Sapna Café

My mom and I tried this place today. We are both avid cooks — and picky but appreciative eaters as a result.
I’ve got to say, we were both pleasantly surprised by the special: Moroccan lentil soup served with bread and salad. The flavors were fantastic! And the soup was hearty.
There are options for vegans, vegetarians and meat eaters here. The food is Spanish and Moroccan inspired. The ingredients are incredibly fresh. The service is friendly. And the prices are affordable. All in all a good experience.
As other reviewers have noted, the pace is slow. This is not the place to go if you are in a hurry.

The food here is just average. I wanted a hearty breakfast this morning, so I invited my friend Seene to join me.
I ordered scrambled eggs with vegetables and a cup of coffee and my friend ordered a sandwich with salad.
All of it was competently made but nothing jumped out as being hearty and good quality. My toast were this two sad little biscuits. :(
I really wanted to like this place, but there just doesn’t seem to be enough special about the place to give it four stars.
On the other hand, the positive side is they have vegan options.

wow what a cool little place
i adored it
stopped in here for brunch on sunday? and it was a perfect experience
other than being a little hot inside
i ordered the andalusian toast for $ 2, delicious!
this is what i would consider the pinnacle of toast
the paragon of toast really
i thought i was good at making toast
i feel ashamed, and embarassed. The skill with which a couple of simple ingredients were combined to make such wonderful toast astounded me. I could go on and on really, I happen to love bread that much (not the 70’s band of course).
i also ordered some coffee for $ 2
all in all $ 5 for brunch, in a lovely little homey setting
the owner/​chef made you feel very comfortable and relaxed.
Its really cool how much Grand has changed over the years, Sapna is a great example of that change, and I hope other trepidatious small business owners take a lesson from Sapna.
Do yourself a favour and stroll down Grand ave. sometime and hit up all the cool little shops and bars and restos, im sure you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
The only bad points of my experience were beyond Sapna’s control: note– huge table of older yuppies behind me who were loud and judgemental, i vividly remember this one old douche exclaiming «excuse me but we were the first group here and the last to order!» to our sweet young little waitress, the look of embarassment and reticence on her face pained me, i couldnt help but think, ‘Really? Really? cause i seem to recall your big group coming in AFTER me… but no no go ahead and complain please!‘
love sapna and will gladly be coming back when they have more of that gypsy stew in stock!

This is my new favorite local foodie spot.
Came in for Sunday brunch with my girlfriend and we ordered two of their specials, the salmon/​rice/​egg scramble and the blueberry pancakes with homemade whip cream and honey syrup. Also got their «orangeade» and moroccan mint tea.
the salmon/​egg/​rice scramble was FANTASTIC. came with a side of spinach with this delicious dressing that we both devoured. it totally hit the spot and was just the right temperature (i have a problem with things either being too hot or too hold when they’re served). i wish this was a regular item on their menu because i’d be in here every day. the blueberry pancakes were wheat i think, which made them not as moist as regular pancakes, but the blueberries inside of them provide the perfect amount of juiciness. Honey syrup was different but what really made the pancakes was the whipped cream. My girlfriend commented on how it was «just like her grandma made it». Always a good sign :)
Like most of the other reviewers said, service can be slow, but I didn’t mind, as I wasn’t in a mood for things to move too fast. Can get a little hot in there, as it seems they don’t have A/​C, just fans and a swamp cooler, and the art on the walls could use some help. But I love the simplicity and design of the place, and considering I moved just down the street, this will definitely be a regular spot of mine to hit up. Can’t wait to try all of their menu items!

