TL;DR: As a long-time resident (15 years) of North Portland, I had higher hopes for John Street Cafe. The food was okay, but the service was a rough-go.

With family visiting in town and a new puppy at home, we decided to order breakfast with curbside pickup at John Street.

Upon arrival, I called per the curbside instructions and was told the kitchen was running late, "a few minutes." I waited 15 minutes and then went inside to check on the order. No line / not busy and was told it'd be another "few minutes." I asked if the order would be brought out curbside, to minimize out/in traffic (and curbside, contact-less was the selection on the online order), the checker said "sure" dismissively.

I waited outside another 20 minutes and returned again to check on order status. After another few minutes, the server saw me and then asked my name, again, and turned to get our order which was waiting on a table, "I guess they didn't bring it out." Again, the cafe was not busy, no one else waiting, no to-go orders waiting for pickup, other than mine.

Generally, I'm pretty sympathetic to those working in restaurants and service industry, and I try to not to make a hard job more difficult. But as a long-time professional, I recognize the importance of how you treat your clients. Every place gets busy (not the case here) and there's a big difference between a server apologizing for an expedition issue vs. a brush off.

I asked who was currently managing and the server pointed out the manager. I noted that this was a curbside / no contact that was 30+ minutes late. The manager nodded and no apology provided. Perhaps this was par for the course.

Upon getting home, the food was cold, but was good enough after reheating. Perhaps to-go / contactless isn't the way to go. I've heard good things about the food here. But a poor service experience leaves a bad aftertaste.

I'll continue to happily patronize other great North Portland breakfast eateries such as Posies Cafe, Stacks Coffeehouse, Madrona Hill Cafe, Cathedral Coffee, Grand Central Bakery, and Grindhouse Coffee, all of which provide great food and service in our community. It will be difficult to recommend John Street.