The Half Day Café
848 College Ave.
Kentfield, Marin County
415.459.0291
Brick and ivy, huge windows and skylights: the Half Day Café personifies Marin. Located across from the College of Marin and the incredible Woodlands Market, Half Day’s airy warehouse feeds everyone from joggers off the bike path, to Kentfield millionaire executives, to ladies who lunch. It is called the Half Day Café for a reason: no dinners are served—but the breakfasts make up for it.
The staff is friendly and the service well-timed. There is an outdoor patio covered with a trellis of ivy and lovely flowers; you may feel comfortable sitting outside for a meal sometime during the two weeks it is actually summer. Before I am banished by the God-Lives-in-Marin Society, I’ll grant that the weather is actually warm, sunny and exquisite for much of the year—just not…hot.
I frequent the Half Day Café for breakfast. The breakfast menu is somewhat exotic and includes granola, giant bowls of latte, lovely fruits, eggs and chorizo sausages. Since I am forced against my will to chow down on three meals a day, I like to keep it light. I don’t always succeed.
Yesterday I ordered the simple two eggs meal ($4.75): eggs over medium cooked to perfection. The breakfasts come with heavenly, giant scones made with ingredients like orange and blueberry and lemon (I stared longingly at the whipped butter); in the alternative, you can choose a cinnamon roll, bagel or toast. Sumptuous fried potatoes are included; of course, I always substitute with the fruit. But you know how restaurant substitutes are usually the stuff that no one else wants, like limp tomato slices or applesauce? Well, not at the HDC: fresh papaya, mango, cantaloupe and strawberries grace your plate and make you feel a lot less sorry for not inhaling a cartload of crispy potatoes.
Peruse Half Day’s assortment of today’s newspapers available at the front desk as you enjoy your eggs with a huge bowl of latte ($2.50) filled with steamy milk and sprinkled with cocoa. You can pretend it is a hot fudge sundae (well, okay, not a hot fudge sundae exactly, but something more evil than the latte really is).
I chanced lunch there a couple of times and had a hard time comprehending the food. One luncheon salad, for example, is warm goat cheese ($8.25) and is like a garage sale: served on a bed of mixed greens with honey-thyme vinaigrette, candied pecans, fresh peaches and dried cranberries. Ouch. Same goes for the grilled housemade turkey burger ($7.95) on a soft Bordenave bun, served with roasted red pepper relish and garlic-basil aioli. Just too, too odd for me.
I think the lunch menu may be part of an elaborate hazing test to see whether or not you will be allowed back into Marin, according to what selections you are hip enough to order. But I figure any food that has words in its description that would challenge me in a spelling bee contest is going to be too much of a challenge to my palate as well.
All that aside, the Half Day Café is one of those wonderful places that could serve cardboard soufflé with filet of shoe sole and you would want to be there anyway. It is light, open, bright, and the breakfasts are to die for. Treat your sweetheart to a happy Half Day breakfast after a cozy night together. The Half Day Café, 848 College Ave., Kentfield, Marin County, 415.459.0291. Mon-Fri 7am to 2:30pm; Sat/Sun 8am to 2:30pm.
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