Review: 20th Century Cafe
In the past, I’ve found that brunch in San Francisco can be a hit or a miss, because some of the best places don’t take reservations and can have 1+ hour waits. However, a co-worker recently recommended his favorite cafe in San Francisco, so I decided to check it out last weekend for brunch.
20th Century Cafe is a European-inspired cafe located in Hayes Valley. Though the food here tends to be on the pricier side, it is well worth it given the quality of the food. And the best part? – no lines! (at least when we went). We just ordered at the counter, sat down, and waited for our food to be delivered to us.
As soon as we walked into the cafe, it felt like we had stepped into a whole other era. True to its name, the interior of the cafe has a very distinct vintage style combined with a little modern flair. At the order counter, you can see all the different desserts and pastries the cafe offers.
20th Century Cafe offers both an all-day menu as well as a special lunch selection. Most of their dishes borrow inspiration from parts of Europe, and are extremely well executed. I consider their dishes well-portioned, but some may find that they’re a bit small, so I would definitely recommend getting at least one main dish per person as well as a snack.
Let’s start with the beverages! For those of you that don’t drink coffee, we highly recommend ordering the Hot Butterscotch! Deliciously creamy and subtly sweet, the butterscotch was the perfect coffee alternative for us. There’s a very slight bitterness to it too, similar to the bitterness that you can taste in salted caramel ice cream.
Hot Butterscotch – perfect for the non-coffee drinker!
For brunch, we always like to order both a sweet and a savory dish, to avoid the post-brunch sugar crash. For our savory dish, we ordered the Baked Eggs Budapest Style: Farm Eggs in Stewed Pepper, Tomato and Paprika. As someone who’s tired of seeing the same old brunch items appearing on menus everywhere, I really, really loved this dish and appreciated how creative it was. The eggs were perfectly runny and everything was well seasoned. The bread was toasted perfectly and was a delicious, crunchy complement to the softer and warmer parts of this dish. The tomato, egg, and bread textures all molded together appropriately. I would come back just for this!
For our sweet dish, we got the Challah French Toast with Wild Huckleberries, Maple Syrup, and Creme Fraiche. Perfectly soft toast with a juicy huckleberries that weren’t too sweet – what more could you ask for? The creme fraiche also went really well with the dish, and was a nice substitution for the typical whipped cream.
For a snack, we also ordered a Potato Knish, a savory pastry containing a mashed potato filling. Very well done and presented, but probably not the best item on the menu. The filling was a bit heavy, so I would recommend sharing this with at least one other person.
And for the grand finale, we ordered one of the most popular items at the cafe – a slice of the Russian Honey Cake! At $7 per slice, this dessert is definitely a bit pricier than your average cake, but it’s definitely worth trying at least once! It’s very spongy and light, and has ten layers of actual cake, kind of similar to a mille crepe. The sweetness was subtle, which is the kind of sweet that we prefer in a cake.
Needless to say, 20th Century Cafe is now one of my favorite cafes in San Francisco. I can’t wait to try the rest of their menu, and I hope you can come here too!
Final Rating: ★★★★★
Price: $$-$$$
20th Century Cafe
198 Gough St, San Francisco, CA 94102
(415) 621-2380
http://20thcenturycafe.com/