Week-End Review

hand-dipped chocolate cigarettes for our Parisian Breakfast for Two

Well Folks, Sunday Brunch went off without a hitch (for the most part) and we were pleasantly surprised to see so many new faces (albeit obstructed by glass through the kitchen.) We've noticed that there are new regulars on scheduled days, and old regulars on new days. We'd (humbly) like to attribute this to the fact that with our brunch menu, we've created another dining option/experience in North Portland. This only makes us more excited for what lies ahead at LRBC. There are rumblings of dinner beginning in...wait for it...two weeks. A soft opening that is. Shshhh...keep it on the down low...we wouldn't want to overwhelm the cooks, manager, DJ, husband/wife team who are frantically trying to pull together all the last minute details to make this thing POP! All that aside, things are good here. Things are great. It's good to be home. To return from holiday to a cafe and crew in near perfect condition and with all of your respect for us (w/ a few exceptions) still intact.

Sometimes I wonder if it's good to let the newcomers know about the blog or if we should just let customers find out about it naturally (if they feel so inclined). We would hate to push our lives/history/drama on anyone without giving them fair chance to walk away first. If only there was a way we could pass along our gratitude to those that have only recently joined us for breakfast/lunch/or brunch these past few weeks; without having to be all, "So yeah, we like have this blog and you know, you might find out more (than you want to know) about what goes out behind the scenes of running a cafe and just our life in general."

And we're just talking about the weekends! Who knows how many friends and guests we miss during the early part of the week. As scheduling has worked out this quarter, Evan and I are working shifts towards the end of the week. Something many of you have duly noted these past few weeks. We are often so preoccupied with setting up for the weekend menu and running it, that we don't get too many chances to leave the bubble in the kitchen or in our heads to meet new faces or say hello to to the old. We miss that interaction with you and our customers. It's part of what makes this whole thing worth it, particularly at the end of the day when you're beyond exhausted, desperately starving, without a thing to eat in the house, needing to walk your (neglected, or so you fear) dogs, and are finally able and ready to recap, access, over-analyze, debate, and decipher nearly every detail of what went down at this place you've just spent the last three and a half years building. Yeah, that's when it's really good to have the ability to bring up fond memories from the day, including but not limited to catching up with a regular about his trip to Bali, witnessing freshly walking babies and misfit puppies outside needing a treat, and/or just sitting down with a beverage at one of our tables trying to take it, everything we've created, in.

At the same time I can say that we're prouder than ever about what's been coming out of our kitchen and that stands for something in this house. It's a synchronized rhythm that works with minimal prompting. That's a very very good thing. Something that shouldn't be tampered with too much. We're having a great time planning the dinner menu and working towards the Ice Cream Sunday service. There are oodles of new experiences and stories on the horizon. We can just feel it. This is similar to how we felt when we first opened up Little Red Bike Cafe, unsure of who would come (if anybody) and if we'd be a welcomed addition. Our emotions are fluctuating somewhere between absolutely ecstatic and fretfully anal-retentive to a fault.



Liquor is proving to be a fun to way to vent some of our anxious creativity. Not to mention a profitable way to do so. As many probably noted this past Sunday, our cocktail menu centers heavily on bourbon. Kentucky bourbon to be exact. Buffalo Trace Kentucky Bourbon to be precise. What can we say? We dig this stuff. In coffee. In ice cream. In butter. And we serve what we like. Needless to say it became our bourbon of choice when it came to starting off cocktails at the Cafe. Not to say we won't change it up every now and again. We plan on featuring local distilleries too. We're just taking some time to get the wheels greased before we can take this well-oiled machine out on the road responsibly.

In the meantime we ask that you sit back and please enjoy the ride. We think it's going to be a good one.

pumpkin-raisin bread w/ Jamaican rum glaze