Wofford students have a new dining option within walking distance of campus: Monarch Café – and they take Terrier Bucks. The café shares a property with Hub City Farmer’s Market on Howard Street, which sits right next to the Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM). Both properties back up against a water system that has gotten a lot of attention from the Northside Initiative over the past few years: a branch that has been called the Greenville Branch, the Nasty Branch and more recently “The Butterfly Creek,” says professor John Lane. “Children at Cleveland Academy [of Leadership] were asked to rename the waterway, and that’s what they chose.” The creek is mostly contained in a pipe, and the small section of stream that is “daylighted” sits in what was once a lake behind a dam (VCOM, downstream, wasn’t always a medical school – the property was once a mill facility, and the lake supplied energy). The Northside Initiative hopes to increase the amount of daylighted stream and create more green spaces, but at the moment the stagnant, murky creek seems to fit its former name better than its newest.Keeping with this butterfly theme, the Monarch Café joins the struggling creek system and the surrounding neighborhood to the newly relocated farmer’s market – as well as an effort for change.The café is part of the Butterfly Foundation, a non-profit organization established in 2007. Their Culinary Job Training Program helps “prepare unemployed, underemployed, previously incarcerated persons and homeless adults for careers in the foodservice industry” (you can read more at butterfly-sc.com).This unique café serves multiple purposes: to eliminate the “food desert” that once existed in the Northside (which means that there are no grocery stores or otherwise reliable food sources in the area), and to provide a place where the community can gather.

In order to do this effectively, the café must meet the specific needs of the Northside neighborhood, and it does this in several ways. The fresh food store sells locally and regionally grown meats, dairy and produce, making healthy foods accessible. Some food made in the restaurant is made from produce from the Urban Farm. Additionally, the menu caters to the neighborhood: fried fish and grits is a dish on the menu specifically because Northside residents wanted it, says Lane. The result is a spread of options for Wofford students to try.

The Monarch Café menu can be found on the Butterfly Foundation’s website and includes breakfast items such as quiche, eggs, muffins and cheese grits, plus a wide variety of lunch options: chicken fried or baked, burgers, vegetable or turkey paninis, salads et al. Also worth noting: fried macaroni and cheese balls, southern eggrolls and homemade Parmesan and garlic chips.

“[My food] was really yummy… very fresh and I could tell that it had been made as soon as I had ordered it. I would definitely go back and try more things off the menu,” says