When Lauren Passero took over the Kensington Café 3 ½ years ago it was just a neighborhood coffee shop. For the first six months it pretty much stayed that way, but Lauren had much bigger plans for this café.
Six months after taking over Lauren renovated the place and began serving breakfast along with a variety of special coffee. The list of coffee’s that are offered is a bit staggering. If you can’t find what you’re wanting here, it probably doesn’t exist. I will tell you that the staff would be willing to make it if you can describe it.
This past Memorial Day the café celebrated its 3rd anniversary and is a full service restaurant serving breakfast, lunch and dinner to a happy neighborhood. When you read the reviews on directories such as Urbanspoon, Yelp and Google, it isn’t hard to see why they have been such a success. It’s interesting to compare the reviews from when Lauren took over to the previous reviews. Now they get 4 and 5 star ratings instead of 2 and 3 stars.
Their menu is vegetarian friendly, but of course they do have meat dishes for those who are not vegetarians. There are a few gluten free dishes and they serve only fresh food. You can’t find a can of anything in the place. The goal set out by Lauren from the beginning was to be health conscious with all of their food.
In the past this café has been primarily a neighborhood café. It still is of course, but they now find people coming from all over the San Diego area because of the reputation they have for providing great food with friendly service. They are very customer oriented and it shows. If you ask anyone what they like about the café they will tell you it is a very comfortable and friendly place to enjoy fine dining.
They have Happy Hour from 4-7 PM daily with lots of special appetizers and small plates for those wanting just a little more. Of course their drinks are also on special and discounted. Their weekly specials start Monday with ½ off bottle of wine; Tuesday-$3 taco night; Wednesday- Happy Hour all night; Thursday- $8 pizza and a beer; Friday-Sunday- Happy Hour 4-7 PM; Saturday’s and Sunday they have $3 Mimosas all day.