Village Market

Richmond (District) Coffeehouses ~ #14

(No official web-site.)


Place: Village Market
Location: 4555 California Street (on the corner of 8th Avenue); phonicular contact: (415) 221-0445
Hours: open Monday - Friday at 7:30am and Saturday & Sunday at 8:00am
Meal: Fried Egg Sandwich ~ Judy's organic egg, organic wild arugula, herbed butter (org. butter, cilantro, & parsley), NY extra sharp Cheddar, pickled onion (org. r. onion & r. wine vinegar); a cinnamon roll/bun and a raspberry bombolino (which I only discovered after I had already ordered and had finished half of the cinnamon roll/bun); and a cuppa (single-serving/fresh-dripped) ARTíS Buttondown Blend

http://www.artiscoffee.com/


My originally planned destination was going to be a return visit to Rocco's Café; however, it had been raining most of the morning (and only stopped about an hour before I left the house) and I really didn't feel like dealing with wet, city streets. So, instead, I decided to keep it local and continued on with the Richmond (District) Coffeehouses series. Next up along California Street (and that leaves just two more further down California Street, I believe; after which, I will start at the westernmost end of Clement Street and head back eastward, Clint): Village Market.

"Hey, Brian, what gives?! Are you plannin' on reviewing all the neighborhood markets that sell cups of Coffee to go?!" Well, no. This place is going away from being an actual neighborhood corner-market and seems to be transitioning (for the most part) to a coffeehouse only. The market used to be larger, but now it is more of a wine shop/boutique bodega[1]. They have replaced most of the grocery shelving now with tables and chairs: four tables for (one, two, three, or) four; two bench seating areas for two-to-three people; and there are a few sidewalk benches and tables (weather ~ or whether ~ permitting).

For a little corner market-coffeehouse, they have a pretty interesting breakfastary selection (which they call their "Brunch Menu"). A few other nice ideas: Kamron's French Toast (all org. eggs, milk, cinnamon, vanilla extract, powdered sugar, maple syrup, & fruits, with Semifreddi's bread); Brad's Special (three Judy's org. eggs scrambled with org. avo, org. arugula, org. pickled onions, & Prather sausage ~ this plate is served w/o bread); Veggie Sandwich (all org. pear, arugula, & pumpkin seeds with Redwood Hill goat cheese on Semifreddi's bread, a touch of fresh ground pepper & white Balsamic); and (off-menu/
handwritten) Veggie Special Sandwich (org. Winesap apple, org. arugula, NY white extra sharp Cheddar, spicy plum chutney [Italian plums, sugar, raisins, vinegar, onions, spices, garlic, mustard seed, salt] on Semifreddi's bread; this looked interesting and would have been my second choice).

This breakfast sandwich can be made with org. avo, bacon (Hobb's) or suasage [ sic ] (Prather) (however, it was noted that they were out of avocado [or avo] today; the irony of a market being out of a produce item was not lost on me). It was interesting how they actually fry the eggs; they do so on a skillet on top of an electric hotplate. The arugula and pickled (r.) onions were a nice touch; plus, the Semifreddi's bun/roll is soooo much better than what Mr. Thomas usually has to offer. I would liked to have had the bun/roll toasted, though (they have a couple of toaster ovens in the small "kitchen" area, so I know they can do so).

Sorry, there is no supporting photo of the raspberry bombolino. I scarfed it up (or scarfed it down) almost as quickly as I picked it up (or put it down). Needless to say, I liked it a lot.

This was a nice cuppa. I am not sure if I have ever had ARTíS before (and that would be "before today", Mr. Nose E. Brandt). This place used to serve Blue Bottle Coffee exclusively, but, since April (I asked), they have been selling ARTíS only. Their reasoning is that Blue Bottle has raised their prices and, with Blue Bottle's own coffehouses opening up all over (in an effort to go National/International), is making it harder for smaller local places to obtain their Coffee. I did happen to notice that they are still using the Blue Bottle cone/funnel drippers to make the single-drip cuppas (I have one of my own to use at home, too).

For condimentary supplements (over by the sugar and cream area), Village Market has bottles of Pain is good.™ Habanero Pepper Sauce (which they also have for sale in the actual market). I only noticed their hot sauce offering after I was done eating and wandering around the market-area. I had come with some of my own hot sauces and simply used some (well, a good ketchup-serving size) Palo Alto Firefighters Pepper Sauce on the sandwich.


Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Fried Egg Sandwich ~ 6.3; raspberry bombolino ~ 6.9; ARTíS Buttondown Blend ~ 6.9

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1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day:

It is interesting to note (well, if you are a linguistics-geek) that both "boutique" (French) and "bodega" (Spanish) have the same word root: from Latin "apotheca" (meaning "storeroom" or "winecellar"), from Greek "αποθήκη (apothíki)" (meaning "depot" or "store").