Prism Cafe

Yawn.
The wifi is intermittant, and the food is overpriced, and the owner is sort of … intense.
Still, I occasionally come here to study. But for good conversation or quality wifi, I usually head north one block to «New Earth Artists Café».

cool little café in a neighborhood where they needed a new cool café. great FREE wifi also!

i needed to put another oakland café on my favorite café list, because i need to represent oakland, because i love the underdog. and, i did most of my grad school apps here. what would i have done without your ample space and your free wifi?
although…there was one time i came here to talk to a friend and there was a very loud and… lively band playing. the lead singer/​keyboardist ended the set by banging on the keyboard with her chest. hmm.
anyway, a very functional café with fair trade goods. so good for them!

I come here all the time, but just because of the convenient location.
Music/​Entertainment: to be avoided
WiFi: always crashes
Coffee: solid three stars — not particularly good, but it is fair trade
Food: passable at best (mediterranean snack plate, for example, is not bad)

Why can’t there be a solid coffee place in the neighborhood? Is that too much to ask?
The coffee is disgusting. The «wheat-​free» pizza still has gluten in it. Prism smells like a pet shop.
The customer service is horrible. It’s either the owner guy who is an asshole or it’s this dingbat chick who doesn’t open the place on time. It’s clear that the proprietors of Prism don’t really give a fuck about running a good café, and that’s just really sad.

Why, oh why can’t people do a café right? Ok, let me start with the positive before complaining: here’s what I like about Prism: fair trade coffee — refillable, bathroom art is exceptional — and there are two bathrooms (crucial for cafes that serve a lot of coffee), and one of the owners — the woman — is very cool. What else? They try, sometimes, color of the walls does a lot, art is interesting, sometimes, pizza is good, sometimes… service is decent, sometimes. It’s all the sometimes that’s a problem. The other owner struggles (I think) with an anti-​social disorder. He’s rude and cold and seems pissed off that anyone has come into his café (but the thing is — I think he knows he’s got a grumpy-​problem — he just needs to hire some pleasant folks to stand and take orders). The thing is, he seems to hire mostly other grumpy-​folk. And what’s up with the smoking thing? I’m tempted (as someone who suffers from asthma from smoke) to call the health dept and report them at times — wide open doors, cigarette smoke blowing right in, signs on the window that say no smoking… The thing is this neighborhood desperately needs a café, a place where people can hang out and gather or just work and drink coffee. How sad that it’s so hard to do it well, or even half-​way decently. Prism — add some more menu items, remove some of the grease on the pizzas, add a little cheer and friendliness, and kick out the smokers (or at least close the doors), and you might make it.

five stars for location — perfect for pre– or post-​parkway eating or drinking, and great to have more activity in the neighborhood, particularly at night.
however, only three stars for food, service & atmosphere. we went there for dinner, maybe would have been less disappointed if we’d just gone for coffee. i was pleased to see that the prices were reasonable, but then disappointed at the small portions. after finishing what we thought was going to be our meal, we were still hungry and had to order more food. so, in the end not as affordable as i’d hoped.
the food was fine, but nothing special. cornmeal pizza crust was good and i like that they have a pesto option, but it was really greasy (much better than parkway pizza, tho!!). the mac & cheese was dried out, and the bowl of olives that came with my hummus plate consisted of regular boring black olives (sliced!), with two kalamata olives on top of the pile. countergirl was friendly, but the food took much longer than seemed right, particularly considering that there was only one other person there that had ordered food.
i won’t go out of my way to go back for dinner, but perhaps before a show if i’m desperate. also looks like it might be a nice place to enjoy a leisurely coffee on a sunday morning.

yipes… let me just say this: never ever ever try the greek pizza. I felt like I must have been the first person to attempt it. It’s about ¾ inch of feta cheese absolutely blanketed in dry basil. *pucker…shiver* I can absolutely, however, recommend the veggie pizza on cornmeal crust. It’s yum.

last night while on an endorphin high from watching «little miss sunshine», the boy and i stopped in for a little soy hot cocoa at prism. (i think i have been there all of three times. but i like it. i just don’t like paying for my hot cocoa.) there was this awesome (read: horrible) lounge singer accompanied by a crazy electric piano player. i couldn’t help but immediately laugh.
although we were there for less than five minutes, and despite the funky live music selection and my burned tongue (damn, that cocoa was hot), i enjoyed myself. the barista was cute and friendly– she gave me a pen to add my remarks to the large banner on the wall that says, «oakland is…» [fill in the blank]. then she gave me a sticker bomb, with the same tagline. i dig it.
they also have a fabulous organic/v*g menu to choose from. mmmm. and, they have cool local art as décor that changes every now and again. it’s a down-​to-​earth feel. no pretenses, no snaz.
however, the floor looks like it’s under construction and EVERY time i pass the place, the customers are on their laptops, so it’s not so much a social hang-​out. bummer. there’s nothing better than a chat and cocoa.

