The 411 on Café Bolita #
Address: 201 Eighth Street #118
Region: West Berkeley, CA
Website: https://www.cafebolita.com/
Email: hola@cafebolita.com
The Vibe: Café Bolita is a modern Mexican restaurant that has transitioned from a beloved pop up to a brick-and-mortar destination in West Berkeley’s industrial corridors. A love for masa inspired Chef Galvan to master milling heirloom masa grains, from nixtamalization to the freshly prepared tortilla or tamal. Café Bolita, named after balls of masa dough, is the result of that dedication to masa greatness.
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The space’s interior and exterior are largely unchanged from its previous tenant, the celebrated Standard Fare, whose chef retired her restaurant earlier this year. Even the ordering method is the same: read the menu of the day posted on the window and the specials on the board inside. Then wait in line to order and hope to claim a space at the indoor tables or large patio with casual seating that sometimes includes a flat surface, sometimes only a chair.
Of course, corn is the celebrated star of nearly every dish at Café Bolita. As corn is one of my absolute favorite foods, I knew I needed to come. Luckily, I have a friend almost as excited by corn as me, who also wanted to check it out.
Café Bolita is only open for brunch hours, closing by 2pm, Thursdays through Sundays. The menu is small and a mix of dishes considered brunch, like frittatas and chilaquiles, and lunch, like tamales and quesadillas. Each dish comes with either a fresh green salad or Rancho Gordo beans.
There’s a bakery case by the register and an inventive range of coffee, agua frescas, and alcoholic beverages. Atoles—a thick, masa-based hot beverage—were on Café’ Bolita’s menu when they opened, and I hope they will return in the fall.
My Take on Café Bolita #
The Food: We split two entrees and two baked goods, which satisfied me to fullness. Contributing to that was the coffee special of the day, a cold brew topped with cacao miso foam.
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It was SO good. I’m not sure I tasted cacao, but the miso hit on first sip, with just the right amount of salt to make it pop. The cold brew was a tasty and refreshing beverage.
We dug into our baked goods while waiting for the entrees. The corn biscuit, served with fresh butter and fruit preserves, had nice layering and savoriness.
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But it would have been more inviting had it been warmed up. The banana bread, topped with cacao nibs, was about as inviting as it gets.
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So enticingly moist, and more full of spice than we expected, particularly clove. Some patrons might find that off-putting, but we loved it. Don’t be afraid to add something livelier than cinnamon to your baked bread, folks! The cacao nibs on top also contributed satisfyingly crunchy, bitter notes.
The entrees came out swiftly. I’d argue that our first item should always be on Café Bolita’s menu: a huitlacoche and corn quesadilla.
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Its blue and black coloring might make you think this quesadilla is best suited to a Halloween special. But it wholeheartedly celebrates corn, featuring it in four different ways. Of course, there’s the masa in the handmade, still-steaming tortillas. And charred corn kernels mixed in with the jack cheese. But the huitlacoche was the star. That’s essentially corn kernels swollen into galls by blue-black spores from a fungus that sometimes infects cornstalks. Many folks consider it a delicacy, and now that I’ve tried it, I can see why. The taste was earthy, the texture hearty, and still, a sweet corn flavor came through.
I’m not sure where the corn miso came into play in the quesadilla, but I trust that it contributed to the overall dish, as Café Bolita’s chefs clearly know how to handle their corn.
We also feasted on chilaquiles verdes, which were served with frijoles de olla.
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I contemplated the differences between the blue corn and white corn chips in this dish and decided I enjoyed the white corn the most—I ought to return for a white corn taco or tamal sometime. The salsa verde had plenty of flavor, but we discovered that adding our extra salsa roja to the chilaquiles, leftover from the quesadilla dish, leveled it up. My yolk-loving friend thought the egg perfectly fried.
I don’t like beans, but I did try a couple forkfuls of the frijoles de olla, and I think the texture and quality of them would please any bean fan.
It’s also worth noting that the fresh green salad served with the quesadilla was outstanding. There were a couple lettuce types in it that I had not tried before, sending thrilling bitter spikes to my taste buds that dissolved in the richness of the simple oil-heavy vinaigrette they were bathed in. The quality ingredients shined—Chef Galvan knows that there is no reason to dress up amazing greens more than that. Doing so would be a disservice to them.
I saved my last couple bites of banana bread to finish my lunch and was quite pleased.
Would I Go Back? My friend and I are already thinking about it when we can meet up there again. A carrot masa tamal is often on the menu, and that sounds like a lovely flavor combination to me. I don’t think the frittatas have corn in them, but the ones I saw were impressive towers of egg. Plus, I need to try an atole on a chilly day when I need a mood lift. I am excited for that!
Reviewed 11 July 2028.
