Jelly Cafe — Restaurant in Denver

Welllll.... I really wanted to love it, but let's just say Snooze doesn't have to worry about this place as competition. Pros and cons...cons first.

1. Absolutely the worst cappuccino I have ever experienced. Like seriously, McDonald's is better. I suspect very cheap beans, maybe a very burned roast? It was inedible even with lots of sugar. Went in the trash. Really need to up their coffee game.

2. This was an order for pick up, and let's say that the presentation was... lacking. The over easy egg was overdone, scrambled was overcooked, and the poached eggs were largely hardboiled. I was looking for some huevos rancheros type breakfast, but not finding that settled on a chili type of eggs hollandaise. It made promises of some kind of green chili flavor that it did not keep. It was a lot of chili powder, and nothing else. No nuance, just a red chili powder sauce, and too much at that, but wouldn't have had any flavor without. HINT:This is Colorado-- we want our Green Chili. Costco has a great brand that many other local restaurants use very successfully, buy a few jars and warm up it up, this isn't rocket science folks. Learn how to poach an egg and make hollandaise as well, while you are at it. Poached and hardboiled are different. I made concessions considering this was a pick up order, breakfast isn't easy to do pick up, I understand, but the poached egg should not be hardboiled. A year into a pandemic and your take out business is your main source of business, you need to do a better job.

3. The pancakes...I was hoping that the pancakes would shine...but they didn't quite hit the mark either. Very flat and... different. Not entirely bad, but no fluffiness or buttermilk flavor. I picture these as pancakes made by a Midwestern person who prides themselves on blandness and "thoroughly" cooking the pancake. They weren't awful, but they weren't great either.

4. Donut holes... Now these I expected to be delicious based on the flavor variety and it just seemed like a place called Jelly should have great donuts. If you like dense donut holes with some chew, this is the place for you. I will say, I was extremely grateful that the donut holes were not sickenly sweet as most donuts are these days, definite perk there. I did feel some lightness would be helpful though. I thought the jelly donuts etc. Would have filling on the inside, but I can see why they don't, way too dense.

5. Ordered 2 cheese Danish, but got 2 slices of orange bread/cake. It was a nice orange cake, just wasn't a Danish. Would have preferred a phone call to ok the substitution or a credit.

Pros:

1. Food was ready quickly even on a holiday (Valentines)

2. The toppings on the donuts were rather well done. The raspberry jelly was real raspberry, not that sickly gel garbage. The creme anglais was nice, I bit more vanilla and a pinch more salt to be able to actually taste it and I would give it a thumbs up. The lemon was interesting. Very thick, and I believe it was a pear base with lemon flavor-- a true lemon flavor and very tasty. The salted caramel was very good, but please a little paper cup maybe to dip in? All the caramel fell off, but it was good. Maple bacon was solid, not a lot of punch but the flavor was there.

3. Packaging appears to economy friendly and biodegradable, thumbs up to that!

All in all, I don't see myself returning based on this experience. Jelly is less of a greasy spoon than Denny's, but for the price, I would rather wait in line for 3 hours to get Snooze bc their food has the right flavors, is cooked to perfection, and the price is about the same. I am not a huge fan of Lucille's either (just not my fave flavor profile/style), but would choose Lucille's over Jelly despite the wait, and the location is essentially the same.

Sorry, Jelly. I wanted you to be great and was hoping for a good place close by, but until some serious quality standards are met, we will have...

This is for their Cap Hill Location:

Everything about our experience was ABSOLUTELY HUMILIATING and HORRIBLE! Their website says they are pet friendly but they are the complete opposite of this. I trusted what they announced on their website and brought my doodle. When I got there they said I couldn't be there with my dog and they guided me to their outdoor seating area. I assumed we would be sitting in the outside seating area where everyone else was, but instead they sat us on the street sidewalk, where they had 2 tables next to a homeless man that was doing chalk work on the sidewalk and yelling a whole bunch of slang. I didn't feel comfortable at all and was confused why we didn't sit in their outdoor seating area since at other restaurants they all have let us sit there. When they brought out the food, we saw an empty table inside the outdoor seating area so we moved our plates to sit inside. The waitress came out fast and started telling us we couldn't sit there because it was against Colorado law to have guests with dogs in their outdoor seating area. This seemed ridiculous to me so I told her this situation had never happened to me at other restaurants in CO. She was extremely rude and told us the 20+ places I have been to in Colorado didn't enforce the law but that Jelly did. She then tried forcing us to move back saying she would move our plates back and got her hands out to grab our plates from us. I told her I didn't want to move back and that I had lost my appetite from how they were treating us. I told her I couldn't eat the food anymore. She quickly snatched the food and we got up to leave. We couldn't believe how unprofessional they were. We stood at the corner of the street to figure out the new plans for breakfast and another of their waiters came out to start yelling at us that they had found accomodations for us and that we should be ashamed we ordered and not paying for the meals. It felt like he was trying to gaslight us when at the end of the day their accommodations were not very accomodating.

Anyway I called my husband on my drive back home and asked him if he knew about this colorado law that doesn't allow pets on outdoor seating areas. He looked it up and was as I had thought. They were completely BS'ing us about the whole dogs not being allowed in outdoor seating areas. They actually are and from what I had seen the layout requirements did accommodate for this. For anyone with dogs or without dogs, please don't come here, they are actually not dog friendly and are very unprofessional with how they treat customers or just normal people. Will not be coming to any of their...

I'm a huge fan of breakfast and brunch food. I had high hopes for this place based on the other reviews...which makes me wonder where these other folks eat, as there are cheaper and better places. Yeah, this place has a certain look and feel, and some may dig it, but we (yeah, my lady partner had the same unimpressed stance) both thought the meal was too expensive for the taste/items we received. The donut holes are not all they are cracked up to be...tasted too bready, and not nearly a good ratio of flavorings to dough . We ate half of each (did 5 flavors). I guess I look for a richer tasting sweet (she doesn't, but also was unimpressed). She had the avacado toast, she thought it would be a bit more tasty/unique based on the price and reviews...she was left hungry (and she has a small appetite). I had standard fair bacon/eggs/biscuit/potatoes. Hard to mess that up. Bacon was good...crisped well, tasted good. Eggs were cooked perfectly. Biscuit had an upcharge (didn't know this)...was rock hard, couldn't even finish it (stick with Denver Biscuit Company...or even McDonalds biscuit, at least it wont break your teeth). The potatoes...soft, not crispy. For the price of that dish....I sorta expected more. The guy bar tender was nice....he did a good job with service (minus telling me of the biscuit upcharge). Coffee was average. I don't like writing bad reviews...but I think there needs to be a few more balanced reviews for this place. After we ate, we went to Snarfs across the street to split a small Italian sandwich...that filled us up and as usual was an amazing sandwich. She never had one...and immediately...