Odd’s Café opens in West Asheville
There is a new home on Haywood Road. Surrounded by West Asheville’s popular restaurants, shops and music venues, Odd’s Café, which opened for business on Monday, April 28, hopes to provide a space that can be like a second home for customers. Odd’s owner Audrie Blomquist describes her new venture as her version of Cheers — the neighborhood bar in Boston “where everybody knows your name.”
Whenever she has moved to a new city, Blomquist reminisces, she has always sought out a café that would be a “place to be [her] home away from home” — where there is not only good food and drinks, but also a sense of community and belonging. With Odd’s she hopes to create that feeling for newcomers, locals and visitors with good products; a friendly, quirky staff; comfortable, varied seating options and vibrant art which she says is “the life of the shop.”
In addition to its daytime hours, the café is open evenings daily as well as late at night on weekends to draw in people who are taking an evening stroll or walking home after a concert or dinner out. The diverse menu features local baked goods as well as genuine New York bagels (made in Brooklyn where the water is famous for its unique bagel-making properties), Counter Culture coffee and loose-leaf teas.
A small-plate option, called the Odd Combination, allows guests to build their own mini meal with two choices from a selection of charcuterie, cheeses, hummus and fresh fruit and veggies. Each plate also comes with naan and grapes, so at $5.99, it’s a good choice for a light but filling lunch or dinner. Drink options include drip coffee, pour-overs, lattes, cold-brew coffee and a house-made, secret-recipe chai that makes for a soothing companion to any visit no matter the time of day. Local craft beer and chocolate desserts will be available soon.
The atmosphere at Odd’s is decidedly minimalist but comfortable. Windows and high ceilings make the space light, bright and airy. Pops of red from the lights, cups and saucers add color to the white-walled interior, as do displays of local artwork, which will change monthly.
The richly stained wooden tables come in various sizes for all kinds of gatherings, and a comfortable, plush seating area lends itself to group gatherings. There is an outdoor space as well, and a bar where customers can interact with the bartenders, as Blomquist chooses to call her baristas.
With its day and evening hours, fun staff and friendly atmosphere, Odd’s is a place that is, as its website says, “a little different, just like you.”
Odd’s Café is at 800 Haywood Road. Hours are 7 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 7 a.m.-late Friday and Saturday and 8 a.m.-9 p.m. Sunday. oddscafe.com
Too bad that a so-called local restaurant uses coffee from a vendor 220 miles away. Doesn’t Odd’s Cafe realize there are a number of local coffee roasters? I imagine it’s ignorance that’s to blame — after all the owners aren’t from this area and probably don’t know much about Asheville — so I’ll give them a chance. For a while at least.
But this is a little like opening a bar and serving beer from just Raleigh, Atlanta and DC.
Kinda sad, really.
You do realize that there is no such thing as local coffee? Vegetables, fruit, meat, dairy all for the most part can be procured within a reasonable distance from Asheville, but not coffee. The closest place to get coffee is the San Luis Potosí state in Mexico which is roughly 1766 miles away. What’s the difference where it’s roasted? It still has to TRAVEL to get here.