Cafe Rain Tree

Hawaiian crêpe was really good (I asked for no onions), but beer was served in a warm glass making it borderline awful to drink, and 85% of my potatoes were burnt and cold. Meal was definitely not worth the 20 dollars I spent on it.

Always seated quickly here. The staff is friendly and attentive. Their breakfast is good, not spectacular. It’s what I would expect from a greasy spoon type place. I’ve been there a number of times and never leave hungry :)

After the Hot Chocolate 15K, got back to the car at SFSU and decided on brunch. Original destination was Inner Sunset CrepeVine, but after circling around a few times for parking, wandered into Café Rain Tree instead. They also had crepes and daily specials including pancakes and French Toast! Both of the other gals had hot tea and the Smoked Salmon Eggs Benedict (salmon in place of the ham), and I stuck with a coffee and the Sierra Omelette (ham, tomato, mushroom, cheese, green onion) which comes with house potatoes and toast (two full slices cut in half, but still huge!). Cute little hole-​in-​the-​wall place, can get full/​busy but we were seated right away. I realize that my particular order wasn’t anything extraordinary, but they did a solid job with an unassuming omelette and all ingredients tasted fresh. Decent coffee too hit the spot. Had the odd bell pepper piece mixed in with the potatoes but no biggie. Ketchup bottle is glass, not the squeeze kind, be aware of mess-​making risks. So many other eateries in the vicinity that I highly doubt I’ll be back, but it was a good meal before leaving the city.

Well I least they fed me right?
I mean come here expecting little and maybe you won’t be disappointed. But don’t come here expecting to be both nourished and satisfied, my dear you are barking up the wrong tree.
What I liked:
Not a huge wait we were able to get in fairly quickly.
They do have a nice variety of food options.
The english muffin was toasted well!
What I didn’t like:
The food was decent. Wasn’t well seasoned and lacked a bit of charm.
Chicken apple sausage was even flavorless.
I got the Chicken Apple Sausage and 2 Eggs which was about $ 10. It just didn’t seem worth the price in its basicness.
Service was decent I suppose.

My friends and I came here for brunch on New Year’s Day when we were starving and I was craving eggs. It is a total dive-​y diner, but actually got the job done for what we needed it to do. I ordered the Mediterranean scramble and it came with a lot of artichokes, olives and feta, which was exactly what I wanted. The potatoes that it came with were cold, unfortunately. The service could have been quicker. We had to ask for coffee refills multiple times and it took awhile for our food to come out. If we had more time to find a place, this probably wouldn’t have been the one!

Love it, the family really likes this place. Cheap prices, very friendly staff and most of all great food

The food is a 4 and the prices are a 2. Two of us for brunch & one drink came to $ 35. If it was $ 25, it would be a 4. The food, a BLT & savory Crape was good, & well presented. Not giant American size portions (a plus) which some places can not help themselves. Will come back for the long rotation. Shorter rotation for other places.

Very legit breakfast spot — many of the places in the area don’t have a full traditional breakfast menu like these guys do.
Must order the oj — idk if it’s fresh squeezed or what but it was pulpy & delicious.
Got the two style eggs breakfast, hash browns with whole wheat toast which was solid and satisfying.
Very small place, but fast service. From my experience they have «an eat it while it’s hot style» serving, meaning they don’t serve everyone at once — not my favorite but not a deal breaker.
Yummy

Incompetent waitress!!! Gave us the wrong order with no accountability! Expected us to wait for them to correct their mistake…

Dope spot to grab some breakfast. Made né feel like i was back at home. The cook is pretty dam skilled to get so many orders out the way by himself. Fsher coming back here when i come back to SF.

Sadly, Café Rain Tree’s 2.5-star rating (at the time of this review) is right on the money.
The food was pretty unspectacular. Everything we ordered was quite bland. Two items worth calling out (not in a good way) were the orange juice and the bacon. The orange juice was on the extreme end of pulpy, and they questionably added crushed ice to the OJ. That doesn’t make for a pleasant, refreshing morning beverage, at least in my opinion. The side of bacon I ordered was room temperature (I think it was precooked and sitting out) and overcooked.
The service was attentive and fast, but not particularly pleasant. It might be nit-​picky to expect a smile with your eggs, but it could’ve made the difference here between a 3-​star and 2-​star review.
Café Rain Tree could really crush it with its stellar location. Hopefully they’re reading and acting on these reviews, which strike similar notes, to realize their potential.

