Restaurant Review: Village Coffee

I held off from trying the food at Village Coffee for a long time. Frankly, the coffee scared me away from delving deeper into the menu. For an independent coffee store in the heart of an upscale shopping district, the coffee at Village Coffee falls short. It’s not bad so much as its sort of wrong; it tastes like the next-to-last trial and error test that occurred before the invention of coffee.

The coffee does have a couple of things going for it, of course. It’s refreshingly over-caffeinated, reasonably priced and served in welcoming atmosphere by a personable staff.  As for the taste itself, you get used to it. 

So the day I was hungry and pressed for time at the coffee shop, it was with great reluctance that I picked up a menu. I ordered a BLT ($5.25), and kept my expectations low. Managing my expectations turned out to be a mistake. The tidy little package that arrived on my table consequently blew my mind. First, it was a BLT club sandwich, so there was a protective layer of bread between the bacon and the vegetables. It was like the ‘80s McDonald’s McDLT containers that kept the hot side of a burger hot and the cool side cool, only without the styrofoam environmental threat. The design was simple and elegant. The sandwich was delicious.

I ate the sandwich and the side of snappy mixed greens greedily, and left the coffee shop stunned. They caught a lucky break this time, I thought, figuring that the next meal surely would be sub par. A couple of days later, I ordered the roast vegetables and Grilled Chicken wrap ($7.25).  A mix of vegetables and flavoring encased in either a whole wheat or a spinach wrap, it seemed more complicated than the triple threat of a BLT.

But, like the BLT, it exceeded expectations. It was served at exactly the right temperature—the sliced wrap was lightly steaming, but not too hot to bite—and the mélange of pesto, broccoli and grilled chicken blended together perfectly.  On a later visit, I found the roasted turkey breast sandwich ($6.50) to be equally simple and tasty. It was served on chunky, crusty French bread and featured a sweet and spicy Dijon mustard spread.

Surprisingly, considering the largely south Asian staff, the Indian food was the only relative disappointment. My chicken saagwala ($10.25) had a pronounced lemon flavor; it tasted almost like chicken francaise surrounded by spinach. Still, it was good, just not what I was expecting.

I plan on continuing down the menu, until I find the dish that confirms my suspicion that the food is terrible. I hope it takes a while.