Delightful Cafe

I love this place. It is so simple and down to earth. There’s nothing fancy about it but the people are friendly, the food is good and the prices cannot be beat. Personal favourite is the classic (and very bare bones) French toast (note: if you like maple syrup, bring a little with you). A clean and inexpensive meal so you can save your moola for Recordland or other boutiques in Inglewood.

They don’t have a menu here, they have a food encyclopedia! If you’re not sure what you want for lunch, chances are you can peruse the choices here and find something. From burgers to teriyaki to vietnamese subs, they have it.
I went with a standard phở (needed help getting over the flu) and it was pretty darn good, at least if not better than the Calgary average. Will be back a few hundred more times to try other pages on the menu.
Only downside was they are pretty understaffed during the lunch rush, so don’t expect to be able to tell your life story. But, on the other hand, they were darn efficient and it was clear most customers were happy regulars.

Delightful café is an interesting place. The prices are great, service wonderful. Décor is clean and bright. If you’re looking for something simple to have for breakfast, something you can make at home then look no further. If you want something special, something out of the ordinary then keep looking.
I had the breakfast with 2 eggs, toast, hash browns and sausage. The potatoes tasted boiled and had no flavour. Eggs were done just right and the toast… well. it’s toast. The sausage was just OK I guess.
Nothing to write home about but if you want something simple, cheap and quick then this greasy spoon is for you.
P. S. I was intrigued with the Vietnamese food being offered, will have to try that next time.

Delightful Café is more of a Vietnamese/​Chinese Restaurant than a café, but it is delightful!
It looks as if it is a converted coffee and donut store, which would explain why for years there was a sign the said «Delightful Donuts Café». This is completely unfounded speculation, but my guess is that new owners took over the existing donut business but knew how to do Vietnamese food, not donuts. It took them a while to get ride of the original sign, but eventually were able to cross some words out and became the Delightful Café.
Being of Tim Hortons-​esque donut/​coffee design on the inside, they have a counter and till that looks like you should walk up to order from, but there are no menu items listed behind the counter. Fooled you! You don’t need to order from the counter; just grab yourself a seat and they’ll hit you up with a menu.
They’ve got a huge menu of well over 100 items ranging from Vietnamese subs, to a whole page dedicated to Chinese food another page for Phở and then they’ve got a bunch of western foods and breakfast items like eggs and bacon.
I really have no idea what their specialty is. Is it really possible to specialize in over a hundred items? By looking at some of the baked goods, I didn’t think their western fair would be all that special, so I went with some Beef Phở (item #91).
It was really tasty and a good value! For $ 10 including a can of Dr. Pepper, I received a large portion with more than enough noodles and broth and a health amount of beef as well too. It’s served with a good chunk of lime, sprouts and basil, all of which were really crispy and fresh. It was as good as any phở going!

Great little diner in Inglewood. Breakfast, Chinese, Vietnamese and Western food. Just across the Starbucks with ample parking. Cheap and quick morning breakfast while you wait for some of the shops to open up nearby.

So random and delicious! We got and shared a beef bahn mi and a grilled pork and spring roll vermicell and a coke. The bahn mi was not the most authentic that I’ve ever had but it was still delicious! The service was good and quick. The woman (possibly the owner) was lovely. When I paid for my $ 18.65 tab with $ 60.65 (I needed 2 $ 20 bills) she gave me back $ 42. I thought it was wrong but didn’t think again. I walked over to sbux to get a coffee and when I sat down on the patio, she ran over to return my $ 5. So honest!

Neat and clean corner café, with a menu that ranges from diner classics to Vietnamese soups, subs and noodles and a few Western/​Chinese dishes for good measure.
Stopped for a quick Banh mi and springrolls last week. Flavor in the sub was good and the price was ‘aight, but the amount of sate beef and cilantro was a little below average. Made up for it though, with a nice crispy spring roll (even better when it’s shoved dirt-​ball style into the sandwich). Service was super fast and the room was bright, and very clean, with lovely orange formica benches.
I’m curious about the greasy spoon specialties: burgers, eggs, etc,. and the service was very friendly and cheerful, so I think I’ll be back.

This delightful place is always full of local folks for a reason. It’s quality food at a great price.
We live in the neighborhood and eat there or get take out at least once a week.
Whether you feel for noodles or burgers, they do it the best.

I personally love greasy spoons. You know normally what you’re going to get, a basically decent meal for an inexpensive price. There’s going to be very little artistry or science or whatever, just basically home cook quality food just like your mom or aunt used to make (providing of course that your aunt isn’t someone like Chef Connie DeSouza or Julia Child).
With this in mind, I decided to try out Delightful Café, a place I’ve passed by time and time again in Inglewood, but never once thought of trying out. So having a little time for breakfast, I though sure, what the heck, why not.
Well, first impressions first, I’m pretty sure this was probably some sort of independant doughnut shop in the 60s maybe, with the general décor pretty much unchanged except for a lot of pics of Bahn Mi sandwiches and lots of writing promoting their Phở on the side. When you enter, it really does look like something dating back to the 60s and 70s, a basic coffee shop and/​or diner, complete with counter seats and the suspicious senior citizen in the back trying to read his paper in peace in case some young’uns come in with their rock and roll and their hippety hop. Though as there was all of the vietnamese food ads, there’s what I think are a pair of vietnamese sisters who run the place. Their menus aren’t printed onto anything strangely enough, and instead they rely on photocopied brochures (like you would get for a take out menu).
From that, you can see a lot of the expected fare, such as burgers, fries, sandwiches and the like, but then, it takes a slightly odd turn with the addition of popular (western-​style) chinese food like egg rolls and sweet and sour pork, and then finally the Bahn-​mi menu (only 4, all satay based) and a decent selection of Phở and Vietnamese rice dishes.
Now being breakfast time, I stuck to the eggs and bacon deal, which for $ 6.50 was a not bad plate of food except for one annoying thing… the colour and texture of the eggs was incredibly white and watery. This indicated to me that the scrambled eggs had been mixed with a lot of milk, almost to the point of the proteins in the eggs were unbinding. This is an old cooking trick to make the eggs seem more in volume though a bit dangerous if the diner has Crohn’s or is lactose intolerent. I personally don’t mind too much since I usually make my own scrambled eggs (for myself) with a little milk (just to add some calcium to the mix), but to do it to this extent made it just awful. Worse, to have done that with no warning in case I was lactose intolerant or had Crohn’s … well, it’s just begging for a bad incident and I really should drop by there again just to warn them to at least label it on the menu or something.
Outside of that, there did seem to be the indication of regulars, and they had a stack of Calgary Sun papers at the cash so diners can read while eating. There was also a quaint display of pre cut slices of pie on plates and muffins and so on, so it seems like they have a regular crowd of sorts. I’d like to give them a 3-​star rating, but those eggs really turned me off, both in taste and as well as possible hazards to others, so I’m going to give a 2 for now, with the potential for a 3 in a future visit (as I’m curious to see how’s their Phở).
One interesting observation… Inglewood really has only 1 vietnamese restaurant, but at least 7 – 8 good to fantastic restaurants for breakfast (especialy considering that Kane’s Harley Diner is just next door!). In all honesty, the area can easily support another dedicated vietnamese restaurant, and even prosper given the areas growing influence and affluence. I think they would do way way better if they did focus that way instead of trying to be all things to all people. Just a thought.
#24 of Unilocal’s 30-​Day Review Challenge

Don’t expect any donuts here; think chinese food favourites, old-​school specials (denver sandwiches) Love the subs and the phở! Koo is the best. Cash only!