Cafe Bernardo

Went for lunch and ordered the polenta with red sauce, sautéed spinach and grilled portobello mushroom. Food was good and consistent with the other times I’ve ordered the dish. Service was good although one person in our party did not receive their food until approx ten minutes after everyone else.
I guess my biggest complaint is that they don’t do enough to update their menu. It has been several months since I’ve been here and still the same menu. They really should consider changing it up a bit and offering updated items.

Tasty and happy. Four of us came for dinner on a weeknight, sat at a table on the bar side.
Salmon BLT: superb
Bang Mi: delightful. Its not spicy
Salad sampler: good choice for sharing
Seasonal pizza (bacon mushroom): very good
Loved the Wiki cocktail. You will too if you like sweet tropical pink drinks

The location is great and the food is A-​OK as Unilocal describes for a 3 star joint. We went in for brunch after my sister’s graduation, and everyone was happy with their orders. Seating is pretty cramped, and the café can become quite crowded on a late Sunday morning.

The Banh Mi is EXCELLENT! Well done, wonderful flavor, a great job for an «American» version.
Kids menu includes:
Grilled Cheese, Cheese Quesadilla, and Cheese Pizza.
My 8yr old son killed his full plate sized cheese pizza. My 5yr old son, had about 3 more slices of cheese quesadilla.
The hubby enjoyed his salmon BLT. I’m not sure why this place would have 3.5stars… Great service and quality foods here at Café Bernardo. We’ll def be back!!!

The Salmon BLT (which was recommended by the waitress) is really good! I had it served with a salad and it also came with a delicious pickle.
The menu is a little pricey but it’s because the ingredients are premium grade from local suppliers. I also had a bite of the Banh Mi sandwich and think this place is top notch with their food.
These guys know what they’re doing. Good food! Would definitely come back!

Awesome people! Awesome food! Awesome drinks! Austin and Erica have so much personality! Love going some place where i feel like I am a friend and not a stranger! We are here for one night and stayed at the Best Western which connects to this amazing place!
We travel often and are just so impressed and excited about having found this place!!!
Go!

We have been her twice now.
First time it was pretty good so decided to try it again.
It’s a pretty simple no frills type of establish which is typical Davis. The food is good, service is good. Eggs Benedict was perfectly cooked.
We ordered a single blueberry pancake it was oily and tasted burnt.
The only down side is they have a wood burning fire overnight for pizzas and well if you have asthma it’s not a good thing to be in an enclosed building with open firewood pit going. I had a pretty intense asthma attack this morning which pretty much put a damper on the rest of my day.

I have always loved Bernardo’s — it used to be one of my favorite places to have a nice cup of coffee and a good breakfast. This review is not to downplay their food. It truly is delicious and I enjoy it. However, their portion size over the past year has decreased so much that I swear I cannot eat there and feel full.
I love the service, I love the food, but, please, give us more of it. I had an omelet this morning the size of an iPhone. My serving of potatoes consisted of 7 small pieces. Bernardo’s, I love you. But until you increase your portions and actually give us what we pay for, I won’t be back.

I came here one day for brunch. You grab your own table whenever and order food at the counter. After that, they’ll give you a number and bring the food to you when it is ready. I had the egg’s Benedict and thought it was alright. As for drinks, you order with them or if you want water, it is self served. They have a little station in the corner for you to get your own drink.
There isn’t really any service here as all they do is bring you food/​drinks. Depending on when you come, it can be crowded or not. I came when it was crowded and barely managed to get a table.
After hours, this place becomes a bar. I came here and had the wiki once. It wasn’t bad at all.

Café Bernardo just lost a customer.
I went in today and ordered the salmon BLT (my absolute favorite) and asked if I can change the bread as their whole wheat sourdough is too hard for my taste. Today the lady at the register said no, they only have a certain amount of bread per day. Um okay. I walked out and will not be returning.

Food was great but customer service was horrible.
The counter hostess was rude and seemed miserable working there.
Guess what Café Bernardo, the way you treat your customers is just as important as your food.
There’s your tip that wasn’t put in the jar.

Great for breakfast, if only they served it longer :(Good place for brunch, but they serve quality food all day long. A little overpriced but a good family place. They friendliest service and really flexible with substitutions!

Located on the side of Best Western, this restaurant is in the perfect tucked away corner for a meal cooked to perfection either with friends or by yourself.
Service was fantastic! Waitress and bartender were great about getting me in and out in no time. I had my freshly made lemonade delivered pretty quick, and the food didn’t take long to arrive either. My meal was so delicious! Red Quinoa with Grilled Cauliflower was very filling. I ordered the small and it was more than enough. I also had salmon added to it to give it some extra protein. I felt it was the perfect meal for me!!! The flavors were done so well!!! This has got to be my new favorite spot to eat in town.
The nearest bathroom is right inside the lobby for Best Western. Clean, nice, and conveniently close. I was meeting friends later that evening but needed a stop to grab a bite and spruce up before having my get-​together. It was a great place to have a quiet meal that was both peaceful and nourishing to both the body and spirit. A fun find that most people would probably just walk on by.

