The Beverage Bar

Just for a change of pace, we decided to forgo our usual taco run, and try out a new-ish coffee house in the 'burbs between the loops this morning. It was nearly noon by the time we got there, but technically it was still morning, and on some days that's close enough.

The place is called The Beverage Bar. It sits unobtrusively in a oak-tree-studded Suburban Modern strip center on Thousand Oaks, just east of Jones-Maltsberger Road. It has all the 21st-Century requisites: free Wi-Fi; flat-screen televisions, one tuned to a sports channel, another to something more estrogen-laced; Old-Fashioned games and puzzles (a young man brought his son in and played Connect Four at the next table; what memories that brought back!); and, reportedly, something called a Wii Station. Also "local roast" coffee, though why it should matter where coffee is roasted is a mystery to me. (Yes, I know all about carbon footprints, but am so tired of hearing about it from people who sit in drive-through lanes with the engines running in their gigantic SUVs, or sit home with their thermostats turned to environmentally unfriendly temperatures, that I get testy about it at times.) But there it is. 

The look of the place is impressive. The shopping center itself is attractive, which is saying a lot. All the buildings are stucco above limestone, with Hill Country-style metal rooves. Many of the live oaks that inhabited the property before development remain, and give the place a feel more of Comfort than Loopland. Inside the Beverage Bar, the decor was done by someone with a real flair for colour, and a minimalist sense that would do the Chinati Foundation proud. And I mean that in a good way, more Claes Oldenburg than Carl Andre. The room is large, spacious, and starkly furnished, yet comfortable. The lighting is good for those who wish to read as well as for those who are slaves to their Mac Books and smart phones. Outside is a large covered veranda area which, presumably, will be stocked with a few comfortable tables when the weather improves. (Even with the noise from the road, it'd be a shame to waste that space.)

The young women behind the counter when we visited were very good. They were friendly but not overbearing, knowledgeable but not garrulous, and pleasant to deal with. They were helpful and patient when we confronted the surprising difficulty of making a choice of what to order -- everything looked soooooo good in the case -- and they were attentive even after the bill was paid and the food and drink consumed. 

Our drinks were straightforward: a cup of coffee for me, a root beer for my friend. (I forget the brand of root beer, but noted that it was from a company in Mukilteo, Washington, which I visited just a few months ago. The Boeing factory tour is in Mukilteo, as is the Mukilteo Light.) The coffee was too strong for my liking, while the root beer possessed a full yet subtle flavour, with none of the flab of the major labels, nor any of the white-lightning brashness of the house brands. (Bet you didn't know it was possible to appreciate root beer like you do wine.)

The food was fascinating in concept but, sadly, disappointing in experience. I simply had to order a spaghetti taco (the little sign says "You've seen it on TV," but I never have; this was my first exposure to the idea). Well, okay, spaghetti in a fried corn tortilla shell. Nothing wrong with that. I'm sure it's very popular with the Lego-and-Barbie Doll set, but it left me cold.  I hesitate to describe it, because I honestly believe that this dish is not meant for discerning adults, and its target demographic could not care less about its qualities, but here goes: the spaghetti was overcooked, and the sauce on it was thin and watery. It would have been better, I think, in a soft taco, too -- more like the forbidden spaghetti sandwiches I used to make as a child, when I, too, gave not a hoot about seasonings or textures.

That taco, I ordered only out of curiosity; I didn't actually expect to really like it, and in fact I left half of it. (Yes! Me!) I also now put it aside in my mind as not being serious food. More like the cartoon before the movie, back in the days (before my time) when there actually were cartoons before the movies. It was more of a plaything, an amuse-bouche, if you will. My real breakfast was the guilelessly named Breakfast Sandwich: eggs, cheese, choice of meat (I went with bacon) and choice of bread (I went with flatbread). This I expected much more from.

It didn't quite hit the target. Eggs, by themselves, are not particularly tasty things; they need butter to give them richness or they end up tasting like egg substitute. These tasted like egg substitute. Bacon must be fried in an open skillet and allowed to crinkle and curl and soak in its own grease. This bacon looked like it had been pressed in a machine and tasted only vaguely bacon-like. The cheese -- cheddar -- was perfectly good but scanty in application, so it failed to make up for the shortcomings of the other ingredients. The flatbread was ... a little flat. Okay, bad pun, but it just seemed to lack something, flavour-wise; though it did have a good texture. Maybe it should have been heated up a little before serving. 

My friend's turkey-and-swiss sandwich, on the other hand, was outstanding. A generous but not excessive portion of thinly sliced turkey breast, paired with a good-quality swiss cheese, graced a perfectly wonderful  soft, tasty bread, and shared it with fresh-from-the-farm lettuce and tomato to make a sandwich that promised little and delivered much. The opposite of any politician. Really top-notch stuff, this.

This place also bills itself as a juice bar and, I'm thinking, does wine as well, which might have made an interesting pairing with that sandwich ... maybe a nice Jo'burg reisling. I'll have to try that, next time I'm there. Because I will be back. Just not for breakfast.