Joanie’s Café

I’ve been twice and it’s been quite packed both times — try to avoid peak hours or come in and write your name on the list right away!
I had Joanie’s French Dip the first time and it was delicious — a bit much and really flavorful but still tasty. However when going their recently I got the Half Soup/​Sandwich option and decided to get the French Onion Soup + Tuna Sandwich. I’ve heard only good things about the soup but when I tried it… I was not impressed. It was way too salty and the cheese on top was extremely clumpy. The sandwich was a good size, a bit overwhelming with the amount of tuna in it but still good.
Not sure I’d come back to order items off the lunch menu, but I’d give the breakfast a shot!

Definitely crowded on the weekends, but if you put yourself on the list and wait around the line moves quickly.
Food was delicious and the service was excellent. I had the florentine Benedict without the hollandaise sauce and I loved it. Their hash browns are grilled perfectly.

Great, consistent place to get breakfast! My boyfriend and I use to frequent Joanie’s a lot when we lived in the area. Sadly, within the past year they took my favorite item off the menu, the Brie omelette — maybe because this omelette contained an actual wedge of Brie, which might not have been cost effective or maybe they determined that it was extremely unhealthy (it was super unhealthy, but SO good). Brie omelette removal aside, I’ve moved on to other breakfast foods here and I have yet to be disappointed. The breakfasts come with a lot of options so it’s easy to customize to your tastes. I love runny eggs — and Joanie’s will provide that!
The service is very nice, lots of quick water and coffee refills. I’m only taking one star off because I’ve had multiple experiences where the staff were quick with the food and drink, but very slow bringing the check. I think the food is also ever so slightly pricey given the amount you receive, however the quality is good.
Just a note on ambiance, if you come here on a weekday you’re surrounded by tech bros having business breakfasts. If you go a weekend it’s mostly families and groups of hungover teenagers.

Very solid — good pancakes and fresh fruit. I wasn’t a fan of the home fries, but overall, this was a solid meal and the wonderful staff made it even more enjoyable.

This place was such a nice surprise. Cozy, great food, friendly staff. Definitely recommend!

Sat outside on a beautiful weekend day. The food was fresh, the staff very helpful and pleasant, and we will definitely be back!

This is my newest brunch discovery around Palo Alto and I love it! They have a solid no-​nonsense breakfast/​brunch/​lunch menu and serve really good coffee throughout your meal to keep you on your toes (with free refills, of course).
I ordered the Mexican Scrambled Eggs (pictured) and it was delicious with generous amounts of avocado, sour cream and the works. The fruit was quite fresh (you could replace that with fries or hash browns, if you wish) and there’s also a choice of toast or English muffin.
I’m looking forward to coming back here soon to try out their lunch menu and also just hang around California Avenue. Solid five stars.

One of our favorite places to visit. My child was having a sad morning… when a server offered to change the cup of milk to chocolate milk with whip cream on top. Thank you to the server who went above and beyond his duty to brighten a child’s day, thus brightening the whole family’s day.

05.19.16
California Ave. is so adorable, I gush every time I’m there. ERRMAGAHD IT’S SO CUTE.
Joanie’s Café embodies that ambiance. Sit outside and order a benedict. Pair it with an iced coffee. Soak in the sunshine. Banter with the waiter.
You won’t be disappointed.
Total damage for two: $ 42

Stopped here for breakfast passing through town. Very nice! Cute cozy and friendly. Food little pricey for breakfast but not surprised due to location. Feta omelette and fresh fruit were fantastic. Fresh blueberry muffin superb. Brioche French toast good but I have had better.

Joannie’s Café is my favorite restaurant on CA Ave. in Palo Alto. Great sandwiches, fruit and yummy soups. Friendly staff and short wait times at lunch time. Parking can be hard to find at lunch time.

Awesome brunch place… Not too boosey n yet very filling with quality food. My family n I enjoyed it like crazy. Definitely a good place to check out with a big appetite (4:20)

Super solid breakfast brunch place on Cal Ave.
It’s not super fancy but it’s more dressed up than your average diner. It’s a great family spot or casual breakfast meat up with hearty portions, fair prices, superb coffee service, numerous mimosa options, and a much shorter wait than the Brioche place up the street.
I got the Florentine Benedict and somehow managed to take down the entire generously plated portion, the side of home fries, fruit, and at least 3 cups of coffee.
Our service was great and on a Sunday they had a nice crowd of families dressed like they’d come from church and folks looking for a substantial sit-​down meal while the farmer market was bustling outside on California Ave.
Would definitely come back… especially for the Hawaiian French Toast with grilled pineapple and carmel and other goodness like that.