This place will always hold a special place in my heart because on my 21^st birthday I was brought here for my first legal drink, the Davis Wiki. If you haven’t had a wiki wacky woo yet, you should probably stop what you’re doing and get one right now. If you’re wondering what the drink consits of it’s: Vodka, gin, rum, tequila, pineapple juice, OJ, cranberry juice, Bacardi 151 float. All I need is one and I’m done.
I’ve never had a problem with service here so that’s a huge plus. It’s not my favorite brunch spot, but the food is decent and reasonably priced. I usually get the Bernardo Benedict: Two poached eggs, Applewood smoked ham, housemade Hollandaise sauce, toasted rosemary bread; served with herbed potatoes
If you come at night they have a bar bites menu. I haven’t tried anything from this menu yet, it includes bar fries, sticky wings, nachos, a couple different pizzas, and some other yummy sounding stuff.

Nice and quiet… six days post Thanksgiving! We find ourselves at Café Bernardo’s because we know everything on the menu is made with the highest, quality ingredients (It is a Paragary Restaurant), one can choose from a great selection of wines and the customer service is always superb! Always! Tonight is no exception. Angelina and Jonathan took wonderful care of us (and everyone else in the Café too.). While sipping our wine and waiting for our order, watched the Manager help a six-​some of older customers settle in a cozy corner of the Café… a nice touch! That was sweet!

Long aware of the existence of the infamous Davis Wiki Wacky Woo, I only now, years after my undergrad time at UCD did I ever stop in. In my defense, I’ve been to the other Bernardo’s in Sacramento a few times.
Early morning breakfast with J., chose the Bacon & Avocado Omelette ($ 9.95), which had bacon and avo, Jack cheese, with herbed potatoes, toast and jam. Slow morning, took a little bit to take our order since ahead of us in line were some guys from the News & Review, I think. The manager came out to help make one of their drinks. Don’t they know I’m Unilocal Elite? Just kidding. Didn’t care for coffee or OJ, instead being a bad Californian and hydrating with some H2O. More than decent-​sized omelette, what blew me away was the cubes of delicious smoked bacon, abundant in every bite. Potatoes were okay (I like Crepeville’s better), but the toast reminded me of the kind of bread Tower Café uses for their French Toast which was yummy. Couldn’t tell if the strawberry spread was restaurant-​made or not. Didn’t want the pancakes, French Toast, or waffle this time since they were standalone and didn’t come with any protein. Might come back for lunch sometime as another option for downtown Davis.

I’ve been here before but I came back here for breakfast, since I was nearby and hungry.
I ordered the apple sausage scramble. Once the food came out, the portions were extremely small. The eggs were tasty, but the potatoes were not mediocre. I didn’t particularly care for the potatoes.
Service here was good though, the wait staff checks on you periodically and they are very nice.
The prices here are a little higher than I would like. I prefer other brunch/​breakfast places, but this will do if you’re near campus.

This review is solely for their bar! I’ve never actually eaten the food here.
Bernardo’s has become a lot less popular in the past 2 years and I don’t know why! The drink they are famous for, the wiki (wicki wacky woo if you want the full name) still tastes great compared to drinks at other bars. The wicki is also part of the Davis Trinity, which is a wicki from Bernado’s, the devastator from Bistro 33, and an FML from Red 88.
Tip when drinking a wiki: Don’t stir it after the bartender gives it to you! They pour 151 into the straw so if you stir it, it’ll get mixed into your drink. No bueno!
Be warned though, they have odd hours for the bar. They will close early a lot of times, depending on how busy it is and what time of the year it is (summer vs. when school starts).

Just wanted to give kudos to manager Austin. Always smiling, asking us how was everything, and overall friendly. We were walking up to the restaurant today and he saw us and already opened the door for us, welcoming us in.
Thanks for your service and for a great staff!
P. S. I believe the Davis location makes better Eggs Bernardo than the other location.

First and last time I ever come here. It’s just not worth the price and it gets crowded quickly. It’s overpriced for the portion and quality of food.
Ambience: I went this morning around 10AM. It was really really loud. No music to drown out the noise either, just a bunch of chatter. I got a bit of a headache after awhile. The table we sat at was a little sticky but otherwise it was fine. I think they have way too many tables lined at the side though, we sat at a table for two and I couldn’t push my chair out because the guy behind me was so close to me. I liked that the marker for a table was a giant playing card. Seemed like the servers on hand couldn’t see them very well though.
Service: Food is ordered and paid for up front, then you sit down. The girl was kind of rude, I didn’t like her attitude very much, but given the rush of people, I can understand why she was a little annoyed. There’s a chalkboard up behind the cashier with all the food and drinks available. Water refills are DIY nearby the cashier. Our food came out twenty minutes after we ordered.
Food: We ordered a pecan waffle and eggs benedict. Originally we wanted the french toast, but they ran out of brioche and were substituting with sourdough, so we passed on that. The pecan waffle just came out as one waffle. It tasted okay, pleasant crunch from the pecan redeemed it a lot. I kind of expected some sides but I guess not? The eggs benedict came out looking good, eggs on toast with some potatoes on the side. When I went for that satisfying fork poke though, nothing happened — the yolks were so hard, it was pretty much a hard boiled egg drowned in hollandaise sauce. The first yolk had a little yolk, and the sauce was decent, but I really had a problem with the way it was cooked. The meat was kind of tough too, not really a fan. Finally, the potatoes, while decently seasoned, were undercooked. So all in all, the food here was really unimpressive.
If the food doesn’t taste good, no amount of good service or ambience can redeem a restaurant. This place didn’t impress me on any grounds. There’s better places out there. I was so, so surprised at the flood of people that just kept coming in. Not coming back, I’d suggest you go to a different breakfast place in Davis.