The Country Cafe
The historic Central Market House in downtown York, PA, is home to more than 70 vendors, including bakers, delicatessens, butchers, farmers, and artisans. Whether you are shopping at the Central Market House, or just planning to meet with family, friends, or business associates for bite to eat, you would be hard pressed to find a better stop than The Country Cafe. Opened July 25, 2006, by Debbie Reid and Kim Potter-Druck, a mother-daughter team who came to York from Ohio 8 years ago. The Country Cafe has enjoyed much success as a result of its good food and affordable pricing. The restaurant seats 57 people, both in the cafe at tables and at a small counter, and in the Market House at bistro-style tables, and is able to accommodate small groups.
Debbie has been cooking since the age of 13. She has done catering and has baked cakes and desserts. "Cooking is my passion," she tells me." I go home and cook for family, neighbors, friends, whomever. I have been working with restaurant food and beverage for about 30 years, so I have extensive experience with this." I asked where she received her training. She responded, "I trained in the restaurants where I worked, but mostly with my grandma and mom. Everything is made from scratch, so comfort food is my strongest background. The catering I did was upscale, though. I enjoy making all kinds of food, but there is something special about comfort food--chicken, gravy, chicken pot pie...."
Debbie received her catering experience while in Ohio, and her food and beverage management experience at such places as a country club in Ohio, Autographs in York, PA, and an assortment of other establishments for a total of 20 to 25 years, so she is not a newcomer to the hospitality industry. Debbie has, therefore, set out to provide quality for her customers at an affordable 
price. She also wants to know what appeals to the customers tastes rather than sticking to a stagnant menu. To accomplish this, The Country Cafe uses daily and weekly specials to find out what their customers want most. "We test something new out on Thursdays. [Today's experimental dish is cinnamon sugar sticks] to get the customers' opinions. By playing around in the kitchen, we get something different, something unique that you can't go elsewhere to get. I try to make something each week that's special." In the near future, the restaurant is going to try a cutomers' pancake flavor special with a prize that is sure to be a real winner. Another great example of the restaurant's meeting the market demands is that Debbie and Kimmy had never heard of crabcakes before moving to York. Rather than finding a single recipe and sticking with it, Debbie experimented with a number of preparations for a few days before perfecting her own recipe. "The difference is that I broil it so its healthier for our customers to eat," she comments.
The Country Cafe takes advantage of being in the Central Market House by purchasing as many of its supplies from market vendors as possible. Meats are bought fresh from the butcher located right outside of The Cafe's door. A variety of farmers' stands are only yards from the restaurant as well. This helps to ensure that their customers are receiving the freshest, highest quality foodstuffs available. Even the eggs can be purchased in the Market.
When asked about the restaurant's approach to hospitality, Debbie adamantly replies, "I have always told all of the girls to treat the customers like you want to be treated. When the customer walks through the door, we want you to feel like you walked into grandma's."
I asked Debbie to pick out her house specialties. She points out that, for breakfast, the Breakfast Bowl and the French Toast would get her vote since both are her personal recipes, made like no other. For lunch, her chicken pot pie and breaded pork tenderloin sandwich with onion rings (an Ohio favorite) are the two that she would choose. She also let me know that she makes all of the desserts herself, which would probably qualify all of them as house specialties in my opinion.
Debbie adds, "If anyone is new to the area or hasn't been downtown, the must come to the Central Market. It's great to have such great products at our fingertips. We use fresh produce and meats. This lets us prepare foods with the freshest products and the highest quality. We know our ingredients are of a fresher quality and not frozen and sitting around like a lot of our competition around town."
The Experience
I arrived at The Country Cafe at 11:30 AM to find the restaurant busy with its lunch crowd. Fortunately, there was a table available, so I grabbed a seat. The menus are kept on the tables so that customers can easily begin the process of selecting from the long list of choices divided between breakfast and lunch selections. Breakfast, I noticed, is served all day long. This caught my attention since I had missed my "most important meal of the day." While I was perusing the menu, my server arrived, remembering me from my only visit to the restaurant two months ago, and asked what I would like to drink. I asked for one of the restaurant's "bottomless cups of coffee" and a glass of water.
Reading the menu, I decided to order from the breakfast menu, selecting the Breakfast Biscuit Bowl, described as a "Buttermilk biscuit made into a bowl filled with scrambled eggs, choice of cheese, sausage, hash browns, and toped with sausage gravy." This sounded like a heart attack special, but that surely meant that it would taste delicious I reasoned.
My server returned with my coffee, served in a cup large enough to swim in, water, and a plate with two cinnamon sugar sticks. She explained that the cook was trying out a new recipe today and that the restaurant was serving complimentary cinnamon sugar sticks in order to get customers' opinions on the confection. I figured that they would go well with my coffee and thanked her for the treat, then I placed my order, choosing pepper jack cheese for the Biscuit Bowl.