Very chill, personal, intimate-​feeling café. I like the food, especially the cornmeal-​crust pizzas. I know the owners and how hard they work to keep the Prism going. This truly is a locally owned business and a neighborhood café.

*I’m not surprised they closed; they were never really open.
I would have written this review while I was there working, but the free wireless kept crashing. Probably because there were at least 10 other people in their on a Friday afternoon with their laptops. Pretty much every table had someone online. Doesn’t make for a friendly atmosphere if it looks like study lounge. Of course, there was some fool on her phone talking loudly on top of being on the computer.
Food was average. At least they have some options for vegetarians and something more than sweets or bagels. I’ll have to try it again sometime soon since it’s in the neighborhood. I give it lots of credit for just existing in an otherwise bland area. It’s nice to have somewhere to get out of the house since the only thing close to a park is that smelly lake surrounded by dog droppings and sweaty joggers.
I’ll just add that the service has been on the poor side here. Sometimes the people are totally confused or more interested in talking with their friends that getting you a coffee. The coffee has not been the greatest either. However, the use free-​trade and organic so that’s important to me. I’ll be glad when the constuction is done!

cozy little café with wi-​fi and couches! the wi-​fi is free with purchase, and i like how they use real mugs to save paper!

This is the best place to hang out in Oakland by far. Finally our neighborhood gets a much-​needed food/​coffee/​beer/​music/​comedy/​art joint! I LOVE this place and the owners have put their heart and soul into. I think this place is what will finally turn the neighborhood around. It doesn’t hurt that the Parkway is right here as well. Try the veggie pizza with cheese or the tuna melt sandwhich. YUM. Great beer as well. I am in love! The Prism Riot comedy night every other Tuesday is hilarious and some of the musical acts they have had, like Mia & Jonah, have been top quality.
This café makes me proud to live in the neighborhood. At last!

Homey ambience, good coffee, okay service. Went in there while waiting for work to be done on my car. The hot cocoa was fabulous, but they girl looked at me like I had run over her dog. Next time was same service, great latte. Not the sunniest of places, if you want to sit outside, but just what the neighborhood needed

I originally gave this place 4 stars but have since returned. .. for my last time!
I now know where the circus freaks go when they’re in town — the café workers were the weirdest friggin people I have ever seen this side of Crazy-​town. Seriously, I hope the guy who took our order had just done crack because the only other possibility is that he’d recently had a lobotomy.
The food was just okay and it took forever even though we were the only people getting food!!! Also, the portions were really small.
I hated the whole experience, felt very uncomfortable while the counter person stared into my soul, and will never, ever, ever go back.

Just what Park Blvd. needed… a great place to meet up with friends before a movie, or to read the paper/​surf the internet on the weekend. Still has a few starting glitches — the coffee seems to be on the lax side — but I’ll be there every weekend supporting this great local business.

We hit this place just before a show at the Parkway. We love the Parkway but the pizza is lacking so we were happy to enjoy a cornmeal crust pizza at Prism before the show. I was hoping for beer on tap with my pizza but I settled for a bottle and got what I was looking for in the beer department with our show.

Exactly what this neighborhood needed! A great gathering place for the locals as well as theatre go-​ers.
Offers your standard (good) coffeehouse drinks, as well as organic juices, a few selections of wine and beer (on tap).
My favorite is the Mexicali pizza for dinner on a cornmeal crust, but they also offer desserts, snack plates, sandwiches etc. I wouldn’t go out of my way for dinner, but it is a step above the standard coffeehouse food, and a step above the parkway’s food.
Free wireless too :) Eat, drink, and be wired, what more could I ask for? Well honestly, service is slow. I think they are still struggling to handle busy-​times. It alternates between dinner in-​an-​instant and dinner-​in-​a-​half-​hour. But, I keep going back, so… I’ll willing to give them time to learn to handle the rushes!

Nice little place we needed so badly! Half the menu is vegan friendly, and most of the stuff is organic. Salads, sandwiches, tea, coffee, booze and pastries-​how great is that? And so close to the Parkway theatre, yeah!