The one thing that I always think when I see a small menu is, «these better be good.» Sapna’s menu is very small — about 15 items — but what they do have they do really well. A friend and I shared the Goat Cheese and Red Pepper quesadilla (awesome), we all had the veggie panini (mmm-​mmm good) and drank Moroccan Mint Tea (perfect). The red peppers in the quesadilla were actually in marmalade form and tasted fantastic — I’d love to try the bleu cheese and tomato quesadilla. I loved the simplicity of the panini; all of the veggies were cooked just right. The sandwich didn’t fall apart, but it was fully stuffed with goodies. And if I could drink the Moroccan mint tea everyday, I’d consider myself the luckiest woman in the world.
The décor inside is simple and the service was friendly. I love the sprigs of basil as the table flowers. We waited an average amount of time for our meals (approximately fifteen minutes) and the waitress was available when we needed her. There were a few other people inside besides my friends and me, but it was Phoenix on a Saturday night — I wouldn’t have expected a crowd. I can’t wait to go back to try the Gypsy soup and get another cup of mint tea.

this was my second trip for breakfast to sapna and again, i was the only customer in there for over an hour.
not that i was in a rush, but damn man, it is like molasses in there. so slow… the waiter guy… just…just…i don’t know what it is about some of these über hip places… like the orange table… couldn’t give a rat’s ass if you ate there or not, just as long as you look forlorn, angry, or wearing an emo-​mullet.
coffee was cold and like other reviewers, feels like forever to get refill. and this time, my portion seemed a bit less filling. a baked scramble with tofu, tomatoes and cheese, it was wicked hot and i nearly suffered 3^rd degree burns when i rotated my plate. i felt like i could’ve eaten 2 more… good, but kinda small. i’ve had better.
but the kicker came, and i don’t know why i didn’t fuss about this in my last review was the price. 10.75 for that small portion and 2 cups of coffee. i know, i know, i’m so hypocritical… i want good, local ingredients but i don’t want to pay the price (did you know you can get an enormous breakfast that would fill 3 people for under 5 bucks?). what’s a cheap bastard to do?
in the end, not a great exprience this time. will check back later…

OK, having read the hot/​cold reviews on Sapna and having a free Sunday to spend with my sweet baboo… off we went.
First of all… service issues listed in prior reviews are mostly true. This is not a «get ‘em in, get ‘em out» kind of place, so we didn’t see our waiter that often. I was prepared for a slow experience, so it didn’t bother me… much. That said, I do want a cup of coffee more frequently than every 20 minutes. Our server mentioned that a fresh pot was being brewed, so I understood the delay for the first cup. When he came out of the kitchen and refreshed all the cups at the other table, I was already itchin’ for my second cup… DENIED! Didn’t even come near our table to check on our caffeine level 8(
We both ordered brunch specials. I had the much bally-​hooed pumpkin pancakes, which didn’t taste all that pumpkin-​y. I haven’t yet decided if that is good or bad. The cream cheese/​walnut topping was awesome and they were not skimpy with it. The pancakes were moist and delish. The leftovers (which didn’t really fit into the chinese leftover box I was given) will be wonderful tomorrow a.m., I’m sure!
Hubby had a baked breakfast casserole. It smelled delish and he claims it was wonderful. It had spinach, chorizo, egg, tomato and cheese (and other stuff i’m sure) and was baked. It looked a bit runny, but after mixing it all together and slathering it on top of the home fries (which he claimed were good), it lost its runny appearance. Go figure!
I felt that the room could have used some sound deadening, as the group at the other table was a bit loud, but the front door was open and the street noise was non-​existent. Cute atmosphere… all IKEA, all the time!
Our check was exactly $ 20 without tip/​tax, so I felt like it was a successful outing. Great weather, great food, good (if not slow) service.
I look forward to a return visit to try other menu items, as many looked like stuff right up my alley!

Now I know why Emo guys can fit into jeans made for tween girls, they eat at places like this. It would make sense; this must be the target audience with this location.
I arrived just past noon with a co worker, luckily there was a police car parked nearby so I was not afraid to leave my car in this less than ideal neighborhood.
From the outside it looks modern, trendy and bright.
Inside are white tables and chairs, seating is limited but their business also seemed to be a bit limited. After hearing about the specials and looking over the menu I chose the Blue Cheese Quesadilla with tomato Marmalade as I do love blue cheese.
When my meal arrived I was shocked how small, pale and pedestrian it looked. Unlike the photo provided my quesadilla was much smaller made with an out of a package soft taco sized tortilla. Accompanying it was a small almost garnish sized dollop of rice salad on top of some baby spinach greens. The rice salad was cold, and flavorless, cold rice is rarely a good culinary choice.
My quesadilla was under done and unevenly browned, there was plenty of marmalade but not too much cheese. The flavors just did not work for me even when I tried to pair it with the apple garnish.
My coworker ordered the lentil soup special of the day. It came in a small cup with a challa spinach and cheese Panini on the side. When a ~100lb female says hr portion was small you know it must be small. She enjoyed the soup, and felt the Panini was just mediocre filler.
My second drink refill, when it finally came was warm as they had no ice in the pitcher.
I see no reason for me to try another meal here.

