Cafe Prado is, at present, my favourite cafe. The coffee is perfectly satisfactory, but not mind-blowing and the interior is decorated plainly. The clientele and staff mostly belong to the younger, whiter commercial drive demographic, but are varied enough not to discourage outsiders from walking in.
It is situated in the transition zone between the relatively sketchy area of Commercial drive around the skytrain station and the trendier part up the hill and the passing traffic (mostly pedestrian) rarely slows. In the evening, a lounger with an outdoor table may enjoy a steady parade of pretty bohemians, babies and large dogs, healthily balanced with hobos, jerks in Camaros and the occasional punk.
Diversity is a word that makes me want to fill my shoes with baby rats, but it is the Prado set's diversity that makes it comfortable. There aren't quite enough of any group present to make a majority, unless you consider white people a group, which is reasonable I guess.
3 comments:
Nice review, although I'm unclear as to why this is your current favourite if the coffee is merely "satisfactory" and the clientele unremarkable. I don't live in Vancouver, but on a recent visit I quite enjoyed the Boulevard Coffee Roastery on the UBC campus. The nouveau-minimalist interior was very chic yet calming. The espresso was bold yet smooth, and the service fast and friendly. Not Colgate-smile, "Have a totally awesome day!", friendly, but efficient and not snooty. They also had tasty treats and sandwiches whose reasonable prices were a pleasant surprise given the upscale look of the place.
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That makes 2 people, not including me.
I've been to the Boulevard once, and found it inoffensive, but have since been unable to visit it on account of a violent allergy to students which I've developed.
I like Prado because it's comfortable, mostly. Plus it's on my way home.
I used to know someone who drove a Camero. It had a luxurious interior and went really fast. It also had an excellent sound system, and whenever he felt maligned or misunderstood, he would go out and sit in his car and play that old Billy Joel song "The Piano Man" over and over. I don't remember what kind of coffee he drank. Possibly he drank tea. But I remember the Piano Man song. I once looked it up on Amazon and it's on their Top 100 Downloads list -- right up there with Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven and Grand Funk Railroad's Closer to Home, which I also remember because I used to live in a divided house and the fellow on the floor below me would play that song over and over every evening beginning at about 7 o'clock. This was before downloads so he must have saved the record for 20 years. As far as I could tell it was the only one he had. Sometimes when I heard it I wanted to go down there and present him with a copy of Billy Joel's "Piano Man." But then again I had to listen, too, and it was pretty hard to choose between the two.
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