Cafe Voilà in Downtown Portland

Cafe Voilà was opened in 2004 as a quick breakfast and gourmet lunch cafe for downtown business people and shoppers. The intention of owners Chef Tamara Kay and Jonathan Goodrow was to provide delicious gourmet food that was affordable enough to eat everyday. Cafe Voilà has developed a loyal following of Portland foodies who appreciate real, made-from-scratch seasonal food and an ever-changing menu.

Cafe Voilà is located on the corner of SW Washington and SW 9th, Cafe Voilà is providing gourmet breakfast treats, Italian Illy coffee and espresso, over 20 rare teas from around the world, and our own gourmet sandwiches, entree salads, daily changing house-made soups, tossed to order green salads, and a chef's special entree every day.

To receive our weekly menu with our Daily Chef's Entree, made-from-scratch Soup, and our toss-to-order Salad, you may request a weekly e-mail or faxed menu by sending your request to executivechef@voila-catering.com. Our everyday Menu for April 2008 includes:

Breakfast Treats: Spiced Carrot Bread, Lemon Cornmeal Bread, Cherry Chocolate Coffee Cake, Rosemary Scone filled with Apricot Jam, Lingonberry Jam filled Scone

Sandwiches: Turkey Breast, Brie, & Rosemary Mayonnaise; Herbed Yellowfin Tuna; Proscuitto, Mozzarella, & Arugula Baguette; Italian Egg Sandwich; Chimichurri Beef Sandwich; and Ham & Dijon Baguette

Deli Salads: French Lentil Salad; Spring Asparagus & Orzo Pasta Salad, Chickpea & Roasted Red Pepper Salad; and Andalusian Calamari Salad

Deli Specials: Salmon Coulibiac with Caper Dill Sauce; Puttanesca & Ricotta Cheese Lasagna; Black Forest Ham, Fresh Thyme, & Gruyere Cheese Tart; Artichoke & Feta Cheese Tart

Composed Entree Salads: Classic Turkey Cobb; Garlic Chicken Caesar Salad; NW Cranberry, Walnut, & Bleu Cheese Salad; Caribbean Chicken Pepita Salad; French-Inspired Tuna Salad Nicoise; NW Smoked Trout & Apple Salad

Sweet Desserts: Bittersweet Chocolate Truffle Brownie; White Chocolate & Pistachio Cookie; Apple & Oat Bars; Lemon Ricotta Bars; German Chocolate dipped Peanut Butter Cookies, Bittersweet German Chocolate Chip Cookies

Cafe Voilà is open Monday thru Friday from 7:30 am to 6pm.

Cafe Voilà

901 SW Washington

Same Day Call In Cafe Orders: 503-595-5606

Voilà answers that eternal question, ‘What’s for lunch?’ "If you work downtown and you haven’t been yet to tiny Cafe Voilà, you’re in for a treat or, actually, quite a few treats!

Open for breakfast and lunch, Monday through Friday, Voilà offers a variety of sandwiches, composed salads and baked goods....The menu changes weekly....There’s also both a salad of the day and a soup of the day. On a recent Thursday, I ordered the chef’s lunch and received a tender and rich, slightly spicy, braised beef tamale. (Other entrees that week included a white bean and vegetable cassoulet, and roasted lamb with garlic mashed potatoes.) The tamale was accompanied by a tasty, mixed green salad sprinkled with sunflower seeds and dressed with a creamy avocado dressing. The soup of the day, tomato-lime with crispy slivers of fried tortilla floating on top, was super. Other soup choices that week included split pea with ham, cauliflower with saffron, and leek with chamomile. Salad options included spinach with garlic croutons and basil vinaigrette and fennel with Parmesan dressing. I also tried a beet salad with cucumbers and dill that packed a nutritious punch. Save room for dessert. The apricot coconut bar was supersweet, soft and scrumptious. The cookies are great, too — I’ll be back for another crispy white chocolate and pistachio.

The food at Voilà is gourmet, but the spot is not. Order at the counter, and a friendly worker will call your name when your food is ready. Get your own silverware and water if you want to eat there. The cafe can get pretty crowded — a lot of customers get their food to go. Another nice thing about Cafe Voilà is that it’s so affordable. Going out to lunch can really add up in a week. Here the entrees are all about $7, sandwiches are mostly $6, and salads and soups are $2.75 to $4.50. Even if you don’t work downtown, Cafe Voilà is worth a visit." The Portland Tribune, Feb. 15, 2008, By Liz Colie Gadberry

