Lunch at Mayfield Bakery Cafe

Well, I told you I would get back to Mayfield to sample the wares beyond the bakery, which I love.  On this sunny Tuesday, we had the opportunity to go for lunch.  We had hoped to sit on the patio, but the shade made that a daunting prospect.  Once inside, the restaurant is handsome, with counter seating on the left side and on the right a combination of a long, brown leather banquette and tables at the windowside.  The space is light and airy with white-painted exposed beams and big windows all around. 

We entered, and waited for recognition from a hostess.  A girl that I presumed to hold that position was very involved with rearranging the menus.  A waiter or busser asked if we needed a table.  We replied yes, and then he tried to get some action out of the aforementioned hostess.  Still a bit flummoxed, she passed us off to another hostess who was able to seat us. Once settled at our table, which had white linens covered with brown paper, we took a look at the menus.  Our server came over quickly and we ordered drinks--an Arnold Palmer for Giselle and a Niner Barbera for us.  There was a good selection of salads, sandwiches and entrees including a dorado with green garlic that intrigued me, but I really wasn't in a fish frame of mind.

I settled on the Cobb Salad, which the server explained was 'deconstructed.'  I wasn't too concerned.  I figured that as long as it had all the essentials I could reconstruct it to my liking. Georges ordered the bavette steak sandwich on sourdough with blue cheese and tapenade on sliced sourdough. Miss G decided on the gruyere cheeseburger off the kids menu.  

After ordering we were presented with warm pull-apart rolls and a ramekin of sweet, creamy butter.  Like all products of the bakery, these rolls were delicious.  Crisp on the outside and airy within.  Yum.  As we sipped our wine and waited, we were able to sneak peeks at the other plates.  The turkey and gruyere sandwich on brioche was popular.  It was served with a small green salad.  Another repeat order was the rigatoni which featured three large meatballs and a homemade tomato sauce.  The pizza, pepperoni with yellow peppers and red onion, looked good.  The crust had a proper char and blistering.  I didn't to check out the oven, so I'm not sure if it was wood-fired or gas.  

After whetting our appetites with table-snooping, we were pleased when our food arrived.  My cobb salad featured a roasted chicken thigh, breast and drumstick that was well-seasoned. Completing the plate were bite-sized pieces of thick-sliced bacon, sliced avocado and lightly dressed butter lettuce sprinkled with blue cheese.  I prefer a creamy blue cheese dressing on my cobb salad but that's a personal quirk.  Mayfield's version was light and satisfying.  

George enjoyed the flavors of his steak sandwich, although he felt it was unevenly cooked--nearly rare in some sections and the requested medium rare in others.  Overall though, the dish had good flavors.  Giselle's burger was a little dry, but tasty.  I am not sure if that's because it was cooked through because it was a child's dish or someone was a little lax at the grill.  The accompanying pommes frite were crisp and salty.  

We could not resist the apple crostata with vanilla bean ice cream and we were not disappointed.  I was happy that Giselle was not interested because it left more for me.  The crust was flaky and tender.  While not a baker by an estimation, I am extremely (irrationally?) critical of pie crust.  Done right, I often enjoy the crust more than the filling.  So I was excited by Mayfield's efforts.  I'm going to again give credit to magic elves in the bakery.  They are serious about their craft.  And, the apples were cooked perfectly, yielding to the fork, but not mushy.  And the ice cream was creamy and luscious with an assertive (in a good way) vanilla bean flavor.  A perfect ending to our lunch.

My overall experience Mayfield is positive, with a gold star to the pastry chef.  I think the restaurant is still finding its footing and given the attention to detail, I believe they will succeed.  Sometimes it takes a while to figure out your neighborhood, and Town & Country is an odd mixture of Stanford students and staff, techies, moms and tots, and ladies who lunch. That's a wide swath to cover.  I expect to see adjustments in the coming months as they fine tune the concept.  That said, Mayfield is a welcome addition to Palo Alto and we'll be back.