The Cafe will soon move across the street, expand hours

If you’re a regular at The Café, the time-tested eatery in Paristown, you treasure the place’s quirky décor, salivate over the house-made baked goods and have a bead on the irresistible Huevos Rancheros a la The Café.

Well, time is running out to have a meal at the current space, as The Café will move its operations across the street into the Stoneware & Co. building, possibly as soon as next month. The restaurant has been in its current location at 712 at Brent St. since 1996.

The good news is, the fun décor, from the collection of chandeliers to the vintage furniture is likely to move across the street along with the breakfast and lunch menu served daily starting at 7 a.m. When the move was announced last spring, The Café owner Sal Rubino said the entire staff will be retained.

Meantime, you can still get breakfast and brunch all day, as well as enjoy lunch entrees and sandwiches. We stopped by for lunch on a recent afternoon and the place was buzzing, per usual. Our projected 25-minute wait time ended up being only about 15 minutes, and we were seated at a table right next to the table up front where the available cakes are displayed. Yeah, that’s not a temptation. Not at all.

From breakfast to lunch, The Cafe is almost always hopping.

We sat down, our friendly server took our drink order, and he returned with them in plastic cups. He informed us that because they were so busy, they were temporarily out of clean glasses. We told him we didn’t mind, and he joked that, “I didn’t want you to think we don’t trust you.”

For lunch, we chose a pair of sandwiches: The Victorian, which is house-made pimento cheese, lettuce and tomato, on walnut wheat toast, and The Early American, which is thin-sliced roast beef with lettuce, tomato and horseradish sauce on a French baguette. For sides, we ordered apple slices and fiesta bean salad, respectively.

The Victorian was packed with pimento, and we quickly learned that the crisp apple slices made for a perfect pairing of the two. The Early American, meanwhile, was highlighted by the near-perfect baguette, with the ridiculously crispy vegetables and tender, medium-rare beef layering the experience nicely. The bean salad was flavorful and slightly spicy, with a mix of beans from kidney to black.

And, of course, there was the cake. We were full from the ample lunch, so we grabbed a huge slice of freshly-made tuxedo cake, rich with chocolate and cherries. Absolutely decadent.

Anyway, while we’ll be sad to see that building suddenly empty, we’re looking forward to checking out The Café’s new digs – not to mention to find out what the dinner menu might hold in store.