Cafe Voilà: " Fellow urban workers, it's time to kiss your bland lunch rut goodbye. You're going to want to thank somebody for opening this sunny new lunch spot while you're moaning over a mouthful of drip-off-the-bone tender lamb shanks or devouring a cup of the elegantly flavored yet scandalously creamy salmon-packed chowder. You can pay your respects, not just to Cafe Voilà's talented chef/co-owner, Tamara Kay, and her partner, Jonathan Goodrow, but also to the City Club of Portland. When the local meeting meisters moved their home base uptown to the Pittock Building, clubbers begged its favorite upscale, seasonally obsessed caterer, Kay and Goodrow's Voilà Catering, to fire up the stove for downtown's hungry masses. Now the just-opened Cafe Voilà stocks a packed lunch case with thick strata of tall sandwiches, tamales, tarts, innovative salads, and daily vegetarian and carnivore-minded surprises. (Pssst--former cookie baker Kay also makes her own helluva German-chocolate chipper.)" Willamette Week,. November 2004

Cafe Voilà: " This adorable little downtown cafe will endear you with its sincerity and delicious high-quality food. Their inventive soups rotate daily recently they served a butternut squash with pancetta and a white bean and vegetable soup zestified with pesto. Order a cup or bowl with one of their sandwiches (like goat cheese and tomato or pecan chicken salad), fresh mixed green salads, or deli salads. I couldn't pass up their duck, wild rice, and cranberry salad creation, which, paired with the bean soup, represented nearly every food group. Next time you're downtown, give this place a try--the owner will thank you, and you'll undoubtedly be back." Portland Mercury, December 8, 2004

Cafe Voilà: "If you haven't yet stumbled across this modest downtown cafe, make it your business to seek it out and you will instantly become a happier lunch-goer. This is thanks to caterers Tamara Kay and Jonathan Goodrow, who made the retail leap with Cafe Voila last fall. In addition to daily changing homemade soups, thoughtful salads and sensibly sized entrees, this clean and bright cafe presents a half-dozen sandwiches, savory pastry pockets and inch-thick chewy cookies -- all at prices that are easy to stomach.

The chow: A slablike sugared scone filled with black currant jam or a wedge of sour cream coffeecake make for a sublime morning nosh or afternoon pick-me-up, and slender bacon-cheddar or brie-chive cheese tarts also pull double duty as breakfast or lunch. Hot entrees range from molasses-glazed pork loin with onion polenta to vegetable cassoulet, and sandwiches can be as straightforward as turkey and brie with rosemary mayo or as uncommon as salmon Coulibiac. Essentially, it's punched-up comfort food, both healthful and playful, similar to the fine fare at the Daily Cafe.

Real deals: The three-salad plate for $5 matches the tossed salad du jour -- shredded cabbage and carrot with lightly creamy lemon dressing or romaine with pepitas and queso fresco, for example -- with your choice of deli salads, such as almond couscous or sesame soba noodle. Sandwiches and entrees are between $5 and $7. Hangout factor: Southeastern exposure illuminates this corner storefront throughout the day, making it a happy place to lunch with a friend. Seating is limited but to-go orders are prepared in a flash. Liquids: Illy coffee, loose-leaf teas and gourmet Izze sodas (try the pear). What's half-baked: It's a great destination if you're on foot, but parking nearby is a crapshoot, and it's not open on weekends -- yet." Christina Melander, The Oregonian, Friday, April 22, 2005

Cafe Voilà: "Nestled up against the City Club of Portland, Cafe Voilà is largely undiscovered. Which is a shame, because it serves up one of the best lunch deals in downtown. The Cafe offers a different entrée each day of the week: weekly menu changes keep the mix fresh and seasonal. And with almost all the entrees staying below $7- juicy pork loin, tender lamb, flaky salmon, beautifully glazed chicken – you may end up here every lunch hour. Even quotidian lasagna gets dolled up with a spicy puttanesca sauce. But be forewarned: if you don’t come early, your favorite entrée might be gone." Portland Monthly Magazine, May 2005

BEST BITES: Cardamom-ginger shortbread from Cafe Voilà - "Psst," a co-worker whispered, shoving a white paper sack under my nose. "The shortbread is back." This ain't no crummy, pie-crusty cookie. This is a lunchtime addiction. Cardamom and bits of candied ginger lend Voila's square-cut gems a unexpected spicy, heady flavor while coarse crystals of Demerara sugar give the heavy, pliable treat a playful bit of crunch. Think of it as a bite of Scottish pastry chased with a swig of Chai-chewy Chai. After a second mouthful, you won't be thinking, period. (KC) Wilamette Week 2006

Cheap Eats - Cafe Voila: "Voilà Catering's sunny gourmet cafe turns downtown workers' bland lunch rut into an urban food odyssey: City Club members moan over white-china specials like drip-off-the-bone tender lamb shanks, while newspaper hacks gossip over cups of scandalously creamy salmon-packed chowder. Check the chalkboard for daily vegetarian and carnivore-minded surprises, but trust in the cafe's drool-worthy lunch case, packed with tall sandwiches, tamales, tarts and innovative salads. Save your pocket change for chef and co-owner Tamara Kay's spectacular baked goods, but hands off that last square of chewy, spicy cardamom-ginger shortbread -it's all mine." Kelly Clarke, Willamette Week, March 20, 2005

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jgoodrow@voila-catering.com