Oh Sapna, like so many others, we want to like you, but you make it so difficult with your awkward and strange customer service + average food.
Not completely important but worthy of noting: I despise the logo. It’s so scrapbooky for a place that is supposed to be hip. The actual restaurant space is great– just don’t look out the windows to avoid catching sight of the scrapbooky logo.
On every occasion that I have been here, the food has sounded amazing but always ended up being slightly above average. I hate getting psyched for a meal that I think I will love and then being disappointed.
The service is annoying. It’s like there isn’t a care in the world and your time will not be valued. On my last visit, it took us over two hours to get out of there and we were eating brunch AND only one of three tables in the place.
Honestly, I totally get why this place is near empty every time when I visit. Sorry, Sapna, I’d say skip it.

Each time I’ve been to Sapna the food has been excellent! I’ve only had breakfast here and each time I order the frittata of the day. My husband has ordered the pumpkin pancakes and oh my god, these are some of the best pancakes I have ever had. The syrup is so yummy. I’m drooling just thinking of them.
We have also had the Calcutta egg roll, which is worth a try, but not sure I would get it again and the pork tacos which were just delicious.
The Moraccan mint tea is very tasty. A very refreshing iced tea with fresh mint leaves.
I love the food, but have to say the service is a bit hit or miss. As other Unilocalers have said, you could be the only person in the place and hardly see your server. It’s a small place, so I don’t know how one person could go unnoticed. Really, the service isn’t much to complain about as the food is so good I can kind of overlook the service.
I think once this place catches on they will have a line out the building like Matt’s Big Breakfast and rightly so as I think the food is far more superior.

I want to like this place a lot. Grand desperately needs some strong eateries. Sapna seems like it should be excellent: cheap, healthy food in a unique triangle-​shaped setting. So what went wrong?
I’ve given this place several tries. Every time the service is terrible. They’re understaffed (even when we were the only table there… one person working at a restaurant isn’t possible), and if there are more than three employees there at once, they always get confused. I’m not sure what the reason is… the place only has like eight tables.
Second, the atmosphere is depressing. Sapna has a really different setting in the tip of the Bragg’s Pie building. If anything, the atmosphere should be the automatic winner. Instead, it’s a plain white room with plain white plastic tables. Last time I was in there, the one painting hanging on the wall fell off, hitting a patron in the head. Then it took several minutes for the server to get him some ice. He had a nice olé welt.
I like the quesadillas here a lot. The food is fresh… just not always tasty. The ratatouille is strong. I have yet to find a really great salad on the menu.

Sapna.
Been here twice. Second instance first Friday. Met with my precocious sister and a girl with a similar hair style.
The waitress was charming and fresca like a cilantro roasted lime crème fraîche. As she explained the menu, she remarked on my visage and stated that I appeared unimpressed. Either I am easy to read or she is good at detecting mannerisms.
I ordered the quesadilla with goat cheese and red bell pepper marmalade. It was tasty. However the inner portion of the tortilla was soft and soggy from the cheese yet the ends were crisp and too brittle. All in all the dish was a good combination of flavors and adequately priced for the ingredients.
The coffee was good. That is a huge plus.
Finally they changed service in between our visit. A bit weird. An introduction would have been nice. They did not offer to refill my coffee nor served us water. Was their a shortage that I was not aware of?
Anyway, it is spartan and white with copious amount of window space. Not sure if I like it, but it is definitely a style.
I am excited that Dominique from Palette. is coming on board to come up with some ideas for the menu. YAY!

