Cebo

When my partner suggested a birthday dinner at Cebo my instincts told me «no». Just reading the menu told me that It would be bar food with hipster words on it unable to live up to the hype.
Still, a few days later looking for a new lunch place I invited friends to give it a try. I mean how bad could a simple lunch be? My instincts were right.
We were the second table seated for lunch. We ordered sandwiches quickly. No drinks, no appetizers, no special requests. I ordered the Climbing Bines IPA battered chicken, and one guest ordered the Linden St. Burger. Another guest took the suggestion of having the bread selection from Normal Bread (NB) in Geneva for her BLT sandwich. I told my story of how NB is never open, and short on stock when I was able to find it open. I no longer try to guess their hours or offerings.
Just as I finished… the waitress came back to tell us that the NB offering was out of stock. This was 1 hour after they opened for lunch, and 3 hours before they would close. Hilarious. So my guest said the brioche would be fine.
We had a chance to talk for a few minutes… then half an hour… then an hour. Finally some hour and 15 minutes later our sandwiches were brought out:
1) BLT on burnt brioche with burnt chips.
2) Flavorless, grease-​soaked battered chicken on burnt brioche and burnt chips.
3) Flavorless burger on burnt brioche with wilted leaf of lettuce and burnt chips.
Some suggestions:
Lettuce: The three sandwiches had 2 leaves of redleaf lettuce between them. Mine was only ½ of a leaf and wilted from the hot grease dripping on it. If you are going to add lettuce to a sandwich, make sure it provides a crunch. A single layer of red leaf will not crunch, especially if you put it on the BOTTOM so that the heat and grease wilt it into mush.
Special products: Don’t bother with the added expense and hype of Climbing Bines IPA in your batter if it imparts nothing special. No beer can stand up to being soaked in hot grease.
Bread: Dude, have bread! You are serving sandwiches for heaven’s sake.
To their credit… the burger was cooked medium rare as ordered.
The total cost for this was $ 45 with tip.
Until these folks master the mysteries of their deep fat fryer and toaster, just find a diner and get the same food, better prepared and about $ 25 less.

Geneva needs a place like this. Something that isn’t a sports bar and has finer food. I hope they get their liquor license soon. I can see this becoming another nice late night spot like Red Dove can be some night. Another step in the right direction for the city as a whole. One star off for not cutting the wings.

Delicious! Very creative and well executed dishes at reasonable prices. They were very accommodating to our needs!

The ambience is lovely, definitely trying to be more innovative with the style of the place, but, at the same time comfortable and has a cottage feel. If you do not like alt rock/​indie music in the background of your conversations you probably want to pick a quieter place. However, I do find the setting quite intimate and non-​intimidating.
Service was exceptional as they all were highly educated on their menu and where they source their products, especially the meat. Ask for suggestions if unsure. The menu is creative and may prove daunting to the novice foodie, so always ask, «what is that?»
As for the food, I had ordered the Brussel sprouts with bacon raisins and goat cheese, along with the Beer Battered Chicken Sandwich. When it had first arrived, my first thought was how great the food looked. The portions were quite substantial and I was full just from the sandwich. The sandwich was excellent. They had made the effort to bring up their locally sourced meats and you could certainly taste the difference. It was succulent tender and the beer batter was crisp and not too heavy. What caught my attention was not the sandwich, but the side salad of cabbage with honey bourbon vinaigrette. It was great, fresh and flavorful with a zestiness to it that gives the whole meal some acidity that it so necessary. The salad paired perfectly. What was disappointing, however, were the Brussel sprouts. Feta cheese and bacon are already quite salty, but on top of that, I believe salted pumpkin seeds were added as well. Charred to a crisp the saltiness was only augmented. The flavors together were great, but the saltiness was distasteful. I found it difficult to eat and requested another that would be less salty. They were kind about it and brought me a new one which was much more tolerable when it came to the saltiness.
The experience was nice overall and I’m sure I will be here again aside from the above point. The food is memorable and is a bit of a rustic adventure worth digging your teeth into.
Thank you and remember,
Chew your food.

This is a new place in Geneva, and it shows. Service is disjointed, and loud music makes dinner conversation impossible. The food descriptions are imaginative, but the portions are very small and significantly over salted. My sausage and cabbage plate [$ 11] featured a single beat and about two tablespoons of very sour red cabbage. The staff was friendly and I hope they get the bugs ironed out and get their liquor license. Until then there are many better places to eat in Geneva!

Last night we ate at a new restaurant in Geneva called… Cebo. All I can say is the food was wonderful you could taste all the individual ingredients used to make the plate and they tasted awesome together… portions were more than enough… but I found myself gobbleing down every last bit because I did not want the eating experience to end… definitely a 5 star experience… can’t wait till they have a full menu… I recommend to everyone!