French Toast with strawberries and banana

I came here for Sunday brunch at 1pm with six ladies– we got seated immediately since we decided to sit outside. There were people waiting for seats indoors, but it looked like they got seated relatively quickly. This is a popular brunch spot, and after trying the food I can see why. Service was excellent and super fast. We ordered and the server said food would be out in five minutes. We were surprised and decided to time him. Indeed, our food arrived shortly after piping hot and fresh. I split a smoked salmon crêpe and french dip sandwich ($ 13 before tax/​tip) with a friend. Portions are huge here. The crêpe was exceptionally good and I really liked the au jus and bread for the french dip. Hash browns were perfectly crispy and soft. Brunch here is a bit pricey, but definitely worth trying if you’re in the Stanford area!

At 8 am on Saturday for right in, ordered quickly and meal came quickly. Blots of smiles and coffee refills! Brie apple sausage crêpe and smoked salmon crepes were awesome. Portions were more than I could eat. Would definitely return

My boyfriend’s favorite brunch place. Service is excellent although the restaurant itself is pretty small so expect a long wait when it is crowded.
I really enjoyed my crêpe bretonne with the slice of brie and topped with hollandaise sauce. Crêpe itself was not too thick — definitely a good start to my weekend.
The pancake which my boyfriend had was light and fluffy. Portion was also super generous.
Will return again!

Joanie’s is not my favorite breakfast on the strip, but since Brioche Café was closed, my wife and I ended up here. I always wonder why there always seems to be a wait here. The service is marginal and the food is just ok. They do have a nice cozy atmosphere, but beyond this the place is pretty mediocre. If your undecided, definitely head down the block to the other café.

I would likely rate this place higher if I could actually get a meal in a reasonable amount of time. Yes, it is popular, but it is also very slow. I tried coming for lunch, but ended up having to gobble as quick as I could so I wasn’t late back at work. This is a good place for brunch on the weekends and everyone in Palo Alto knows it.
The food is pretty good. The french toast is rich and yummy. The egg dishes are done very nicely. I also like their sandwiches. If it was just the food part of the experience I would give this place a higher rating, but I can’t get fed in a reasonable time frame.

It was my first time here on Sunday and me and my friend got seated pretty quickly despite there being a Farmer’s Market just outside (~15 min). The service was just okay, he didn’t come to refill our water or check on us but the food was pretty good. I ordered the Crêpe Bretonne and it easily filled me up! It came with hashbrowns which is the best decision to order if you come here. They are really crispy! There wasn’t really anything special about this place so I have to give it a 3.

Joanie’s is one of our favorite go-​tos for weekend brunch! The food is consistent and the wait staff does their best with wait times given that the place is always packed around 10 – 12 on the weekends.
My favorite is the breakfast medley, which comes with two pancakes, choice of eggs, yummy garlicky potatoes (our potatoes might have had some extra garlicky bits, but I’m not going to complain), and choice of meat — my choice is always the corned beef hash. Unlike some corned beef hashes, the corned beef is incorporated throughout with onions and softened scrambled potatoes, yum!
I’ve had the benedicts here before which are equally delicious, and my boyfriend tends to go for the omelettes. They used to offer a similar combo with french toast instead of pancakes, which I have a slight preference for, but the pancake option is great too for those of us who always have trouble deciding between sweet and savory breakfast.
Keeps me coming back for more every time!

Lovely menu, interesting concoctions. Had the Carmel French toast, nice but the regular would have done. The open face Chibata bread sandwich however was delicious. May have to go again.

As a pit stop on the way back to LA this place was a complete miss. Long wait for table, then service, food came out spardoically at best. What go me. was the british burger all tasted the same, just buttery grease. Was looking forward to it, oh well. Service was good when they had a moment.

Came here on a sunny Sunday around 11am. Waited for about 20 minutes to be seated. Although the table was small, the atmosphere was nice and our waiter was extremely friendly and awesome.
I had the Florentine Benedict and my date had the special, some delicious bread pudding + berries french toast thing. His meal was actually better than mine – super fresh and tasty.
The farmers market outside was an awesome bonus – we took advantage and walked around after brunch :)

Came for Sunday brunch. Had about a 20 minute wait. Once we were seated, we ordered a round of mimosas. Will say they do their mimosas RIGHT. You get a small bottle of champagne, and a teeny personal pitcher of orange juice. No Bloody Marys though. :/
Service was average. Waited a little to long for someone to take our order and the waitress wasn’t personable at all.
I had one of the specials; it was a crab omelette with hash browns. Hash browns were your normal shredded, fried potatoes. Nothing to complain about there. The crab omelette was too crabby. The flavor was overwhelming. I could barely get through half of it. Friends were mostly satisfied with their dishes. Would be willing to give Joanie’s another shot because of their generously-​sized mimosas.

