Specialty's Café: A Decent place, we say!

Lunch date #61, September 5, 2014

Somehow we missed going to lunch throughout August…now it is time to get back into the swing of things. Thought we'd try something new: Specialty's Café on Hopyard, at the old El Balazo site near 580 (5331 Hopyard Rd, www.specialtys.com). This is a newish chain on the seen-similar to Corner Bakery type of place; this one with locations in the Bay Area, So Cal, Seattle and Chicago.

Location 3 points: Not easy to pull into this parking lot as motorists are gearing up to get on the freeway. Might access from Owens. A reasonable amount of parking.

Ambiance 3 points: They did a great job with the build-out of this location to totally change the look from the previous restaurants-my guess is there is probably a common look to all of their locations. Order at the counter/bakery case, with the Peet's Coffee bar adjacent (go there to pick up drinks).  Inside: open space with a tall ceiling with lots of seating at basic tables, and the outside seating is nice—unfortunately the local view isn't so great of either the low-budget motel next store or the Hopyard on-ramp to 580.

Service: we decided not to score service when we order at the counter, but their "thing" is that you can skip the line and order on line—and there are several computer terminals at the entrance. Interestingly, on this day, they were all covered with bags and out of service…so no skipping the line today! One good idea: once you order you get a buzzer that will light and buzz when your order it ready to be fetched.

Menu 4 points: Great choices for lunch: sandwiches hot or cold and many salads. They also have some breakfast sandwiches and lots of goodies in their bakery case, and they sell mix for their cookies. We had Emily along as our guest diner and she chose the turkey pesto sandwich, Mom went for the turkey cranberry sandwich (sans the sprouts and sunflower seeds), and I tried the Southwest salad.

Food 3.5 points: We loved the bakery items (Em tried a chocolate chip cookie and I got a morning bun). My salad was fair, but fresh and a good portion size. Mom liked her turkey cranberry and was very happy with the portion size-a full half sandwich as a left over for another day! Emily's turkey pesto had such little pesto that we really couldn't see it (and she couldn't taste it), so more of a regular turkey sandwich, that wasn't bad…just not what she thought it would be.

Value 4 points: all prices are very reasonable at $7-9 per item. It is all a la carte though-no chips or anything else included. Still, a good deal for decent food. The bakery items are about $2 each; which I think are better than Starbucks' prices…and much better and freshly baked on site.

Overall score for Specialty's: 3.5 points. My main criticism: all served "to go"-all plates are paper (but the sturdy recycled type), but eating a salad on a paper plate isn't great. It's definitely a grab and go type of café. On a prior visit with friends, I had the turkey/apple/brie/bacon sandwich-that was very good, but the service was really slow. It was better on the day I went back with mom and Emily. Overall, the food is quite fine and the prices are great…so I think we will go back and try other menu items.