Cafe Devine

Café Devine is very much a local spot — it seems the sort of place where people who have known one another for years bump into each other and catch up.
Inside, it’s very simple and down to earth with painted wooden panelling round the walls which gives it a sort of cottagey look. Had it been lunchtime I’d have tried something from the special menu such as chicken and bacon carbonara or panfried chicken with garlic bread that suggests there is something beyond greasy spoon capability here.
Instead, as it was too early for that I just had coffee and found it a fine spot to sit down in peace for a while and figure things out in my notebook.

Café Devine is always a disappointment to me when I go. The food is always a little below what I wanted. I once came here and asked for a hamburger with peppered sauce and they told me they were out of hamburgers. This was a Saturday afternoon, how can they not have a hamburger? There are always a lot of specials on the boards and they change regularly, but true to form, it always tastes quite bad. This is a pity because the staff are friendly, polite and the prices are always very reasonable. There is a sandwich takeaway counter which is always nice and quite cheap so I tend to just stick to that. Their chicken and stuffing sandwich is huge, very tasty and only around £3 which is a bargain.

Totally agree with the last reviewer-​this place is an institution. Devine’s All-​Day Fry is famous in North Belfast. The name Devine is well known in these parts; it’s a chain of consumer businesses run by local entrepreneur Brendy Devine, everything from decorating and Christmas trees to the flower shop right beside the Devines’ Café. This is your typical greasy spoon joint; visit here if your looking for a much needed hangover cure.

If you’re suffering with that all too familiar dry mouth and banging headache, swirling belly and horrific flashbacks, then you know you need the ultimate North Belfast hangover cure — a fry up from Café Devine. It’s practically an institution in the area, well-​known and loved by the locals, who frequent it often in order to avail of the sausage baps, stonking big sandwiches, and scrummy fry ups. The staff are pleasant and decently down to earth, and the service is quick and honest. If it’s a nice day, (which is rare of course) you can sit outside at one of their little tables and enjoy watching the rest of the Antrim Road pass by. Really good place for a good honest fry up, and you can’t say fairer than that.