La Bera Cafe

Unfortunately, this place falls very short on the food, service and atmosphere. Very disappointing — the tables were not cleaned, the silverware and glasses were spotty. The service, while friendly enough, was very, very slow.
There weren’t even that many customers so not sure what was happening — maybe really short handed?
The food (soup, salad, sandwich) was lacking.
Too bad — Northgate needed something like this.

Yuck just about sums it up.
During the Snowpocalypse of November 2010, I hit up La Bera for the first and last time. EVERYTHING about this place was terrible — the coffee was awful, the service was spotty, and the food was bad. The coffee was bitter and weak — impressive. We had the Northwesterner — smoked salmon omelet with homefries — and the french toast. The food took almost half an hour to arrive, and when it did, the potatoes (tiny little cubes of dry potato, unadorned by onions, peppers, or flavor) were cold — I am assuming by their terrible-​ness that they were previously frozen — and the omelet was barely warm. Perhaps it was ready in a reasonable amount of time and the server forgot about it.
I will forgive lousy service and bad atmosphere, but terrible coffee and cold food at a breakfast place? No. Someone told me the waffles are good, but how do you enjoy waffles with bad coffee?
The day after we paid $ 30+ to eat here, we had breakfast at Bark! It was delicious, and much cheaper. Oh! And the coffee there is actually good!
Don’t waste your money here.

Very disappointing, especially since I live around the corner from la Bera. If you aren’t interested in eating waffles, the menu leaves only a few choices. Service was disorganized– our orders were messed up several times and it was a lot of work just to order 2 coffees! The food was very mediocre and they specialize in waffles yet my husband’s waffle was burnt! Not going back there again.

Let’s start off the review with a –_​-​, since that sums up my experience here to a T.
We got here for brunch at about 11 on a Saturday. There weren’t that many other people around, and we foolishly thought «hey, this’ll be great for a quick meal, and then we can be off to do whatever we have to do»…No. We ordered, waited, and waited some more. This was made much more frustrating by the fact that there were about three people standing by the waffle irons doing absolutely nothing, while my tummy was grumbling rather loudly.
45 minutes later, out comes my pumpkin waffle and side of homefries. Was it good? I think so. I’m not sure though, since I snarfed it down because I was soooo hungry. Sucks that the food took so long, since the prices are reasonable and it’s about a million times better inside than the Seattle Crab Co that was here before.
It’s too bad… I really *wanted* to like it.

Completely and wildly inconsistent. Go more than once and you will understand what I mean.
Keeps me scratching my head: have these people ever run a business before?
We’ve frequented several times, and after the last visit, in which my husband was ignored for 10 minutes and then watched another customer (just walked in) get served, we decided that was the LAST time.
Try Bark Espresso-​they ARE what La Bera wants to be.
Enough said.

Don’t reccomend this place for several reasons:
First, not really kid friendly. Place only has 2 high chairs, which couldn’t accommodate our 3 toddlers. The play area is small and not gated, so my 14 month old was running around the whole restaurant.
Second, the service was really slow. Only saw the server to take our order, bring the food, and give us the bill.
Third, for the $ 20 I spent wasn’t happy with the brie grilled cheese. Was happy with the Salmon sandwich, but my 14 month old son just liked the waffle fries and made a big mess.

Inexpensive, but unimpressive.
Came by for lunch with a friend the other day. We ordered home fries, waffle fries, and a strawberry waffle. My waffle was slightly burnt, which I didn’t really notice because they covered it with syrup. The waffle itself was also a little too doughy for my tastes– I like them to be crispy on the outside and this most certainly wasn’t. The home fries were good, but nothing too special– diced potatoes cooked up like french fries with, like, two pieces of bell pepper and some onions.
They have some potential because it’s a large, open space and I like the whole breakfast-​served-​all-​day thing, but that’s only something to brag about when you’re open past 4pm. Also, the outside looks so uninviting and the inside needs some pretty-​ing up. I feel like this place could become a good spot with time, but currently it’s lacking.

LOVE this warm and inviting café! It’s my new favorite place to take the kids. Comfortable, friendly atmosphere, great hosts, awesome, yummy food, fun play area for the kids to be entertained while you enjoy a meal or latte! I created an account on Unilocal just so I could review La Bera!

This place deserves a 5-​star review, but Unilocal likes to vacuum the 5-​star reviews off of their site (so consider this 5 stars…).
We walked there today for our first breakfast experience at this restaurant. We were impressed for the following reasons:
1) We were seated immediately, with friendly staff members.
2) Very timely service, remaining very friendly.
3) EXCELLENT coffee. I highly recommend this coffee.
4) The ambiance was perfect.
5) The food choices were amazing. Waffles, amazing oatmeal (my choice with eggs), and lots more.
6) The actual food that came was incredible, and enhanced by the small details that are presented with this restaurant.
We are so glad to have this restaurant in the NE Seattle area, and have been wanting a great breakfast/​brunch place for years! Great job, La Bera and welcome to the area.

very kid friendly and sit in the café and get writing done on your laptop friendly. Coffee was good, nice amount of light, lots of parking, not crowded. Kinda far from where I live but when I’m in the area, it’s my go-​to place that is not Starbucks.

