Casbah Café

Yup they are closed people !!! They pa led up in the middle of the night and disappeared just before Christmas! They didn’t even let the employees know and didn’t pay them before closing shop ! Imagine waiting for your paycheck just before Xmas only to go to work and everything is gone !!! The owner changed cell # so no one could call her. Pretty fucked up !!!

What horrible news to find out it closed! I will miss its atmosphere, its mind tea, its baklava, … and its friendly and down to earth staff. I hope this is just a bad dream and that I’ll wake up soon to find out the Casbah is still there.

So sad this place closed. One of my favorite local joints run by very nice people. It will be missed!

I guess we won’t be rocking the Casbah Café any longer. They disappeared like a ship into the night.

Noooooo, why must this place go?! I loved it! One of the few, unique, authentic places in this neighborhood. So bummed!

Some of the best coffee I’ve ever had, and their food is great too. Though there are signs asking you not to work on your computer on some tables, it is common to see people working here and acceptable to do so.

Nice small place to get some studying done. Was a crowded on a Saturday afternoon and although this may be unrelated to anything provided by the café, it was nice to know that the crowd they attract are nice people lol. A small party noticed my group had more people than theirs so they offered us their larger table. Products were standard.
The wifi password is 3 236 647 000 … It has been engrained in my skull from my friends asking me to read it out for them. I don’t even know my girlfriends phone number by heart but now casbah’s wifi password shall be with me forever.
Summary: average café. Nice people.

Way chill place who serve up decent basic caffeinated drinks on a cool Sunday morning. The staff are cool and chill and the place is nice and relaxing.
Ordered regular hot cappuccino. It was pretty good, but I should’ve ordered an extra shot. Maybe it was a rough night, or just wasn’t strong enough for me. Nevertheless, pretty cool hang out if you feel like hanging out West LA style in Silverlake.
Parking on Sunset Blvd. I got lucky on Sunday mid-​morning. (As far as parking, wink).

Very friendly and down-​to-​earth staff. Reminds me of Berkeley or that tv show Portlandia.
Attracts a hipster-​y crowd, and people who are intellectually curious and politically active.
The menu needs to be updated though.

Quiet chill and Unpretentious. People were considerate and spoke softly, which was nice. Goat cheese tart n baklava were decent. Staff was pleasant. Maybe cos it’s a slow weds afternoon. No complaints really

Ambiance is overwhelmingly comfortable… I wanted to like this place. I really did. I live up the street so I thought maybe this could be a new place to get work done once in a while.
However, my amusement with the surroundings quickly waned when I received the chai latté I had ordered. I realize that coffee is the beverage of choice at a café…however, I’ve been to enough other café that at least TRY to cater to the tea drinkers.
After waiting a few minutes, I received my chai… I noticed the foam was very white, when it should have had a tan color if it were made properly. Mind you, most other cafés that serve chai lattes are pretty lazy in using a pretty generic store bought pre-​mix, but at least they foam it all together. When I took the top off my drink, I stirred it around a bit and found a large mysterious lump floating around… oh, it’s a tea bag… ok. I gave it a sip… mmm, lukewarm milk. No chai flavor. Homeboy couldnt even heat up the milk enough to steep a tea bag.
I mentioned to the Indiana Jones hat wearing barista that my chai latté was… warm milk with a bag in it. He said that’s how they do it there. Oh, so you just suck at making a proper drink then. Got it.
I left. In hindsight, I should have made a scene and demanded my money to be returned. Meh.
Cliff Notes: I paid over $ 4 for a cup of warm/​hot milk and an unsteeped teabag. Fuck that… take some pride in your work or don’t get out of bed in the morning. I would have rather given my $ 4 to the guy that roams Sunset asking for change, then immediately asks you again only seconds later… at least he has some tenacity.

Loved this coffee shop!!! Wanted to try to find a cool little coffee spot and I definitely found that here.
I got the iced coffee and it was delicious. Loved the vibes. Also loved the murals painted on the outside seating area. I’ll definitely be coming back!

Food is delicious and fresh right down to the very flavorful salad greens!(I split the prosciutto plate and salami plate with my boyfriend) And very reasonably priced as well. The ambiance is casual and comfortable.
What needs to be said is something about the dear older gentleman who buses and runs the food. He was so courteous and seemed genuinely concerned about our experience. He greeted us and offered the last menu which we were fine to split but he offered to go dig up another if we’d like, and he brought over a second table to set our food on as we were using ours as a work space. He double checked we were sure we were done with our food before taking plates. He was so kind! And he was like this with every one, you could see the wheels turning on who he should take care of as he scanned all the tables. I want to come back for all of it but mostly for him!

This place is cute. I love love love the baby clothes section! My friend and I ordered their crème brûlée which was good – and tiramisu. The tiramisu was super strong, I felt like I was drinking some rum!
I love the concept of coffee shop meets boutique. I really wanted to buy a lot of the cute vintage clothing!
Lots of tables and its open late which is nice. The outside area has a cute set up. They tried to make the outside more private little bungalows which totally works.
It’s also located in a prime area with all the other hipster shops and eateries.