I had the brie and carmelized onion quesadilla and my husband had the calcutta egg roll. Can’t wait to try everything on the menu.
Ana was our server for our early saturday morning bruch. When I first saw the small space and fold out chairs, I worried I had made a wrong choice, but when the food arrived we were blown away. Never would have expected such depth in flavor. Ana took the time to come out and answer questions about ingredients used and even went back to the kitchen to bring us the jar of an ingredient we’d never heard of.
Great place, amazing food. I only wish I could have a calcutta egg roll everyday.

When I was a kid, and a restaurant would close that my mom & dad liked, they would always say, «oh, darn, I guess we didn’t go there enough.»
Sapna Café is one of those places that I plan to go to enough! It is so darn CUTE, great adaptive reuse of an unusual space on Grand Ave. But most importantly, the food is AWESOME.
Friday night I stopped in for dinner solo — warmly welcomed. But, sadly, only two other tables were occupied. Two more came in while I was there. Now there are only maybe 12 tables in the place, but still. Based on the tasty food and the almost anachronistically low prices, this place should be rockin’ every Friday night. Constantly changing menu, because everything is fresh-​fresh-​fresh. I was also offered numerous off-​menu options, by the lovely and friendly server, Paris, and settled on a linguine pasta with shrimp and pesto sauce. Oh my it was so good I snarfed it right down, and wanted to pick up the plate and drain the remaining yummy olive oil pesto sauce into my mouth. (But I didn’t. Really.) Dessert was homemade Tapioca pudding, yum!
If you do Facebook, fan them and you’ll get the planned special as an update every day.
Go, really — it’s awesome.

I’m pretty disappointed because my first visit to Sapna was really awesome! My second visit was unfortunately not…
I went in last night to get some take out from the restaurant, lets just say Sapna is not prepared to do take out orders! I ordered the Gypsy Stew for $ 5 and the daily special (garbanzo bean salad) for 7.50 my total came to around $ 13. When I got home and opened the bag of take out, my gypsy stew was placed in a 6.0z to go coffee cup. I was a little put off by that, and then I look down and the garbanzo bean salad was placed in the smallest lil’ container I have ever seen. I was upset because I had just paid $ 13 for this meal and waited 10 minutes for it to arrive to me.
I ate the food and it was good, but I was upset about the fact I had just paid $ 13 for a ridiculous amount of food! It is a good restaurant, but for dine in only… I also feel the restaurant staff/​owners could use a little lesson in organizational skills.

The food is really very good. Always fresh and interesting. My favorite thing is the gazpacho.
Today, I went for lunch with a largish group of people. Even though the dining area isn’t that big, we were all accommodated nicely. They even split up the tab for us! (there were 9 of us) I love that they have really tasty vegan fare which in this city can be hard to come by.
Here are my issues. Although the owners/​servers are nice, the service can be really really bad. I’m not a pessimist, but why would a waiter only fill up a glass of water halfway? Also to describe the non-​vegan special today, our waitress said «oh, you know, it’s like fish and rice and tomato sauce» appetizing… I prefer my servers to have social skills.
BUT I still recommend going here. The food is good, and it is a locally owned establishment. I can’t wait to come back and visit Phoenix when the Grand Ave area really explodes.

This is the cutest place with great healthy food options. I love the décor and shape of the space, triangular, light and airy. I had an eggplant and onion panini and some ginger lemonade. Totally fantastic. Great little spot for a light brunch after Mass.
Looking forward to visiting again!

Solid menu choices.
Great customer service.
Sapna Café is a breath of fresh air along Grand Avenue.
Robert M and I drove past this place after arrive home from a vacation in San Francisco. Having dined out daily there, we were in no mood to cook but a bit apprehensive about eating somewhere that would disappoint. Sapna came to the rescue.
We split the Croque Monsieur panini and a tomato salad. The panini was fabulous; the salad a little too bitter for Robert’s tastes but otherwise good. They don’t refrain from their use of garlic in the latter, so it’s best to share this on a date.
Apparently, this space can be rented out which would make a great party spot. Plus, they’re working on getting a liquor license.