WOw! I have to say I am impressed by my fellow Unilocalers. The average rating is 4 stars really?
I live in the area and my bf and I wanted to try them out for breakfast.
Walked in and was seated by the Hostess. She seats us with water as she is pouring my bf’s water, she spills and the water covers half the table, she says sorry and she will be back with a towel. We wait and wait… no towel, she walks by and other servers walk by not remembering that we spilled water on half of our table. Finally fed up I walk to the counter to request a towel. Their was no offer to help clean up. By this time 15mins have pased no server has come by to ask about drinks or what we would like. Its about 9am The place barely has 4 tables full.
My bf goes and flags down a lady who looks to be a barista to see if she can get our servers attention. She comes by and offers water. We have water.
The resturant is bascailly empty and you have employees milling around.
The hostess (the one who spilled our water and than proceeded to ignore the spill) was on a laptop and not even checking the resturant, she appeared to be a manger or supervisor also.
I have worked in food service. When the server or a coworker is held up you step up and help out. Especially if you are not slammed and you are playing on your laptop.
So After the unsuccessful flagging down of our server it’s already been 25 – 30 mins with no service. I told my bf we were walking.
As we are walking out, the server appears and asks how we are?
WOw! That was pretty comical. We tried to be poliet and just told him they blew it. Sad because northgate needed a cute little breakfast/​café.
I would just drive to the University district of Wallingford for better service and food probably.

I just Unilocaled ‘Waffles’ on my iPhone and was drawn here. This place is really fantastic, and will definitely be back very soon.
First of all I’m a huge fan of breakfast sandwiches and am always in the hunt for the best. I also am a huge fan of waffles. So when I see that I can get an egg, bacon, and cheese sandwich on a freakin’ waffle I knew I had something special. It was really good. In addition I got a pefectly pulled cappuccino that hit the spot!
Did I mention they had Connect 4 and Jenga? Anyway clearly this place has everything and I hope they fare better then the Seattle Crab Company.
Peace out.

My husband and I just moved into the neighborhood and are getting a feel for the local restaurants. Given that we are pretty surrounded by chain restaurants, we were interested in trying out a local establishment. I read a bit about La Bera on here before going, and can definitely say I had some reservations about what our experience might entail.
Boy am I glad I tried it!!! Service was super friendly from the moment we walked in. I ordered the La Bera Breakfast (less than 6 bucks!) and a latte. At first I was concerned that the small price tag would mean small portions or poor quality, but way more food than I could eat was delivered (even my husband was full after his!), and the quality was amazing. The homefries are to die for. Even after I was stuffed I kept sneaking extra bites.
The food did take a little longer than expected to arrive, but there are books and games to occupy yourself with while you sip on the very tasty coffee or espresso drinks. In my opinion, the quality was well worth the wait.
Lay out is great, and can easily accommodate small or large groups.
Sign on the table talked up their happy hour and upcoming beer/​wine menu.
I’m super excited to live so close to such a cool place and can’t wait to try other items off their menus!

Somewhat dissapointed here.
I came here with decent expectations as a quaint little café opening up in the Northgate area with a diverse menu sounds pretty enticing! But honestly, I was not impressed.
Let’s start with the venue. Definitely a nice spot, being that this took the place of Seattle Crab Co. I liked the layout and how they made it more «open.» Also a cute touch adding the play areas and couches. Parking is always extremely easy so that’s a definite plus. The lady working the front counter was pretty nice, and clarified some of their items well. I ordered the fish sandwich and half and half fries (half regular and half sweet potato), while my girlfriend ordered the salmon sandwich, a cup of split pea soup, and we both got sodas. All of this came to around $ 26.00. Not bad, a little pricey, but not bad.
As we were both hungry, we were rather excited for our meals, but this is where things were a little frustrating. We patiently wait for 10.15…20…finally 25 minutes for our orders to get to our tables. Mind you thats not a terrible wait if they’re busy, but there were 2 orders in front of us and not a line in sight. What even magnified the wait was the fact that no one was checking in on us. I finally got the attention of an employee who was cleaning another table and said our food was still in process (the 22^nd minute).
When we finally got our food, it was actually pretty tasty. Although I’ll give the complaint that the fish filet in my sandwich was rather small in comparison to the bun it was on. The bread slightly engulfed it. Other than that the flavors boded well together, and my girlfriends Salmon sandwich was very tasty as well.
All in all, the food was tasty, and this place has potential, but common customer service aspects were lacked in this visit. I might give it another shot further down the road to see if they’ve improved.

