Long-time Cville residents know Brix Cafe as a catering outfit, but in recent years, they moved from an out-of-the-way location to a stripmall on Pantops. Aesthetically, the location is great. The cafe is open and tastefully decorated. The food cases are full of tasty-looking pastries and snacks. The menu is chock full of good lunch choices, many with a slight twist to make this more than the average soup and sandwich shop.
On my first trip to Brix, I ordered a fantastic turkey panini topped with slices of granny smith apples and melted brie ($6.50). The bread seemed to be cinnamon toast, which really “made” the sandwich. Unfortunately, my companion’s sandwich wasn’t remarkable and the cookies that looked so great in the case were nothing to rave about. My panini was so good that it was easy to forget about the rest.
I made my second trip to Brix today and was tempted to order that turkey and apple sandwich again, but was thinking of you, dear reader, when I decided to order something else. Yes, I actually thought about writing a review when I made my menu selection. I ordered onion soup ($3.50) and a salmon sandwich with lemon-caper dressing ($6.99). The menu said the salmon would be warmed on the customer’s request and I took them up on the offer. The girl at the counter wrote my name on a chalkboard shaped like a wine bottle and sent us off to a table to wait for our order to be brought out.
And wait we did.
No less than 20 minutes after ordering, my soup arrived. It was very, very good (with mushrooms…nice touch), but I have to admit I was a bit soured by the wait. Our sandwiches came out a little while later and they were adequate, but not amazing. My sandwich was a bit bland and my companion’s turkey-bacon panini was good but could have been hotter. The “side” that comes with each sandwich is one pickled baby carrot and two mini gherkins. Adding sides would have pushed our bill to over $30, which is a bit steep for lunch. Small touches that were missing: we had watched our server bring silverware and cloth napkins to other tables and we were left to fetch plastic utensils and paper napkins ourselves.
I’ve heard great things about Brix catering, but they seemed to be really crushed by lunch traffic, which was steady, but not relentless. Looking around, the crowd seemed to be more “ladies who lunch” than corporate types. I imagine that most office workers have learned that the last place to get a quick lunch is at Brix.
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Tagged as: Brix, Charlottesville, Restaurants, Reviews
Upstart, sorry I didn’t comment sooner. After an earlier post about sandwiches, a writer Jeannine suggested Brix. I did, and I walked out! I went to the one by Monticello at 53, and I ordered something over-priced and frou-frou that looked AMAZING. They were out of it. Okaaay. I ordered something else that also looked great! It was at their Pantops location. I’m afraid I had no inclination to order a turkey and brie sandwich because I think Granny Smith apples should be used in baking, with a lot of sugar– terrible to pair with ingredients that will suffer from their bitterness. I’d do stayman or honeycrisp. Brix: offer the same menu at both, and if you’re a place that runs out of stuff frequently, build a website with a daily menu that you keep updated.
Cafe Europa has a similar sandwich called the Normandy, which is granny smith slices and brie on a slice of a baguette. It’s pretty good, actually. I don’t know if I’d want to mix turkey with that, though.
Speaking of baking, I prefer Nittanies. I’m really looking forward to apple season this year. There are a half a dozen orchards south on 29 that the Charlottesvillians don’t go to. This means no crowds and plenty of apples and cider to go around. This year I’m going to try marinating the apples in brandy in addition to the maple syrup I tried last year.