Stopped by Joanie’s Café near the Stanford University campus area of Palo Alto after searching Unilocal for a solid place for breakfast. We found exactly what we were looking for at Joanie’s on California Ave.
Joanie’s is a one-​of-​a-​kind cozy little independent restaurant that attracts a diverse and eclectic clientele in this highly regarded college town. We really enjoyed some small talk with a few locals at the next table over breakfast.
We ordered a specialty Combination Omelete and one Smoked Salmon Benedict. Both were complimented with a choice of either California Fresh Fruit or Joanie’s Roasted Potatoes. Both breakfast entrees were beautifully presented and tasted every bit as good as they looked.
I can recommend Joanie’s Café for a delicious breakfast and a really cool Northern Cal college town vibe.

Nice surprise, we hardly ever try new places. Great food and service.
We wanted to have breakfast in downtown Palo Alto, weren’t really sure where. Joanie’s was right by where we parked, so we decided to give it a try. The wait was about 10 minutes, there was a long line with larger parties waiting, thankfully since it was only my husband and I, we didn’t wait long.
While we waited we were offered water and coffee, nice touch! The menu has plenty to pick from, omelets, salads, sandwiches, pancakes and more.
I went for my usual ham and veggie omelet and my husband went for the bacon and cheese omelet. The omelets come with toast and potatoes. The toast is really good, not your typical bread, soft and larger than the usual slices of toast. Now if you are a garlic fan, you’ve got to have their potatoes. They are cubed with a generous serving of garlic. For some people this might be too much. I personally thought they were pretty good, seasoned to perfection. My husband is not a garlic fan at all, so I ended up eating his potatoes. I had wanted to go a bit healthy so I swapped the potatoes for fruit, which didn’t work because I ate his anyway.
Service was great, they were busy but they never lost track of our table. Our waiter was very friendly and accommodating to this prego woman.

Joanie’s is a solid, old-​fashioned style breakfast café, at which we’ve eaten several times. The menu is good and the service is friendly and efficient. On weekdays, it is a very enjoyable venue. Weekends, however, are another matter.
The lines are almost always quite long — and the food isn’t good enough to merit the required wait time. To make matters worse, the waiting list is not handled fairly; arriving earlier than other customers does not mean you will be seated first — regardless of the size of your party.
Go to Joanie’s for a nice, predictable breakfast… but only on a weekday.

this is a review for the lunch menu.
I’ve been here a few times and this is a solid lunch place. lots of salad, sandwich and soup choices. I’ve had the Cobb Salad twice. this seems like a small thing, but somehow they do a great job with the bacon. it’s very crispy without being charred.
there are a few tables outside which is nice if you can snag one. the service is really good too. every server I’ve dealt with has been friendly and attentive.
I love the restaurants on California street. it’s like a hidden part of Palo Alto for insiders. usually easy to find parking, and plenty of restaurant choices. don’t tell anyone!

Spring Break 2015 in CA… Went for a visit to Palo Alto because we wanted to see Stanford and stopped here in a nice little new downtown area that is really investing a lot of money for new places. We stopped in at Joanie’s Café for lunch and it was very nice… the weather even cooperated so we could eat outside where they had seating for maybe 10 or 12.
One in our party of four had the grilled cheese with avocado and bacon (this was very good as the avocado was so fresh… doesn’t that sound like a comment from a Midwesterner in March?)…another had the ½ soup and sandwich (white bean soup and tuna salad sand on soft sourdough bread… both very nice)…someone had the goat cheese omelet (raved and left nothing on his plate)…and the last in our party had the home fries favorite (pretty much eggs, potatoes, onions, and cheese, and the potatoes were done home-​style and were tops).
Service was peppy and quick… all our food was hot. Inside there isn’t too much room as the tables are a bit crowded but this is a happen’in place. Since it is so close to Stanford there are tons of 20 somethings here and many young families… most probably of graduate students. Neat place and neat area… come on down.

