The Breakroom Cafe

Dear Breakroom,
You will be missed BIG, BIG, BIG TIME. What can I say, best vegan food I have ever put in my mouth. Best vegan sandwich i ever tasted and the nicest owners evr put on the face of the earth.
Just found out that the Breakroom has just been sold to the nicest man ever and I wish them all the best of luck with their new plans and wish him all the best of luck in his new business. I will be there to support him all the way.
Thank you Susan and thank you Jason for making the corner or 13^th and Franklin a sweet bright spot for the neighborhood. We owe you for that.
If you ever open a new vegan heaven I hope we find you soon.
Love you Longggggg Timeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

This place is GREAT! So many delicious vegan/​vegetarian options. I wish the hours were longer, but if you are vegetarian or vegan and looking for good options for good breakfast/​lunch/​coffee-​shop-​snacks, then this is it!

My first time here and I was impressed… they had options, just not many options available at the time I was there.
None the less I enjoyed my sandwich and the cakes I chose were great as well. Location is even better considering there is public street parking, bart close by and may other options.

Four stars for being a solid vegan lunch option. Breakroom has a chill café environment, reasonable prices, and healthy food. I’m not a vegan myself so maybe I’m not the right audience but I’m disappointed they moved from vegetarian /​vegan to only vegan. The club sandwich was great and has been taken off the menu along with the potato skin sandwich. Just had the meatball sandwich which was good but could really use an extra punch of flavor, more seasoning maybe.
It would also be nice if they had their menu online someplace.

You don’t understand how bad I’ve been to my body the last couple weeks. Tons of physical and emotional labor helping my 76-​year old mother move from my childhood home, and I needed to self-​medicate with whatever greasy, meaty nostalgia I could find. And after all was said and done, my walked away sore and feeling like I needed a detox.
So for lunch today, instead of the convenient pizza joint downstairs from the office, I strolled over to the Breakroom. A co-​worker had mentioned that they had an all veg menu, and I was tired of Golden Lotus, so here I was.
Went for the first item on the sandwich menu, the Chicken Sandwich.
Also got a side Kale salad.
Both were excellent, although I have a pet peeve about sandwiches falling apart as I’m eating them.
Can’t wait to find an excuse for a lunch meeting here. Definitely am coming back.

Great lunch place. I’m not vegan, but the meatball sandwich, kale salad, and pumpkin roll are so good that I don’t even notice. I probably wouldn’t order a meatball sub for lunch normally, just because I’d end up in a fat and calorie-​induced coma in the afternoon, but since it’s vegan I feel like it has to be at least a little less damaging to the body.
In addition to the food, the atmosphere is great, albeit small — mind you it’s never been so busy that I couldn’t find a seat. Good indie music, lots of plants and art. Feels like a proper place to relax and take a break from work.

Delicious vegan/​vegetarian sandwich shop in Oakland, a place I highly recommend.
Yes, I got the turkey bacon sandwich, off Unilocal recommendations and because that is obviously what you get at a vegan/​vegetarian place. Ordered a hot tea as well.
Place is nice and cozy, with interesting décor and a relaxing feeling attached to it. Not too busy during lunch, so you can plan to stay here for extended periods of time if desired.
The sandwich came out on great looking marbleized bread. The turkey and bacon, which I think were variations of fried tofu, had the texture and slight taste of meat. It is a light lunch here, but enough to satisfy you. I look forward to further opportunities for selections, but my recommendation remains with everyone else’s on the turkey bacon sandwich.
The restaurant is on the corner and has a notable yellow/​orange awning.

