Description
20th Century Cafe was conceived by owner and chef Michelle Polzine out of
years of hard work in front of the oven, thoughts about food, old movies, and
drunken discussions about the future (and the past). Searching through
vintage cookbooks and traveling through the cites of Vienna, Budapest, and
Prague brought tremendous inspiration to the creation of San Francisco's own
little grand cafe which opened in the spring of 2013.
The menu draws heavily from over twenty years of cooking and baking
experience, as well a love of California's produce. Nestled on a sunny corner
in Hayes Valley, the early 20th century building once owned by famed
cartoonist R.L. "Rube" Goldberg is now home to all these ideas and many more.
Before I became the medium for your grandmother’s kiffles, your auntie’s
linzer augen, or your pappa’s pierogi, I had to get through SFO airport
security...
“How many bags will you be checking?” asks the attendant at bag-check. I have
two suitcases, one carry-on, and a couple of hat boxes.
“Two,” I reply and pass her the first of the suitcases. She tags it and sends
it off to Prague. I pass her the second bag, which she sets on the scale.
“I’m sorry, this bag is over the limit,” she says. “I beg your pardon?”
“Your bag,” she replies, a hint of irritation in her voice. “It’s too heavy.
The weight limit is 50 kilos.” My face turns red. Why would anyone design a
suitcase that could so easily fit more than 70 pounds of clothes?
Dear reader, how can I explain? After collecting vintage clothing for over 25
years, I had amassed a fairly respectable closet of beautiful old clothes,
and by fairly respectable, I mean my wardrobe has its own room in my
apartment. The objective of this trip was to remain glamorous while stuffing
my face with every schnitte, kuchen, and torte I could get my fat forints
around. All of those years, watching Carole Lombard and Myrna Loy, with their
innumerable, overstuffed steamer trunks, and nothing but a well-dressed dog
to carry on the train platform: this was how I envisioned the start of my
voyage to Mittel Europe!
I’d chosen each outfit very carefully, including some larger sized garments
for the assault I was planning on my waistline, making sure I had all of the
proper accessories and foundation garments. But there was a nod to economy! I
had limited myself to only four hats, which I ingeniously fit into two hat-
boxes, and squeezed my jewelry case into one of those! I fit the rest of my
loot into two suitcases: unfortunately, I’d forgotten I was taking a 757 and
not the Orient Express, and now, here I am with my knickers showing.
I open up the large suitcase, the scent of mothballs and Chanel wafting out.
The bag-checker stares at me. I look at my husband, Franz. Franz is normally
a very gentle man, but he is not being very reasonable at this turn of
events.
I start pulling out shoes, figuring these to be the heaviest things, and
stuffing them into Franz’s suitcase. I give her the bag, laughing nervously.
It’s 2011, and it seems that a sense of humor in an airport has gone by the
way of steamer trunks and porters. “Still over.” My ears are now as red as my
face and my heart is racing. Two more tries, and a lot of shoes later, I get
the weight down to the requisite 50 kilos. We head straight for the bar to
catch up with our traveling companion, Franz’s brother, Ben. A couple of
drinks to settle our nerves and we’re on our way to the pastry promised land!
Armed with Rick Rodgers’ Kaffeehause: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic
Cafes of Vienna, Budapest, and Prague, I choose our first stop: Cafe
Imperial. I’m wearing my favorite 1930’s knit jersey dress (very bulky, for
those of you still besmirching my packing technique), hat, gloves, and a silk
coat with a fur collar. We step inside: the entire cafe is covered with the
most amazing Art Nouveau tile work that I have ever seen. The pillars, the
walls, the floors! There are beautiful tile murals set in more tile! The
ceiling is all tile! In danger of spoiling my makeup in the face of this
beauty, I dab my eyes with my handkerchief, take a few deep breaths and head
toward our table, but something stops me dead in my tiled tracks.
The pastry case! Filled with both familiar and unexpected sweets, and its
marble top, covered with glass and silver cake stands, holds even more
unfamiliar, unpronounceable wonders. Unable to form words in even my native
tongue, I am still to be spared. This cafe culture, so civilized, and so
merciful to the novice; one simply needs to point, nod, and wait for the
magic to appear. My companions stop me after a great deal of this pointing
and nodding, reminding me that this is the first of many stops.
The desserts, among them, Medovik, Esterhazy Torta and an apple strudel not
so unlike the one I’d been struggling to create back home, arrive on gold
rimmed china, with real silver-ware. Our coffees come, suitably dressed to
compliment their companions, on little silver trays, with a demitasse spoon
and a tiny glass of water on each. As Franz, Ben and I sit there in a
caffeinated, sugary stupor, sipping our coffees and tasting these time-tested
treasures, things start to come together. It is at this moment the seeds for
what has become 20th Century Cafe, my little grand cafe in San Francisco’s
Hayes Valley neighborhood, were planted. After a career spent working as
pastry chef in other people’s kitchens, I wanted to make a place of my own,
one that will give you just this experience: a little moment of carefully
crafted time-travel, with sugar on top.