Great Cafes

Wednesday, 6 April 2016

Freshly Toasted

Pre-prepared hot food is a tough one to advertise and makes the case for those cafes with kitchens.

Tuesday, 5 April 2016

Baby Chew

Chilean bull kelp - dried seaweed - as sold in markets and used as a flavouring, meat substitute and apparently as a great chew for babies!

Monday, 4 April 2016

Premier Smoothie

Freshly made smoothies are not new but on a Premier Inn breakfast buffet? If you serve breakfast make sure your breakfast coffee, smoothies and food are as good as offered at your nearby Premier Inn.

Friday, 1 April 2016

Cafe with Legs

A Chilean (sexist) speciality - cafes with legs. There are apparently hundreds of these cafes in Santiago appealing to mostly men and where the female staff wear skimpy uniforms.

Coffee was good and this was one of the more upscale ground floor cafes with legs

The cafes with legs became very much seedier in the underground units located by the metro stations - the research this blog entails! No April fool.

Thursday, 31 March 2016

Chilean Staples

Empanadas - traditional 'Pinos' contain ground beef, onions, raisins, black olives and hard boiled egg

Large portions of steak, egg and chips

Hot dogs with lashings of ketchup, mayonnaise and avocado

Wednesday, 30 March 2016

All Day Hot Food

Exki hot food quiche/tart self-service selection at Paris airport - it worked and presented well.

Tuesday, 29 March 2016

Chilean Street Snack Drink

'Mote Con Huesillo' is a Chilean street snack/drink of peach juice (huesillo) and wheat (mote)

Copihue is the brand leader and provides the carts and ingredients

The sweetened drink has pieces of re-hydrated dried peach.

Wednesday, 2 March 2016

To celebrate five years of continuous blog posting - over 1,400 blog posts and 400,000 page views - Great Cafes is off to check out the cafes in Santiago, Chile and then visit Cape Horn by sail boat. Chris is back after Easter.

Tuesday, 1 March 2016

Coconut Flavours

Coconut water goes with flavours - ginger or matcha - at Farmstand

Monday, 29 February 2016

Farmstand

Taking its inspiration from US "small roadside stalls selling surplus crops and produce from local farms", Farmstand in Drury Lane offers hot food meals - main and two sides - at £7.50.

@WeAreFarmstand

Pulled beef plus Puy Lentils with wild mushrooms and chervil and roasted artichokes with capers and parsley was excellent.

Friday, 26 February 2016

Coffee House Kitchen

Tempting food at Black Penny Coffee House and Kitchen in Holborn - check out the full menu at http://www.theblackpenny.co.uk/Black-Penny-Menu.pdf

@blackpennyWC2

Simple and effective design in a listed building

Wednesday, 24 February 2016

Just for Kids

Kids offer at a Morrison's cafe

Tuesday, 23 February 2016

How Not To

Confectionery in a Cafe - great for the confectionery brand but little margin, almost no cash profit, zero creativity and suggests an operation more in tune with a newsagent/forecourt than a cafe that wishes to build its own brand.