Roba!Dolce

Roba!Dolce
178 Angel Street (corner of Thayer St. and Angel St.)
Providence, RI
(Visit their website for other locations)

This is a fun little place near Brown University. I didn't realize that this was a chain store because it was so much like just a little cafe that catered to the college and tourist crowd. At least in the case of the Providence store, the service was very good. Enter the cafe and you are greeted by "Welcome to Roba!Dolce!"

The store offers a wide variety of drinks, meals, and desserts although it is primarily a cafe so you're going to get the most choice in the drink realm. For lunch though, they had a special Penini with turkey (or ham), American cheese, tomatoes, red onion, and Balsamic vinaigrette. My dining companion and I topped that off with some coffee, espresso, and two desserts: a raspberry pie and a chocolate covered (and lathered) cream puff. Pretty good overall. I would say the atmosphere in this store makes it worth the visit.

Metropolitan Bakery and Cafe

Metropolitan Bakery & Cafe
4013 Walnut St.
Phildalphia, PA
(Check out their website!)

this chain of Pennsylvania bakeries is a fine establishment if you want a good pastry, cup of coffee, or a sandwich. I'm not sure if each of the branches has a different menu but the one I tried in University City was pretty good. The menus are not extensive but they offer a pretty good selection. They do breakfast bagels and toast and salads but I was in the mood for lunch. I ordered the roast beef panini and this came with grilled onions, smoked Gouda, and Dijon mustard. A fresh mixed green salad came on the side with balsamic vinaigrette. All items tasted very good.

My dining companion had the roasted red peppers panini and this was served the marinated artichokes, goat cheese, and black olive tepenade. Generally I don't care for goat cheese but the mix of flavors really blended well. She also had the lemon vinaigrette on her salad and that had a zesty taste to it as well.

One complaint though. The panini were too crispy for my taste. Though my dining comrade tells me that the panini was well done as it wasn't greasy, I have to disagree. The crispy bread did a number on the inside of my mouth and I'm still feeling the scratches.

Mantra - Entree

Mantra
122 South 18th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
(Visit their website!)

The salmon fillet sandwich is a real treat. I was afraid that the bread roll would be too tough and hard but I was pleasantly surprised. My dining companion could not finish the sandwich, so I had almost half to myself. The salmon is well cooked and was neatly wrapped in the roll with greens, green chili peppers, and cilantro. There was also a light dressing that I couldn’t quite identify but it complimented the meal. We had a side order of sweet potato fries, which was topped with a sweet and hot sauce. One problem with order: we were told that we had a choice of greens or fries or something else. My companion ordered the sweet potato fries but when we got the check we found that there was an additional $2.50 charge for them. What’s up with that?