Oakland - Saint Anna Cafe Shop (HK style coffee shop)?

Question

So has anyone been to St. Anna Cafe Shop on 8th in Oakland? 

Dave MP was reporting about Prince Cafe in SF and someone mentioned Oakland had a similar place.
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/358480

Are there any other of these types of restaurants in the Bay Area? Do they all serve borscht? What's up with that? 

Sorry, this topic might be discussed to death on the board, but it was the beet soup mention that woke me up. 

St Anna Cafe Shop

326 8th St
Oakland, CA 94607
(510) 893-1238

Answer

Went there a few times several years back... it was pretty standard HK western style food at the time.

Answer

Thanks, Melanie & S U. 

I reading about those places on the board I was just thinking cheap Chinese food ... didn't realize the menus were quite that eclectic. 

Of course, now I'm interested and asked a little on the General Topics board. 
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/358642

I feel an informal crawl coming on to scope some of these places out.

Answer

Saint Anna is great. Used to go there when we lived in Oakland. Definitely one of the better HK style cafes around in terms of food and value.

Other places I really like:
Denny's Cafe in SF (on Geary - not the chain)
Broadway Bistro in Burlingame - it has a wider variety of food

T-28 (SF), S&E (SF), and D&A (SF & Oakland) are a few other places. They're all ok.

Answer

Yesterday I grabbed lunch @ Cafe 88 in the Plaza, downstairs from Peony & Sushi Zone. We ordered a bowl of wonton noodle as well as an order of baked beef tongue (subbing spaghetti for rice). On a whim we also got half a roast duck from the counter. Roast duck was of course excellent, since they come from Peony's kitchen upstairs which has the capacity to properly execute roast duck (for those who don't know, both establishments have the same ownership -- I think they wanted to open a "short order" place for those who don't want to wait for dimsum). This was my second time ordering baked dishes at Cafe 88; and although this time around the sweetness in the dish was toned down to half of what it was last time (I think I'd ordered a seafood bake last time, or was it pork chop bake?) it was still too unbalanced and weird for my taste. Note to self: no more orders of sweetened baked dishes here. At least the tongue was cooked till tender and on the whole it wasn't bad... but I just can't get over the weirdness of cheese, cream, and sugar.

Wontons were pretty standard, with firm filling of shrimp and pork. There was a bit of a wait for seats, and then my baked dish came out about 10 or 15 mins after we'd ordered. However, the wonton noodle took another 20-30 mins... I think the kitchen consolidates orders and cooks a huge batch of noodles all at one time. I had a seat that faced the kitchen area, and the staff left the door open so I got a "free show" of kitchen goings on. Kitchen looked quite clean compared to most other Chinatown kitchens.

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Oakland - Saint Anna Cafe Shop (HK style coffee shop)?

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