We had really great food at Threefold Café, but our overall experience was tempered by an unfriendly greeting by the hostess when we walked in, and no substitutions policy, limited gluten-free options, and a fairly expensive check when it was all done.
Step one: the greeting. Our very first experience inside threefold Café, and the very first interaction with anyone there was when we asked to be put on the list for a table. The hostess, who greeted us (eventually) was super unfriendly and made us feel like we were interrupting her entire very busy life just by asking for a table.
While waiting for our table, I needed to use the bathroom. This is also a frustrating experience, before we even got to our table, because they only have a single use bathroom for men and for women, and there was a large crowd of people waiting to get into the bathroom for about 15 minutes, and when the person using it finally came out it was one of the cafés staff members. Now I understand sometimes it just takes a while in the bathroom, but if it's a super busy branch time at your restaurant, and your staff people are preventing customers from using the bathroom for such a significant amount of time, you might need to look into other options to provide this is sensual service to your customers.
The other issue we encountered, and this is again before we even got any of our food to eat, is that their online website menu didn't match the menu that was actually given to us in the restaurant. We're not from Florida and we check out menus before we stop into restaurants, because we have various dietary preferences such as vegetarian and gluten free, so we rely on menus online being accurate to make our decision about whether or not to come. And specific items which were on their website we're no longer available which was very disappointing, because those are the items that brought is in the in the first place.
Also although they state on their website menu that they offer limited modifications (a.k.a. substitutions) when we got there and my wife tried to substitute something for the tellers to that came with the green and gold egg dish, because she's gluten-free, we were informed that there was a strict no substitutions policy. Again we haven't received any food yet and we already have numerous complaints. This would've been a four-star restaurant for us based on the quality of the food that we eventually did get, but all of these items that happened before we even got the food really created an atmosphere of disappointment for us which was hard to get over when considering the overall rating for this place.
Now for the good news: everything we had was really good. It was impressive that they offered coffee artistically prepared in either an Aeropress or Chemex. I had the aero press brewed coffee, since I'm an arrow press User at home and it was really good. Exactly what you want coffee to be at breakfast bold strong and lots of flavor.
I very much enjoyed the Green and Gold breakfast under the "Eggies" menu. I have this prepared with egg whites which were perfectly cooked, not always a given when you ask for egg white breakfast places. The goat cheese and herbs gave it all a great flavor and I enjoyed the ZTB bakery bread it was served on top of the oblivion of the floor of the café.
My wife also have the green and gold breakfast which she thought it tasted good, but she was definitely disappointed that she couldn't substitute anything for the bread. She's a gluten-free person and so wasn't going to eat the bread and ended up spending extra money to add a separate side item to complement the dish. (and overall they were limited gluten-free items.)
The absolute star of our meal as far as I'm concerned it was the hashbrowns. This was a sort of puck shaped hash brown which was perfectly brown and crispy on the outside, and perfectly tender on the inside. It had a nice lime flavor and it was nicely salted. I confidently tell you this was one of the best hash brown experiences I've ever had.
Our kid had a plain waffle, which he enjoyed and which was served with strawberries on top.
The tea service was also done right, my wife had tea it was steeped at the table and came with a little hourglass timer so we would know exactly when the tea was done. Very thoughtful all around with the tea service.
This is also one of the most expensive branches we've had in what we thought was more of a mid range café based on the style of the place. Over $50 for two dishes and a waffle plus our coffee felt like quite a lot relative to what we spent and other places for the three of us.
The hashbrowns on their own or almost enough to make me want to come back. But the rest of the experience definitely needed a bit of help. read more