Cute place, super friendly people, little play area for kids they’re working on, lots of unique food options (big plus for me), decent price.
I’m a pig so I was expecting more portions but otherwise food was pretty decent for a brand new place. Will definitely be going back to check in.

Northgate has its coffee woes. Though I enjoy the $ 1 drips at Cloud City, and I like to swing over to Makeda on Greenwood, I have not found good coffee near the Mall. La Bera has so much promise. It hosts one of the few Synesso espresso machines in the city, brews coffee from elegant Seattle roasters, but unfortunately lacks the little bit of experience and perhaps passion that it needs to make good coffee. The upside is that it’s a new café, has lots of room to grow into some great coffee, and offers a nice menu that is easy on the budget. I hope they don’t wait too long to make some of these improvements. Coffee lovers who have been waiting, will not wait too long.

Well, I am glad to have someplace new very close to my house and that likes children.
I have never seen mice or any other rodent in the bushes like the previous reviewers (?) and the owner (or maybe the owner’s daughter who is managing the place?) was very nice and said they still have more work to make it the way they want. I took that to mean there were some more renovations that would be happening in general. She said she is trying to feel out the audience and find when busy times are to increase staffing and they haven’t even done an official grand opening day yet! This is only the first couple weeks of being open so i give them a break to figure things out.
The food was slow but good. I didn’t drink the coffee as I am not really a coffee drinker, but the waffles were yummy! Well cooked and just enough sweetness and they have yummy combinations like s’more waffles and a a peanut butter, chocolate, bacon waffle that sounded delicious (but too rich for me at 10am on a Sunday). I will try some of the others. The home fries were crisp, pretty basic, but hot and tasty.
They were extremely friendly, even when my friend’s toddler son ran into the kitchen screaming and giggling they were just like «Hi! Do you want a tour?» They were very patient.
I haven’t been for lunch or dinner, but there were a steady stream of folks in and out and the food I saw all looked yummy and fresh.
Plenty of room to tweak things but since they just opened that seems typical. I will continue to check it out as it progresses.
They have a cute kids corner and will be adding more books/​puzzles/​train table (which may put some folks off and may draw others…).
Overall, the place has potential and the waffles are worth the trip.
(oh and apparently no complaints were ever made about Bark… just so you know,…http://www.mapleleaflife.com/2010/07/31/la-bera-café-is-open-for-business/)

Since it decided to rain today and our outdoor plans went out the window, we decided to check out La Bera.
The café is clean, spacious and bright. The owner and employees are incredibly friendly and checked on us several times to make sure things were good.
The plus about this café is that they have a small playspace for children. So if you’re a perent wanting to get a bite to eat or some coffee, you can enjoy your meal while your child occupies themselves in the playspace!
La Bera Café serves breakfast and lunch «café style» where you walk up to the counter to order and at 4pm, it turns into a sit down restaurant. We came during lunch — I had the soup of the day (incredibly delicious) and the hubster had a white chocolate mocha w/​rice milk which he enjoyed.
La Bera is a nice addition to this neighborhood and I can’t wait to taste other things from their menu!

Wish them well, but there’s work to be done.
Just had lunch at La Bera today, somewhat by accident. We were in a hurry and this used to be an ok place to get a quick lunch.
I spoke to one of the staff about the very sad state of my salad. She went directly to the cook and berated her for serving those greens, but she did not attempt to make amends with this customer.
Service: sketchy at best. The servers appear to be affraid to approach customers.
Coffee: ok once they fixed it to decaf as I had ordered
Food: My suggestion – Keep driving. There is better fare near Northgate Mall!
–salmon sandwich very messy
–kale soup pretty good
–salad greens were horrible, as though a blind person had tossed the greens… they were black around the edges! There was no vineagrette dressing available at all, so had to make due with some lemon.
–my son liked his waffles, although they were very small.
Again, I wish them well on their journey, but some quality control is sorely needed a La Bera.

A cheap rehab of the old an loathsome Seattle Crab Company, this peculiar latest incarnation is that of da-​ttime coffee house, nighttime Italian food dispensary.
Owned by local restaurateur Chetta Berpan (Cilatro’s), the menu is peculiar and for me off-​putting.
I was only here during the day and coffee was so-​so and the selection of pastries was bland. The service is friendly but sketchy, and to be fair this is their first week in business.
One last note, this building is on a very busy interesection (Roosevelt and Northgate) It is surrounded by dusty, flithy rodent infested juniper bushes. For the love of God, please pull these out!!! They are awful!
Easy and plentiful free parking.