Okay, I gotta say it — I LOVE THE BREAKROOM CAFE!!! Period.
They have, without a shadow of doubt, the BEST vegan meatball sandwich on the face of the earth! There are other demi-​chain sandwich shops in Oakland; however, their sandwiches pale in comparison to the handcrafted love that The Breakroom Café puts into each and every sandwich they offer.
In addition to their super yummy sandwiches, they also offer a fabulous selection of vegan cupcakes, nothing says good lunch like a meatball sammich w/​a tasty cupcake chaser!
In addition to their stellar food, the owners are stellar people, recently, they did a benefit for Farm Sanctuary, giving 5% of their sales that day (I believe it was April 20-​ish), which puts them in the league of not only great food producers, but into the Hero’s for the Voiceless Animals class — which I can do nothing but respect and support.
Thank you for all you do Breakroom Café — I will be back often! Love!
Joe Bob SEZ CHECK IT OUT! 5-​STARS +

A recent discovery for us and we couldn’t be happier!
Our favorites: Turkey w/​bacon with their special fabulous vegan cheese. AWESOME!
Sloppy Joe plate … also very delicious.
Cornbread … YUM!
And the piece de resistance: pumpkin roll. O M G. I should’ve skipped lunch and just had a few of these. There’s a reason they run out of this quickly … because it rocks.
Food is made to order, so park it in a window seat, relax and enjoy.

This café has to be one of the best spots to eat in Downtown Oakland. The owners are fabulous, the food is (healthy) and sensational (the tomato soup is ridiculously good, almost fought a customer when she purchased the last bowl), free wi-​fi, great music spinning, and an overall fantastic vibe.
Update (2÷21÷12): Okay, just had the Hearty Bagel. Oh lawdy lawd. What’s on it? Avocado, sprouts, melted cheddar, tomato, mayo and… vegan bacon. And note — she (Susan, the owner and chef) makes her vegan bacon on the premises and it is motha****ing delicious!!! While I do not stick to a vegan diet explicitly, I know when it’s good — the cooking here is Great. Trust me, give this café a chance, you will love it and come back for more.

The day started out with a bust, having jury duty, yet ended at Breakroom Café thanks to all the good vegan reviews on Unilocal.
I ordered the turkey w/​bacon on marbled bread. It was scrumptious! I’m not normally a sandwich eater & actually came here looking for vegan sweets & coffee after a long day of sitting in the jury pool with no breakfast. If I was looking for lunch I would’ve found a burrito joint since that’s my usual standby for lunch. I was tempted by the pairing of turkey & bacon.
Unfortunately there isn’t a vegan version of bacon as good as the barely-​veg Morningstar. This bacon may have been Lightlife? but it was prepared quite well. Coupled with the «turkey» & fresh lettuce ‘n cucumbers it was enough to get me thinking about ordering some of their other tasty looking sandwiches.
The service was prompt and courteous. What more could you ask for? I grabbed a vegan sweet to go. There are plenty of vegan options to go along with the other vegetarian stuff. Hopefully I get to visit this place again before the next jury cycle. If not, I’m sure I’ll get summoned again next year.

I get summoned for jury duty two, three times a year. I’ve checked my voter registration vs. my driver’s license, and they match, so don’t talk to me about that. Anyway, I got snagged by the «complex litigation» department, so this was the first time I actually had to go down the Oakland courthouse. (Been across the Bay to the federal court a bunch of times, but they stopped calling after I voir dire’d that corporations should be re-​criminalized.) Breakroom isn’t open for dinner (or at all on Saturdays), and I don’t have much occasion to head downtown in the middle of a weekday, so I took the opportunity to visit them, and blow my whopping great $ 12 jury salary.
Club sandwiches used to be one of my carnivorous staples, so I started with that. It was fantastic. The three kinds of soy meat were not only distinguishable from each other, but identifiable as what they were mimicking. (Most places just use food coloring to separate the «ham» from the «poultry», but not Breakroom.) The bread was fresh, soft, and chewy. I would not have known the mayo was vegan if I hadn’t read it on the menu. It was a perfect club, down to the house-​made pickles on the side. And it was brought to me with a friendly smile.
The drawbacks? The place is teeny-​tiny. The prices have the standard vegan /​organic /​trendy /​healthy /​local surcharge. And the hours are limited.
–
It wasn’t until after I sat down that I noticed the PETA «best vegan meatball sub» award on the wall. Oh, well. A few days later, a torrential summer downpour and lack of umbrella (in almost July? really?) prevented me from making it all the way to No Worries or Golden Lotus. So I popped back into Breakroom to rectify my marinara mistake.
Which turned out to NOT be a mistake after all. While it’s possible that it’s among the best vegan meatball subs in the country, it certainly isn’t the best thing on the menu. Which, if you think about it, is really just praising with faint damnation.
My duty is up for now, but I’m sure I’ll be back at the courthouse next fall. I’ll feel a little better knowing Breakroom will be just a short hike away.