The Country Cafe is decorated with handmade crafts of all kinds, ranging from wooden stars, to wooden birdhouses, to wreathes, to name a few, each of which is for sale. The windows that fill the walls of The Cafe allow plentiful light to fill The restaurant, giving it an open, friendly feel. The tables seem to be situated too closely together, however, making it a bit difficult to move around. This is simply a problem created by the size of the room in which The Cafe is situated. For this reason, extra seating has been placed, bistro-style, in the Market House.
The servers are in constant motion, back and forth between the kitchen and the tables, filling coffee, taking orders,
and serving food. You would expect a more relaxed atmosphere for them in such a small restaurant, but they are obviously dedicated to the provision of high quality customer service. They are all smiling. One of the servers, I note, is Kim Potter-Druck, a co-owner of The Cafe, showing that this is a real hands-on operation.
I tasted my coffee, added some Splenda, and tasted it again. Perfect. Next, I tasted a cinnamon sugar stick. This was a light, flaky
Customers of all sorts surrounded me--families, couples, mothers with their toddlers, jurors from courthouse across the street, etc. The restaurant obviously appeals to people from all walks of life. I could see an early morning or lunch business meeting being held here at one of the larger tables, too.
My lunch/breakfast soon arrived in a large, deep bowl. The meal itself was off white and brown with no attempt at improving presentation. The aroma, however, was marvelous. I tasted the thick concoction with great anticipation. The biscuit crust was light and fluffy; the eggs were scrambled dry; the sausage had a different, but very pleasing flavor to it; the pepper jack cheese was spicy; the hash browns were potato-ey and crisp; and the sausage gravy was cream-based with real butter rather than grease-based, and peppery. The overall flavor was delicious, spicy on my tongue, and a pleasure for my palate. What is more, the portion was huge. Apparently, The Cafe had no intention of allowing its customers leave hungry or thirsty. I had just had my coffee refilled, and would probably float away if I tried to drink it. Finally finished my meal, I was more than full, not having wanted to waste any of my meal. Of course, I enjoyed absolutely every bite, too.
Here is where I get to grade my dining experience. I grade on 5 factors: Atmosphere, Service, Presentation, Taste, and Value. These areas are scored on a 0 to 10 scale with 0 being the lowest and 10 being the highest.
Atmosphere: 8.5 The tables sit too close together and the restaurant itself feels a bit small due to, well, the small size. This establishment would do well to look into expanding its operations in order to handle its popular business and expand its clientele. The decorations are appealing and the fact that there is no smoking allowed because of The Cafe's being located inside of The Central Market House contribute greatly to the high level of comfort when dining.
Service: 10 The servers could not have buzzed around more had they been bumble bees. Watching them, it was obvious that they all made a point to keep their customers more than satisfied with their service, the food, and the hospitality offered. My server was a tremendous example of this, having even remembered me from my only visit to the restaurant two months ago. She made me feel comfortable and welcome.
Presentation: 8 The food I ordered was served without any fanfare. There was no color to my meal, other than the deep, rich brown of my coffee. This did not detract from the flavor of the dish, but it did not provide any eye appeal, either. The bowl was very large and deep, though. That did portend a large portion size which prepares the diner for a big meal.
Taste: 10 I was unsure what to expect when I ordered my meal, never having heard of the Breakfast Biscuit Bowl before, probably since it is a Country Cafe creation. The description on the menu sounded appealing (and hazardous to my health;) however, I could not imagine what it would taste like. I was most pleasantly surprised by the meal that greeted me. The combination of flavors and textures was amazing. Finding that there was no grease used in making the sausage gravy allowed my mind to rest a wee bit when I thought about my cholesterol levels. And the peppery flavor combined with the fluffy texture of the eggs and biscuit contrasted with the crunch of the hash browns sent me over the edge. This dish was pure pleasure to eat.
Value: 10 To say that I received more than my money's worth for this meal would be an understatement. I spent 2.5 hours parked in the parking garage across the street from the Central Market House while I ran some errands and had lunch at The Country Cafe. My parking bill was more than my lunch cost me including tip. Ladies and gentlemen, I ate an enormous meal, swam in a vat of bottomless coffee, and spent less money than it cost to park in a city parking garage for 2.5 hours, and the parking in York, PA, is not that expensive. I dare you to beat that kind of value and receive the quality meal and service that I received here.
Open Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday from 7AM to 2PM
Special Events are held on Sundays, i.e., Lance Armstrong fund raiser, March of Dimes, Theresa Fogelman Foundation, etc.
Carry-out is available for the entire menu.
Daily and weekly specials.
Reservations not required, but will take them if requested. Otherwise the restaurant will do its best to accommodate small groups.
The Country Café |
17 May 2007