Revival Cafe+Kitchen — Restaurant in Cambridge

5 stars! 1 for taste, 1 for ambiance, 1 for service, 1 for menu innovation, and 1 for value!

My two good college friends and I came here one Saturday afternoon sweaty and starving after a killer workout class, and was pleasantly surprised to find not only free and plentiful parking, but a nice, cozy but well laid-out space inside, buzzing with people but not so crazy you couldn't find space to sit. We ordered 4 things to share: the kale salad, the magic melt, the black cap breakfast sammie, and the tuna salad sammie. Everything was great! My favorite was the black cap -- super rich Italian deli slices (capocollo?) atop a ridiculously fluffy, square (!) egg between two slices of rich bread. The tuna salad sammie was surprisingly yummy as well -- the radish brought an unforeseen freshness to the sammie that was both excellent and unexpected for something so pedestrian as tuna salad. The magic melt was meaty and rich, with amazing brioche bread. And the kale salad -- while our "least" favorite of the four things, was fresh, light, and still tasty, with the toasted nuts bringing a nice texture and sweetness.

They serve George Howell coffee (so it's good). My cortado was solid -- dark and rich, and my friends seemed pleased with their drinks as well. Service was quick! We got all our food within 7 minutes easy. And value was great as well. We paid $16 each (so the bill was $48 total) for 4 things and 3 fancy drinks, so...

Okay iced latte and okay bagel with cream cheese.

The iced latte had a nice coffee flavor but it was hard to catch because it was pretty watered down. Their to go cups are terrible—it dripped coffee on me through my entire consumption experience, getting worse as it went on. The solution would be to stick a straw in the sip opening, but that wastes even more plastic so it wasn’t my instinct. Find new cups.

The bagel was decent, not quite the right texture but fine for Boston. The standard seems to be toasted, which is good—they didn’t ask, it just came toasted automatically.

Thanks to other reviewers who noted the built-in kitchen fee. I don’t have an issue with its existence, but they should give people a heads up so you can build it into your tipping, especially for...

For some reason I really like this café. Maybe it’s the eclectic choice of a book placed on each table, maybe it’s the open casual industrial atmosphere, music at just the right level, maybe it’s that you have to pass by construction equipment and under scaffolding as you try to find the café in the back, maybe it’s that it is located just off the Fitchburg Cutoff Bikepath (if you happen to be riding to Fitchburg, this sounds like a bonus) alongside Alewife Reservation, maybe it’s that the staff is friendly and the café is just the right kind of busy. Whatever it is, its espressos are excellently pulled and served in a Gibraltar glass accompanied by seltzer water on a wooden platter, and its classic cinnamon coffee cake is seriously addictive. Seriously. Don’t say I...