Came on a Friday morning at about 10 in a group of 3, we were seated pretty fast, within 5 minutes. A mix of a college crowd and an older crowd. The college kids were pretty rowdy. The location is pretty intimate, and cute. The food was fine, but service was pretty terrible. Prices were average.
I started off with a tea which already was spilled all over the plate. The server did not bring us any water. He took forever to come by for anything, never checked on us, our bill took absolutely forever and we waited so long for him to collect the bill we ended up taking it to the front. My friend had been to this location before and didn’t have the same problem, so maybe it was just a bad experience, but our server was awful.
I ordered the crêpe brettone. It had sausage, onions, mushroom, eggs inside with a hollandaise sauce on top which was pretty good. Overall the dish was tasty. The hash browns were also good, but nothing super amazing. My friend enjoyed her chicken sandwich which had egg plant and caramelized onions on it.

The short: Nice brunch place to catch up with a friend!
There was a wait, either because it was brunch hour, or because there was a farmers market going on or both.
My friend and I scored a place that had a street view (yup! that small corner on the right when you walk in).
I ordered a crêpe bretonne. Delicious and oozed with goodness. The brie cheese gave the crêpe a nice touch!
My friend ordered the eggs benedict salmon. He enjoyed it!
I would love to come back to try out other items on the menu, like the Parisian Brioche French Toast and maybe for lunch too?!

So this place place was pretty good!
We just stopped in for a quick bite and its not so much a café as more of a restaurant we came to see. They gave you bread and butter at your table, and they had a pretty nice wine and beer list!
Their menu has a variety of things, Mac and cheese, Chicken Sandwiches, fish tacos! Super eclectic if you ask me. But everything looked amazing.
We had the fish tacos and they were really good. We would have liked to try more, but just weren’t very hungry! I will be back to try more however, and to update the review!
The staff are all super nice and the place is really clean, the only thing is that when they realized we weren’t going to be ordering much, they got kinda pushy! …Which I guess is understandable.

Nice little café.
I decided to venture out for breakfast early this morning, after staying at the Sheraton close by.
It was farmers market this day, preventing me to be able to park within the main street where Joanies was situated; I did however, manage to find a nice parking spot just a block away. It was early morning, and the streets were scarce, other than the local produce vendors setting up their produce booths. I arrived at Jonies several minutes before their opening at 7:30.
Me and a few other people were waiting to get in. We were told it was open seating upon entering;which allowed me to get a nice spot in front of the window.
Service was prompt, with someone assisting me and taking my order immediately. I started my morning off with a cup of joe. For food, I decided upon the Smoked Salmon Omelette, consisting of: cream cheese and green onions, topped with Hollandaise sauce. It also comes with the standard sides such as your choice of hashbrowns, toast or a muffin. I’m not much of a hashbrown loving person, but I decided upon that. And instead of toast, one of their homemade strawberry muffins.
Coffee was decent. My dish then arrived fairly quickly looking average delicious. The omelette turned out to be extremely delicious-​hearty and very filling. The hashbrowns were ok; not the typical greasy, jam packed with flavor due to the grease and juice of the grill but I suppose you could look at it in more of a healthy sense. I only had one or two bites. I ended up taking the muffin back to my mother, who thought it was incredible.
Service was also very attentive, however, a few times I felt as if the rest of the buss boys/​staff, were a little to eager to take my plate and potentially rush me out of there, but overall, everyone was exceptionally friendly. The prices also seem quite reasonable.
All in all, if I was in the area, I would potentially try them again perhaps for lunch, however, I don’t feel this is a destination point that I would drive out of my way to go to.

Joanie’s is a cute little café on California Ave. that offers a delicious breakfast/​brunch menu! I came here on a weekday in the morning, and the wait was pretty short.
Parking:
Street parking along California Ave. or public parking lot located behind the restaurant.
Service:
Our server was polite and friendly. He took our order and brought our food out quickly. He also made sure that our waters were filled throughout our meal.
Food:
— Omelette St. Jacques– with crab, scallops, and shrimp covered in hollandaise sauce. Served with choice of toast/​muffin and a side of fruit (or hashbrowns or home fries). I was surprised at how much seafood they put in this omelette! They gave a nice variety of fresh fruit, including strawberries, bananas, honeydew, grapes, watermelon, and pineapple along with an orange slice.
— Huevos Santa Fe — Breakfast burrito filled with scrambled eggs, sausage, onion, and bell pepper in a flour tortilla. Topped with cheddar cheese, avocado, salsa, and sour cream. Served with choice of toast/​muffin and a side of fruit (or hashbrowns or home fries). The burrito was huge! There was a good mix of ingredients inside of the burrito and plenty of sauce and toppings. I would definitely get this again!