The Bridge Cafe — Restaurant in Upland

The Bridge is a unique experience for anyone going through Upland, Indiana. Unassuming on the outside, cozy inside. This is a perfect place for a cup of coffee when you can stay and hang out with a friend, but also works great for brunch, lunch, or take out. The menu, while in some ways straightforward, also has a flair to it. They advertise organic ingredients from their farm and things have a handcrafted feel.

On this visit my wife and I had our favorite sandwiches: A Green Goddess on wheat, and Chicken Salad on a croissant. These sandwiches come with Broad Ripple chips (from Broad Ripple, Indiana, go figure). There's other things we like on the menu but for lunch, these sandwiches are our go-to items.

They also have some very tasty drinks with their coffee shop (my favorite is iced chai) and often seasonal or special drinks that are fun to try out. Note: I also vote for larger drink sizes, as they basically have one size for everything. Even better than their drinks, in my opinion, are their bakery items: muffins, croissants, and pain au chocolat. These are consistently great and worth a drive over there on a Saturday morning.

This really is a fun place to visit, the food is good, and they make the most with their physical space to create an atmosphere that is welcoming. Also check out the handmade craft and gift items for sale from local artists (especially the Wallace Wire signs).

One thing to consider: if they are busy, it might take a little longer to get your order. This is handcrafted food made in a small kitchen, not fast food... Also, this premium food comes with a higher cost and so we see this more as a treat than a regular lunch place, considering our more frugal-than-many food budget.

Still, everyone needs to try out The Bridge for themselves, so if you haven't been here yet or it's been awhile, check out their current menu. There's a lot going on here that's...

Slow but friendly service. It has the "understaffed" vibe to it - workers are often (not always) hard to access because they're in the back prepping someone's meal. Be prepared to wait 5-15 minutes for a latte because chances are the staff will be have to work on something for someone else first. I have come here several times since their opening and this is a consistent issue, no matter what they say about changes in management made.

That being said, Upland doesn't have many options so The Bridge is an important part of the community. They have fresh ingredients (though they always seem to have inventory issues), the coffee is fair trade, and the food is good... mostly. The grilled cheese is hardly cooked, if at all, and falls apart (every time I've ordered it, though I finally gave up on it a couple months back, so maybe something has changed there?)... And it doesn't seem to matter how many times I ask for an extra hot latte, it always turns out just warm. The environment is nice and the pain au chocolate is to die for, assuming it's available when you get there.

In general the place feels like it needs someone with a business degree and experience to spruce up the general running of things. I understand this is typically an issue with new companies; it takes time to work out the kinks and get everything running smoothly... but it has now been two years and I haven't seen much improvement. Props to the friendly workers who have to constantly inform people of inventory issues - they're always so friendly! The issues with this place lie in management, not the...

We ordered the hot mocha and a hot cocoa. I didn't try the hot cocoa but was satisfied with the mocha. It was decent and the price wasn't bad, $10ish for three drinks. It had a weird flavor my husband said comes from a darker, better bean but I'm not a huge coffee nerd so I'm not really sure.

It was a cute comfy place to relax. My only complaint was the cloth chairs needed cleaned. We would have sat elsewhere but every other seat was taken, they were packed when we visited. Also their customers are not great if you have kids. They have a kids special and a little play area but I got glares from the college kids trying to study/play chess as soon as we entered with our 8 year old and 3 month old and they were actually super well behaved that day. Baby slept the whole time and big sister was full of questions but respectful with her noise level and stayed seated the whole time. Wish they had a drive thru so I didn't have to face public scrutiny for a cup of coffee! My kids go to South Elementary and I'd love a place to grab coffee in the morning after I've dropped them off that is local and not out of...