Sidewalk Cafe

MarketPlace at Collegeville Shopping Center, Collegeville, PA

 

As I have said on many occasions, location is almost everything when it comes to restaurants. A good location can generate those walk-ins and drive-bys who become regular customers. A bad one can guarantee that you are never noticed. Further, your restaurant should reflect its location: we just saw an ad that the local indoor go-cart track now has Indian cuisine! Seriously? 

 

I also am saddened by restaurants that lack an identity or sort of have an identity but don’t seem willing to go all the way with it.

 

This of course leads me to Sidewalk Cafe, the latest entry in the Collegeville dining scene, such as it is. First, it’s in the Marketplace, which is set back from the road, and unless you’re really looking, there is no way you would have any idea the Sidewalk Cafe exists. It actually is just a couple of doors down from the recently reviewed Tortugas, which has proven that a restaurant can succeed there. However, Tortugas is part of a mini-chain, so the owners were likely able to be more patient with the growth of Tortugas; further, Tortugas is the only Mexican place in a 15-minute radius, so they likely had an easier time getting customers.

 

We were the first customers of the morning; we almost didn’t go in at 8:30 because the Open sign wasn’t lit up, but noticed other lights on and the hours posted them being open at 8. Let’s deal with the hours shall we?

 

Tuesday-Wednesday: 8a-4p

Thursday-Saturday: 8a-8:30p

Sunday: 8a-2p

 

Wow, ok. You really don’t know what you want to do, do you? Listen, if you’re going to be a breakfast and lunch place, that’s awesome: just close at 2 and be done with it. No one will eat there between 2 and 4. But, then you’re going to go ahead and try for dinner on weekends. Um, good luck with that. Here are some dinner menu items from the menu we grabbed on the way out:

 

Stuffed Chicken Breast $14.95

Salmon $12.95

Grilled Steak $13.95

 

(BTW, we had two different menus, with mine being cheaper and less extensive; we can assume then that they are still working out some menu issues, but also not bothering to hide those menu issues from customers)

 

OK, I’m going to assume that the dinner menu goes into more detail, but I’m also not sure about that. Regardless, the price point seems way off considering that the interior is composed of metal chairs, tile floors, and several paint ‘techniques,’ including a drop ceiling painted to resemble the sky. Also, the sleep-inducing piano music (are we on the sidewalk outside John Tesh’s house?) doesn’t help. The sidewalk effect is achieved indoors by having an entire wall with two windows and a door and an awning (this is indoors, mind you, so the panes of glass are replaced with mirrors). Ironically, the Sidewalk Cafe does not actually have seating on the real sidewalk outside of it. 

 

So, what other identity might Sidewalk Cafe be playing with? Well, their tagline appears to be “Eat Well — Be Well.” OK, healthy, good food? Or high quality food? And, indeed, for breakfast they had a ‘lite-bite sandwich’ and organic multigrain pancakes. They also offer breads from the fabulous Le Bus Bakery. Their lunch offerings also feature a burger made from organic beef and they have a seitan sandwich. Here’s my issue though: if you’re going to go in this direction, then go this direction. But, the rest of the breakfast and lunch menus are pedestrian, diner fare. I actually think that a high quality breakfast/lunch place that featured creative breakfasts and sandwiches might fare well in this area (I’ll review Nudy’s soon), but Sidewalk Cafe only peeks in that directions. Without a hook, I think this place probably has until the end of the year, if that.

 

It’s actually too bad because what we had was good. The home fries were well-cooked, though not remarkably seasoned. The scrambled eggs were a little harder than I’d like, but still nice (and definitely preferable to runny). The bacon was quite good and the bread wonderful. The service was good enough, as were the prices for breakfast (aided by a coupon).

 

Here’s the thing though: there’s really not quite enough for me to come back really. I certainly wouldn’t consider dinner. I might consider lunch or breakfast, but the place is a little depressing and a veggie burger for $7.50 doesn’t exactly scream great bargain to me. As with any restaurant that wasn’t evil to me, I wish them luck, but I think they may be stuck with a location and concept that don’t work very well.

Collegeville Diner

290 Main Street, Collegeville, PA

http://www.collegevillediner.com/

When we first moved to Collegeville, there was a Pizza Hut on the corner. Sadly to some, I love me some Pizza Hut, but we didn’t go often. So, when the Collegeville Diner rose from the rubble of the PH, we were pleased, though we didn’t see the absolute need for another diner, since they seem to be everywhere in this area. Within ten minutes, there are probably half a dozen places we could go for our weekend morning breakfast, the time we’re most likely to go to a diner.

However, the Collegeville Diner has pleasantly surprised us. Beyond breakfast, they offer good food at decent prices — and service is quick. Breakfast though is what we normally go there for, and so:

We each got the #1 — your basic two egg breakfast with coffee and (a thimble of) juice included, all for less than $5. The eggs were quite good: the scrambled ones weren’t soupy nor rock hard, and the over easy were good, so Rick said. The bacon is good quality as well — enough crisp that they can stand on their own, but not burnt. Also, the home fries walk that difficult line of crisp/tender well — with enough crunchy bits to keep me satisfied.

So, Collegeville Diner will remain a standby for breakfast — and any other time we need a place where anyone can find anything to eat.

Satchmo’s

315 E. Main St., Collegeville, PA

Perhaps you are unaware, but if there is a default dinner in our house, it is Wawa hoagies. That is, if I don’t feel like cooking, we will invariably turn to the dependable Wawa: Rick will get a turkey, and I’ve been turning lately to their ciabatta sandwiches. We also enjoy other places in the area, but we are a lazy people here at Stonesthrow.

So, Satchmo’s opened up last month, and last week we had our first occasion to try it. It’s owned by the people who own French Quarter Bistro in Royersford (which we’ve never been to), so it has a NoLA twist to the usual hoagies, including muffuletta, a crab and andouille gumbo (that I may have to try next time), variations on the Po Boy. Rick didn’t stray far from home and had a self-devised turkey hoagie with lettuce, tomato, sweet peppers, and mustard. I went with their menu options and selected the Roast Turkey, which is really attempting to be the Bobbie from Capriotti’s.

[Aside: The Bobbie is the best sandwich on earth. It starts with a wonderful hard roll that isn't too hard. Inside that is lovingly layered fresh roasted turkey, homemade stuffing, a generous portion of mayonnaise, and, of course, cranberry sauce. It is perfect. Simply perfect.]

The Satchmo’s Roast Turkey adds cheese, which isn’t really necessary. The sandwich was good though and is in the running with the McNabb (turkey, cole slaw, 1000 island) up at Sonny’s Limerick Deli for favorite specialty sandwich within a 15 minute drive.

I do wonder a bit at Satchmo’s prices–at $7 and up for a hoagie, they’re pricing themselves outside of Wawa, and thus outside of most of the college kids. The quality probably does make the sandwich worth the money, but we may just stick with Wawa for that spur-of-the-moment run, especially when we don’t want a 10-inch hoagie, which is actually much of the time. All that being said though, it was good, I’m up for trying more, and I hope they succeed.