First of all, don’t go to this joint. Monday 6:50AM, other 2 local hole-​in-​wall cafés are closed so waited for this one til 7, and walked over. Sign in front says opens 7AM. Door is open. I start to walk in at 7:00 and am stopped by guy inside, told they aren’t open yet. I mill around outside, reading paper. 7:10 they open. I get coffee, nothing special, kinda weak, but seems like coffee. Pick a California omelet with potatoes, which I asked for crispy, on side. Omelet not great, tiniest dab sour cream, but it sems OK. Potatoes not particularly well done, seem like they were frozen, not much flavor, kinda oily.
Part way through my potatoes I notice a long black hair mixed in with them, look for combo cook/​waiter, who in awhile comes in from vack, get his attention, point it out, no apology, says he’ll cook me some hash browns. I say OK. He takes my plate. I immediately hear him scraping the potatoes off my plate into trash can, could not have had time to first remove my eggs sanitarily to new plate, and I am hoping he isn’t bumping my plate with my omelet onto trash can rim. He brings what’s left of my omelet back on new plate. Eventually brings a small plate with the barely-​cooked hash browns, forgetting I asked for crispy, and this time bringing them even less cooked. I should be grateful: at least they weren’t still frozen.
During all of this, cold coffee was never offered to be refilled. No discount or apology for the hair. I left 85% of the hash browns on the plate. Paid with a 20 to the waitress who by then had arrived. She brought my $ 6-​something change in all ones, fishing for a tip. No way. What a rip-​off, and my stomach now is queasy from the oily undercooked flavorless potatoes, with my purse much lighter than it should be for that. Never going back there. Crappy way to start a day of hard work. Thanks a lot, on several counts… Not.

This is a solid option for a diner type breakfast. The service was pretty fast and there was no wait on a Sunday at 11. I realize for most people no wait might seem like a bad sign, but I hate waiting for breakfast so I was willing to take a risk. I’m glad we tried it. The breakfast staples (eggs, bacon, etc) were all good and the service was decent. I wouldn’t make a special trip to come here but I’ll be back if I’m in the neighborhood.

Mehh… small space tightly seated against the backs of others. Slow and inattentive service (water and coffee was served to other customers/​groups who entered after us). Food priced at $ 9 or more and very basic. I’ve gotten their pancake and egg breakfast which comes as expected but small portions. Their monte cristo sandwich was unsatisfying and had ham that was kinda chewy and gritty. The only things I see going for this place is the window seating and the fact that they take card. Your time, money, and palate is better appreciated elsewhere on the many other breakfast places nearby.

How is this place still open? My boyfriend and I live close and were coming from church super hungry so we went here just to try it.
It starts off with terrible service when the waitress neither greets or gives us any direction to being seated, so my boyfriend and I are standing there for an awkward eternity it seems before we are even acknowledged. Red flag #1. I later see that there’s a small handwritten sign that says «seat yourself where table is clean.» We sat ourselves at the bar and notice a number of tables that were empty, but haven’t been waited yet. Red flag #2. My boyfriend and I sit down to review the menu and when we’ve made our decisions, we put down our menu to get the waitress’ attention. Nope. The entire restaurant itself is small, so the fact that she didn’t notice us waiting for a solid 10min is beyond me (Red flag #3) But my boyfriend and I aren’t exactly in a rush so we aren’t angry or anything. She finally takes our order and I ask for the porkchop, sunny side up eggs, and salad to replace the side of potatoes. My boyfriend orders the vegetarian dish American omelette but requests to add turkey. After we place our order, we wait. My boyfriend and I are sitting right in front of the cook so we are able to observe how he cooks. Red flag #4? My boyfriend sees him taking my porkchop, completely frozen, and pops it into the microwave to defrost. Yeah… My expectations are already lowering. We see him making other people’s food meanwhile, and amongst many things wrong, we notice a pretty burnt pancake going out, him wiping one of the plates (with food already on it) with a dirty towel, the waitress taking people’s orders incorrectly and wasting food as it was sent back, and overall, no care when it comes to the food that is being plated. When our food came out, as expected my porkchop was 100% dry on top of being the flattest and tiniest portion ever. I took a few bites and literally spat it out (as undramatically as possible) because it was like eating salty rubber. The cook forgot to replace my potatoes with a salad and had to switch it out after being reminded of my order (which he did so by using his hands to push it off my plate and back into the pile of potatoes used for all plates). However, I did get to try those potatoes via my boyfriend’s dish and needless to say, we didn’t finish that either. There was like a hint of cayenne pepper that seasoned it very poorly. And it was cooked very mashed and dry. Given I’m a home cook myself, I was not impressed. My boyfriend’s omelette was actually decent, but even he said there’s no way you can mess up an omelette, and he doesn’t cook… At all. I had earlier ordered waters when the waitress originally took my order, but never got it so I asked for waters when I luckily got her attention. She comes back with ONE water. SERIOUSLY? So I proceed to ask her for another for my boyfriend. Overall, we finally got our check and couldn’t wait to leave.
I honestly don’t understand why people would open a restaurant and not strive to make it at least decent. Everything was just not good here and I rarely complain. So here it is.