Our tradition on vacation is to seek out breakfast spots. We either find something near where we plan to go, something in route, or just plain go out of our way to have some place that has gotten killer reviews. This place is not the third one yet, but was on our way (mostly) to Goodyear. We were headed out for a ball game (of course).
From the direction we were heading, there was no real perfect exit to get off the 10, so we did a little round a bout thing. But, we got there and found it. Take a good look at the pictures, it helps when you are searching for this place. We got parked with no difficulty and were worried that the place might not even be open. It is pretty desolate around this area. Not too «scary» as Matt K’s sister thinks, at least not at 10am in the morning.
THe place is cute. A triangular building with lots of windows. No huge sign to advertise, but maybe just being on Unilocal will help them. We walked in to the small main dining area. Lots of white ikea tables and chairs with cute flowers on all of them. Bright drapery covering the sunny side of the building’s windows. Lots of natural light in here and very inviting. The staff greeted us right away and asked us to order up at the counter, as they do not have menus printed yet. So, I assume that is coming.
We walked through the doorway into more of a kitchen area that had a counter setup and a large board with menu items. There are daily lunch specials, about 6 – 7 breakfast items, a lunch menu and a heafty list of specialty drinks. This place is really a true «Asian» Fusion, incompasing all of Asia. But, with a dabble in a few extra places, we will just call this world fusion. There are lots of really creative dishes and things that I would not necessarily have put together. But, they work.
I ordered a Calcutta Egg wrap. This was really unique. The tortilla and the egg were like one. Inside there were veggies (too many onions for me, I will omit them next time), including carrots, cilantro, and tomato. They give you a side of sweet chili sauce to top it. Other than the onions that I fished most of out, this was DELICIOUS. I am not sure how they did the egg, but I do not have to know. I just have to eat it. SG ordered a scrambled egg plate with stir fried asian veggies. He loved the combination and was surprised to find how great it all was together.
We both stepped outside our norms and also got a specialty tea. We ordered the Indian Chai. It was very good. There were lots of other choiced that tempted me, but this one struck me first. I would love to go back and try the Ginger Lemonade. I am a sucker for ginger!
Overall, this is a good little place with some really fresh, tasty, creative menu items. I hope that the lunch traffic can sustain them, since they have such potential. COME ON UnilocalERS, get in there and check it out. It is close enough to stop in for breakfast or lunch and get a little bite, even if you take it out, rather than eating in.

The first thing you notice about Sapna Café are the windows pouring natural light into this neat, white space. (For shape, think of the Flatiron Building in New York on a tiny, tiny scale.) The windows are covered with thin 15-​foot mix-​and-​match drapes tied to reveal Grand and 13^th Ave. views. The vaguely triangular dining room gives way to a door frame through which you find the blackboard menu and register, where you order.
I took two friends on Saturday during Art Detour for a late lunch and the place was about half-​full with the owner and one other person working.
There are two daily specials, and I had the Garbanzos and Eggplant in a Coconut Milk Curry, which came with brown rice, baguette pieces, and a side salad of field greens modestly but flavorfully dressed, all for $ 6.50. The curry was rich, warm, and filling, and the firmness of the garbanzos went well with the butter-​soft eggplant. A great lunch for the price.
My friend Katie had the messy but delicious tabbouleh and chipotle hummus wrap, and my friend Kelly had a large salad with cranberries, almonds, goat cheese, and manchego. It was dressed with balsamic vinegar only (no oil?), so the flavor was mostly sweet and tangy.
The drinks, we agreed, were on the subpar side. The orangeade was inventive and attractive on the menu, but was mostly diluted and unsatisfying for $ 3.
Sapna’s seems to be sorting out the ordering, serving, clean-​up system, not to mention operating the register. Ringing up sales took about 3 – 5 minutes per patron, and you pay at the end. The half-​eaten and abandoned sandwich at the adjacent table remained for our entire hour lunch.
Nevertheless, I am so grateful for fresh, interesting food on Grand Ave., and I’m confident Sapna Café will work out the service issues.
I will return.