Gracing the halls of the Erb Memorial Union food court on the University of Oregon campus for 12 years, Holy Cow Café has been at the beck and call of almost 20,000 students’ culinary whims every term. One of the first all-organic vegetarian cafés on a college campus, Holy Cow remains at the forefront of sustainable agricultural practices today.

While strolling past the Holy Cow Café counter and viewing the menu of exotic vegetarian dishes with names like dhal, sag paneer, falafel, and padthai, patrons seldom inquire about the source of such recipes. Few people know the rich international background shared by the two owners of the café, Katherine (Kathee) Lavine and Anton Ferriera, the founders of Holy Cow. This history claims responsibility for the café's success and philosophy today.

Lavine embarked on international travel at an early age. Her first adventure began after high school when she volunteered on a kibbutz in Israel. The Hebrew word kibbutz describes an agriculturally based collective settlement in Israel. The kibbutz where she lived was a large farm of approximately a hundred members who engaged in major agricultural practices.          

After a year, Lavine returned to school at the University of California in Santa Cruz and graduated with a bachelor’s degree with honors in creative and expressive modes of therapy.          

Upon graduation, Lavine went back to Israel and Asia. She traveled to places like Nepal, Burma, Singapore, and Indonesia. While visiting friends in Hong Kong in 1982, Lavine first met Anton Ferriera, her future partner at Holy Cow Café, whom she later married.

Ferriera was a South African emigre who received his bachelor’s degree in South African history from the University of Cape Town. He became a professionally trained journalist who worked as a reporter and radio broadcaster in a myriad of places throughout the world including Cypress, London, Spain, and China. Ferriera enjoyed cooking and collecting exotic recipes while working in new locations.

“He took the opportunity to learn to cook all over the world, because that was his hobby,” Lavine says. “Hong Kong alone has the most dazzling array of local and international food.” 

Following their stay in Hong Kong, the couple decided to move to Israel to join Kibbutz Gezer, a community of about 100 people located between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The couple lived and worked on this large farm for six years.

“The kibbutz has many businesses that we collectively own and operate,” Lavine says describing economic principles of the community.

Ferriera worked as a vegetarian cook for two years on the kibbutz studying the kitchen’s classic recipe collection of food from every persuasion. “He also mastered the art of cooking for large numbers of people. Ingredients were hard to come by, so he taught himself how to make tofu from scratch and often went to market to seek out interesting ingredients,” Lavine says. “Many people switched to a vegetarian diet during Anton’s time in the kitchen, as the food he made was better than the standard meat-based fare.”

In his position for the next four years, Ferriera drove a truck while delivering glue produced on the kibbutz all over Israel and the neighboring occupied territories.

“This gave him the opportunity to sample the best of Middle Eastern cooking all over the country, including shishlick, schwarma, falafel, hummus, and more,” Lavine says. “That completed his Middle Eastern culinary education.”

The large quantities of chemicals sprayed on the cotton fields, the herbicides used in vineyards for weeds, and the inhumane living conditions of the chickens and cows persuaded the couple to find a better way to eat, Lavine says.

After six years, the couple moved to the United States, where Lavine could live closer to her family in Southern California. The couple decided to settle in Eugene, Oregon.

Unable to find work in their desired professions, Lavine and Ferriera decided to use their acquired knowledge of international cooking to produce packaged organic foods, such as roll ups, to distribute to local markets. They named their business Holy Cow.

In 1995, the couple took an opportunity to operate the Village Restaurant at the Oregon Country Fair, which gave them the idea of operating a restaurant in town. When the University of Oregon redesigned their food court in the EMU, they applied for the healthy food spot and won the bid, Lavine says. 

More than making money, Lavine would like to make a difference in life. “We see business as a powerful change agent. We chose to change the way people eat through education and example,” Lavine says.

“Holy Cow takes pride in maintaining sustainable business habits beneficial to the local environment. We are in business to change lives.”

The café is adamant about using sustainable practices in food choices. Lavine believes the most important factors in food selection are that the food be organic, local, and vegetarian, in that order of importance. The café participates in other sustainable practices including composting, recycling, reusing dishes and silverware, dispensing bleach-free take-out containers, and donating oil to biodiesel production.

The café also buys food from local organic farmers and supports local events like the Mt. Pisgah Mushroom Festival. Holy Cow began and continues to support the UO Erb Memeorial Union’s wide environment and sustainability policies. Their efforts were recognized in 2007, when the Lane County Commissioners awarded Holy Cow the Trashbuster Award for best business.

The café menu is based on the recipes Ferriera acquired while living overseas. Concentrating on food devoid of meat, the café’s entrees are “a combination of authentic, creative, and adapted recipes,” Lavine says. Ferriera took time to design recipes without meat that required special spices for flavor.

“We will never compromise deliciousness,” Lavine says.

Some of the ingredients used in the café are difficult to find locally, like paneer cheese used in the café’s popular spinach entre called sag paneer. Many of their dishes are of Indian origin, since those are primarily prepared without meat.

“It is easy to cook meat,” Lavine says. “It is much harder to make delicious food without meat.”

Lavine firmly stands by the café’s organic food choices.

“Organic is our highest ideal. We provide excellent vegetarian food at the café, because it is harder for people to produce these items easily. We want to offer delicious food that everyone will want to eat regardless of their own dietary choices at home,” Lavine says.

Local produce also tastes better because it is picked within several days of distribution, thereby retaining savory ripe flavor and nutrients.

Long-time friend Debi Strochlic, who resided with Lavine on Kibbutz Gezer and who also now lives in Eugene, has good things to say about the couple.

“They really do live their values,” Strochlic says.  “They are very involved in environmentalism, vegetarianism, and organics.”

Strochlic was impressed with the creative ideas Lavine and Ferriera conjured to run their business sustainably, such as using real dishes and silverware instead of disposable dishes and utensils.

“I think it was a brilliant idea,” Strochlic says. She was amazed at how the couple constantly found ways to live what they preached in their business.

Ferriera oversees the cooking aspects of Holy Cow, while Lavine tends to business management. The business also indulges the community with a lavish catering service of organic farm-fresh produce and local coastal fish or free-range meat, as specified in personal catering orders.  Holy Cow catering uses only the finest local products featuring organic foods because Lavine believes that one must begin with quality to end up with quality, and that “growing food organically creates quality.”

“Vegetarian is not the end-all deal,” Lavine says regarding cooking with animal products while catering.

“Catering on the other hand is a celebration usually, and culturally for a lot of people, it includes some sort of meat to feel like a celebration. So we serve some of these for celebrations when asked, but only the best quality and humanely raised,” Lavine says.

Holy Cow almost lost its spot to Laughing Planet Café over a year ago, but regained its lease when Laughing Planet backed out at the last minute, EMU Food Services Director John Costello says. The decision to replace Holy Cow with Laughing Planet was nothing personal about the café.

“It was just business considerations,” Costello says. At that time, loyal patrons signed petitions, started an Internet blog, and organized campus sit-ins to demonstrate their support for Holy Cow.

“We believe they (Holy Cow) do a great job of serving faculty, staff, and the student population here,” Costello says. “They are here, they are well received, and they remain well received.”

Planning to stay at the University of Oregon for the next nine years, Lavine and Ferriera will continue to live by their words on the sign that hangs on the wall overlooking the kitchen in the café: “We believe one’s food choices are a powerful political statement.”