Life Thyme Natural Market

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Home to New York's first raw food bar�arrayed with such California inspired items as raw pies and puddings, "live" halvah and super vitaman C salad�Life Thyme also boasts a kosher-certified, vegan bakery and all kinds of organic produce, packaged goods and prepared dishes. One side of its double-wide shop showcases a vast arsenal of vitamins, supplements and health-promoting teas and tonics, with a small but well-stocked natural-foods grocery, takeout shop and juice bar on the other. Thanks to the restaurant that formerly occupied the building, the store maintains its own industrial kitchen, which both caters and supplies a booming takeout trade, with vegan Spanish pizza and three daily soups among its specialties. In addition to impulse sweets, the bakery prepares vegan wedding cakes to order.

Upstairs are books, natural beauty products and hundreds of soaps. The easygoing staff stop to chat, advise and even help moms tuck wriggling babies into hard-to-reach backpacks.