Solid neighborhood place with dandy options for eating lunch and diner. The environment is pretty mellow during the week days and the food is square. The service is good.

This week I tried all 3 hole in the wall breakfast places around 9^th and Irving.
Café Rain Tree is definitely the one to avoid at all costs, 0 stars if possible.
I ate here about 10 years ago, thought it awful, but figured hey, it’s been awhile, let me try it again. Big mistake. Both the service and the food was beyond pathetic. I dined alone and sat at the counter, the only person. The menu arrived soon enough, and I put it down in an obvious «I’m ready to order» while making eye contact with the waitress. She proceeded to make 2 milkshakes while completely ignoring my simple order (Eggs Benedict and a coffee), and then took the order of a party that had arrived and sat at a table way after I sat down. Then she seated another party at the counter before addressing me.
I ordered the EB soft-​poached and promptly got my coffee, she asked whether I wanted cream. I said yes, so she got the little metal jug and put it on the counter, maybe filled or didn’t fill it, but that’s the last I saw of it because it went to another table and my request for cream was never addressed again. The EB arrived and the eggs were hard as rocks, the home potatoes wilted and soft. I cut the eggs in half, tasted a potato, and got up to leave.
I said to the waitress, «This is horrendous, the eggs are rock hard when I ordered them soft, I’m leaving, I’m outta here, let’s just call it even». And I left, definitely never coming back now.
Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice…

Went here for lunch with a friend… I ordered a tuna salad sandwich and my friend ordered an avocado BLT. I had maybe two tablespoons of tuna in my sandwich. My friend had a smear of avocado in his sandwich (not even a slice of avocado). Ripped off as their prices are high.
Be aware… the cashier/​waitress DOES NOT practice good hand hygiene. We were there for at least 45 minutes sitting at the counter and we watched her handle the cash register/​exchange cash with customers and also help prepare the sandwiches (putting slices of bread in the toaster). She did not use gloves when handling the food and NEVER washed her hands at the sink. GROSS!!! Hello Health Dept!!!

I stumbled upon this place by accident, and I’m glad I did… It was fairly busy but found a counter seat, and got to watch the cook do his thing up close… Man can that guy get down or what… I didn’t catch his name, but I’m making it a point to look for him becauase he’s great.
I am very particular when it comes to egg’s, and only want to see white & yellow (no burned edge, clear under cooked liquid) and this guy WAS PERFECT!!! I had the corned beef hash, and it was great, with toast, potatoes, and a smiling waitress… I will defiantly be back, and its worth the drive from Diamond Heights… I noticed this place is also in West Portal, so I will be so inclined to check that place out also, GOOD TIMES!

January 6, 2014 Monday — breakfast 8:30 AM
3 adults
Atmosphere — 4 stars
Food — 4 stars
Service — 5 stars
Background — We are on our way to the California Academy of Sciences from Daly City. So the plan was to find the first area with some restaurants and we would park. Well we ended up right in from of here.
Atmosphere — An old diner that is a little worn down but lots of character.
Food
Drinks — Coffee, but refills were hard to come by.
Appetizer — None.
My Main Course — I had the banana pancakes. I watched our cook pick the bananas and cut them up and place into the batter. Everything was from scratch. They were a filling warm breakfast. I could even watch him cook them. I enjoyed them and would get them again.
Dessert — None after breakfast.
Service — For only two groups it was slow.
Future — Yes if I lived in the area but location and where I live makes it difficult.