Walking in the first thing I noticed was an abundance of feet pictures! There must be 10 – 15 pictures of lower leg and feet!
So if you don’t have podophobia then this place is worth checking out! A solid Oakland lunch option!
Positives
+ Free wifi
+ Friendly staff
+ Funky music
+ Comfortable seats
+ Simple colourful menu
+ Lots of Veggie and Vegan options. I’m neither but nice to see.
Negatives
— A little overpriced
Warning: The meatball sub is tasty but not a walking sandwich, it is a tricky customer if like me you are walking while you eat! Luckily I have a darker shirt on today… White shirt and walking with a meatball sub equals embarrassing afternoon in the office.

Still think it’s a stellar 5 stars after visiting at *least* once a week since I wrote my first review in January.
I even took my meat-​loving Montana parents here when they came to visit. My dad gave me «that look» when I brought him in, saying there was nothing there for him. He got the meatball sandwich, started it down, then gobbled it up pretty darn quickly. By the end he was picking stuff off of my plate to eat.
Love it, the people, the atmosphere, and the FOOD.

A great place for people of all dietary backgrounds to eat some socially healthy and indulgent food. Coffee is fair trade organic and changes on the regular. For a small place, that makes everything from scratch (everything from their salty smokey vegan bacon to vegan cupcakes, which are kind of ridiculously huge) and doesn’t just microwave everything, this place gets suprisingly little foot traffic.
Good recommendation to take some out-​of-​townies off the beaten track; also a perfect place to add to your routine of honest-​to-​goodness mom ‘n’ pop’s…
Menu Highlights:
— PETA-​award certified (no seriously) vegan meatball sandwich!
— Marinated tofu sandwich (get it with the BACON!)
— PB & Chocolate Cupcake
— Great Soy Chai Latte

It’s so good to have places like this in Oakland! Especially in the part of downtown that the Breakroom is located where there aren’t many good coffee shops. As I work on the side of downtown that is not smattered with coffee shops, I spend most of my morning breaks walking to the Breakroom just to get a decent latté.
It helps that they have delicious little breakfast treats like the pumpkin roll (precise name?) filled with cream cheese or the apple sauce muffin (Mmmmmmm!) which are both vegan. While I’m not vegan, I have eaten vegan fare before and lemme tell ya’ that this stuff is fantastic. Their breakfast bagels (cream cheese, cucumber, sprouts and avocado) are probably my favorite item on the menu; its just a fresh and tasty snack that really does me right. I’ve made fans of the breakfast bagel out of some office mates. You must try it.
The staff is always really courteous and will bring your drink out to you while your waiting which I find to be a nice touch. They care enough to form rapport with their customers and will remember your special requests.
While I’ve never eaten lunch there most of the items on the menu sounded great. The prices for some of the lunch items seemed a little expensive to me but this may have to do with the organic/​vegan ingredients being used.
The hours are a little funky and I look forward to the day I can go on a Saturday morning and hang out while drinking coffee and zoning out to the art on the walls. But if your looking for coffee or lunch on a weekday give them a try. As you can see from most other reviews, you won’t be sorry.

