Café Francais

Review

The French way

It's actually a miracle: the Café français on Währinger Straße opened in mid-January and has been full to bursting every day since. And that's in the morning, at lunchtime, in the evening and in between, even though it's a bit of a "dead time" right now; and even though a French café in Vienna wasn't exactly considered a big hit until now, but rather the opposite. And this despite the fact that two other restaurants have opened in the immediate vicinity in recent weeks (Pizzeria Riva and Rochus 1090), which together also have around 200 seats and are also packed.
Finally, the most astonishing thing of all: Café français is located in a place where absolutely everything has failed in the past ten years: the stylish sushi restaurant ra'an, the mainstream pâtisserie Sajado, the ambitious Jin's Sinohouse and the Mediterranean designer paradise Como - in all these places, there have been as many guests in ten years as in Café français in one week. But why is that? I have no idea. In any case, it can't be down to the decor, because it's nice, discreetly modern, the restaurant is spacious, there's plenty of room upstairs and (sometimes too) much light from outside, but it wasn't much different in the previous restaurants and most of the Como was taken over anyway. So maybe the food? Not really. The Café français does offer French cuisine as little Franzi imagines it, i.e. quiche, onion soup, coq au vin and crème brûlée during the main serving time, with croissants and baguettes in between. The club sandwich is impressive (€ 10.50), the onion soup is hearty (€ 3.90), warm goat's cheese with honey and thyme is always a delight (€ 7.50) and the quiche lorraine may not be the best in town, but it certainly has the highest egg and butter content (€ 8.00). But a far cry from what Herbert Malek cooked at Como or Jin Loh at Sinohouse. Is it really the background music? The Café français creators - former Red Bull media art director Axl Schreder and Grinzing pizzeria owner René Steindachner - not only managed to generate a bit of atmosphere with small details, but also - according to experts - to fill the restaurant with clever social media marketing. And people prefer full restaurants to empty ones. Which is why the Café français is full because it is full, everyone goes there because everyone goes there. And as strange as that may be, it undoubtedly has its good points. To sum up: a large, new restaurant in a previously disastrous location is doing a little bit of French - and has found the philosopher's stone. Café français 9th, Währinger Str. 6-8, tel. 319 09 03, Mon-Sat 9am-24pm,

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