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The cafe—which relocated over the summer to the crusty stretch of Milwaukee I happen to inhabit—is staffed by a maximum of two people, no matter how busy it is. That’s two people to punch in orders on the ol’ iPad, take money, make the coffee drinks, and cook the food, i.e., scramble eggs, heat up slices of quiche, press the panini. The only time there are not two people behind the counter is when there’s only one person there to perform the aforementioned tasks. I had stress dreams for a week after watching a gangly twentysomething try to go it alone while an increasingly agitated Sunday-morning crowd—en route to the Logan Square Farmers Market, no doubt—gnashed their teeth and rolled their eyes. (I should mention that, other days, the place is dead and none of this is an issue.)
It’s possible that La Farine’s front of the house operates a little bit like it’s an afterthought because it is a little bit of an afterthought. La Farine is a wholesale bakery. A huge one. Owner Rida Shahin apparently relocated it to Avondale from its previous space in Noble Square to increase baking capacity by 300 percent. La Farine’s wholesale clients have include the Four Seasons hotel, the InterContinental Chicago, and Henri—so this is a real score for Avondale.