I’m not a vegan. But when you put vegan cookies and cream cupcakes in my face, I will probably eat your hand as well. I guess if I ate your hand then technically the meal will not have been vegan.
Anyways, this place is awesome. I had the Potato Skin Sandwich and I was sad after I finished it cause I wanted more. The cookies and cream cupcake was scrumptious as well. Btw, there was a bit of a wait so I’d definitely recommend that you call ahead. Oh, and the meatball sammich is good too!

Holy god, I love this place.
Last month, I was looking for somewhere in the Lake Merritt area to get a cupcake for my friend for his birthday. Handy dandy Unilocal app to the rescue. This is one of the few places that my BlackBerry’s Unilocal app picked up (which is weird, because my friend’s iPhone Unilocal app got a bunch, but I digress), and, though I didn’t end up getting him a cupcake here, we did stop in so that I could have a sandwich. On account of I was HUNGRAH!
The interior of this place is cute but not enthralling, with some rather mediocre (and expensive) original art on the walls. It is also very small, but there are nice window benches with cushions on them (!!!), which pretty much makes up for the size. The menu is written on chalkboards above the counter and, if you’re blind/​stupid like me, it’s easy to miss the «all meat is vegan» disclaimer and think, «Hmm. How can a turkey and bacon sandwich be vegetarian?» At least, it’s easy if you’re me. Which is often code for «stupid.» Just sayin’…
The service here isn’t über enthusiastic and, if I’m in a bad mood when I come in, I might be put off by the high hipster quotient, but if I’m in a good mood and just looking for a tasty snack or meal, I’ll sport my I FUCKING LOVE THIS PLACE face and eat my sandwich too quickly, but in good spirits.
The turkey bacon («turkey bacon») sandwich is really good, as everyone has mentioned. No, it totally does NOT taste like meat, but who gives a shit? It’s delicious. Talking about meat substitutes as if their taste relationship to meat matters is like talking shit about «ethnic» food that isn’t «authentic»: if it tastes good, shut up and eat it. The eggplant sandwich is also good, although I scalded the roof of my mouth trying to eat it. And the sloppy Joe… oh, that’s a good sammich right there. Spicy, filling, delicious. And vegan? Fantastic. Also, sandwiches come with pickles which, while not my favorite dill variety, are sweet and tasty.
On my most recent visit, my friend and I split one of The Breakroom’s cupcakes, also vegan, and it was freaking AMAZING. I don’t eat a lot of sweets, but this cupcake did not taste any different than your creamy, eggy variety would. It was fantastic. Rich, moist, delicious. Like all the best things in life? Wait – what?
There are still many things at this place that I want to try, from the apple and cheese sandwich to the marinated tofu dealio, the hummus, the cornbread… and so on and so forth. I’m sure none of them will disappoint. Well, not too much, anyway. Nothing can be perfect, but the food has, thus far, been superior to what I expected, and it’s awesome to have a place like this in Oakland, just hanging out, not in a particularly hip neighborhood, but close enough to downtown as well as Lake Merritt to stop in quick, grab some food, and then get on with your day or evening.
Basically, I’m saying I’m pretty much in love.

The soup of the day was good, as was the marinated tofu sandwich. Actually, I will upgrade that remark to «pretty darn good!!»
Regarding the service, they aren’t exactly friendly here, but I haven’t experienced any explicit negativity. These aren’t happy, smiling hippies running a sandwich joint. If you want that, take the BART a few stops over to downtown Berkeley.

Man, major bummer that the rosemary panini that helped make the «potato skin» a 5-​star sandwich has been traded in for sliced bread, due, apparently, to cost, and yet the cost of the sandwich remains the same.
But I’ll balance the gripe with a new compliment: the window treatment — the sorta pseudo frosted glass material that covers the lower ¼th of the windows? Nicely conceals butt crack from the sidewalk passers-​by. ’cause I don’t like to think before I sit.