than fruit juices. Of the three mostly veggie juice blends, the Hardcore has salt and cayenne pepper added to it, and the taste of salt and pepper predominates, tasting more like a peppery version of V-8, if not a V-80. Only for the brave! Instead, I recommend the Signature Green blend, which has some pear but thank goodness no salt or pepper. Wisely, they are trying to appeal to a wider clientele than just me, and they indeed deserve to win that wider patronage. When it first opened early in 2015, it was hard to find in Stonington’s remote Velvet Mill complex. As of March 2016, it relocated to downtown Mystic, near where the health food store Puritan & Genesta formerly was located. While Biologic’s new juice bar is easier to find, traffic and parking in downtown Mystic always is challenging, especially in the summer. On the one hand, there are 15-minute parking spaces right in front of the shop, which should make parking easier. On the other hand, the police are rumored to be lax about strict enforcement, which would explain why those spaces always are occupied. But don’t let the dismal parking in Mystic dissuade you from making a visit, or at least from trying to visit. Updated from previous review on 2016-12-02