So cute! Unique and exotic teas (rose, sage) and an adorable warm atmosphere. Great, soothing music.

We went to a restaurant just down the street, and after completely stuffing ourselves to thr point of breaking we decided to take a walk down Sunset, and find a café to see if we could cram some hot high octane liquid somewhere down our gullet. The place we originally picked was closed for café service, and on to dinner so we ventured on to Casbah Café’. Eclectic. warm. friendly. There is a small store inside the café’ as well as upstairs. This brings the pretentiousness down, and turns it into a real neighborhood charm.
I actually enjoyed that this was a coffee shop, and no one had laptops. As a matter of fact it is prohibited at most if not all tables. It makes a real difference when you pay attention to it. People are reading, or — get this — enjoying each others company without being buried in a large electronic notebook.
The coffee is as good as expected which is fine. I wouldn’t go out of my way to get it, but I am glad the level of quality they met is up to standards as the snooty places.

This is an update. In 2008 I wrote a chocolate chip cookie review for Casbah. This April (2015) I went back, here’s what I found.
The cookie was still good, nice balance of sugar, butter and flour. Some salt, just to the right taste. Enough chips, good deal, the chocolate wasnt my favorite, but again satisfying.
The price was higher, since 2008 when the cookie was $ 1.75, it was now $ 3.25. I was a bit shocked by that, thats one expensive cookie, but hey this ain’t no secret dive no more, we’re in Silverlake Buddy.
It was not soft, which my readers all know isn’t to my preference. But still, I enjoyed it, I’d give it a 3.5, but Casbah itself deserves a 5, they are just about the coolest café on earth. And I never want them to go away. So this one and only 5 star cookie review is actually in support of the venue, not the overly hard cookie. So if you’re a café or bakery and you’re annoyed by my bias for Casbah, and got a lower cookie only rating, live with it. Or go see Casbah for yourself and you’ll know why they need to stay in Silverlake.
I’ve uploaded a picture for this review. That’s right, these reviews are going web 2.0 on this byatches!
Enjoy your cookies folks.
T

Coffee isn’t bad. 7 out of 10.
I got a poppy seed bagel– & it was soooo burnt & inedible. I really tried to eat it– tasted like an ashtray. I ordered it with avocado & they forgot that as well. Sigh* fail.
Seriously– it’s a bagel, I don’t even know how you can mess that up, but mission accomplished guys.
Bummer, cuz the atmosphere is pretty dope. Love their outside sitting.
I wouldn’t recommend eating here.

I don’t know if we came on a popular night at a wrong time, but my boyfriend and I did not enjoy Casbah Café as much as we had hoped to give it a try. Finding a late night spot to study or finish work in the middle of a work week is harder than I thought in the Echo Park/​Silverlake area, especially when you compare it to the late night spots of Koreatown where they make coffee coupled with studying/​working «a piece of cake» (which they also at times literally give you access to). On a Tuesday night search, I found that Casbah Café was still open after our dinner at Samosa House on Sunset and thought we’d give it a try.
To our dismay, we found out that this café was not laptop friendly at all. There were several signs throughout the café that stated «no computers allowed» in certain areas, and there were hardly any outlets to recharge for areas where your laptop was allowed. The outside seating was nicely lit, but also within proximity of smokers, street noise, and engine exhaust from cars that drove by.
We both ordered teas that we felt were overpriced for tea bags that you could get anywhere else or in my case, freshly picked mint that I could have picked up at a farmer’s market, yet was charged double for. Even the workers behind the corner, did not seem very friendly as they appeared like they were ready to close down for the night, with still a couple of hours left to spare.
The good part about the café is the décor and I will have to try the food here someday but for a café, I felt bad that my boyfriend and I left disappointed after trying to make it work for 15 minutes. We had a much easier time working at home with wifi access, no one telling us that we couldn’t sit with our laptops at the table, easy access to tea and boiling water and outlets to recharge.
Sorry Casbah, but you lost a couple of customers. I hope that we have a reason to come back and give you another shot someday.

Sorry but this place is gross. Cute outdoor private seatings smell like pee. Indoor tables are sticky. Im scared to touch or sit anywhere. Chai tea soy latte wasn’t good, wouldn’t replace.
Wasn’t expecting this mom pop place to be so rude or stuck up. Was planning to try their gluten free pastry, but no thanks… taking my business to intelligence. No wonder intelligence is packed all the time, and this place is just surviving off of wifi junkies.

What a unique little hideaway!
You may think you were transported to some Spanish city with Arabic influence… beautifully decorated with authentic and exotic little things! Thoughtful details are everywhere, some subtle some not… I loved the sugar in the silver container on a silver tray!
And items from all over the world, like Bay-​leaf type Lebanese soap!
Did I mention how good the cappuccinos are?