Cavala Cafe

I’ll give it 2 stars and that’s because of the proximity to where I live. I highly doubt these types of places actually read or care what their patrons have to say, it’s trendy and honestly the crowd that frequents there won’t read this anyway. I had a small appetizer platter, which wasn’t on the menu (I had to show them one of their Instagram pictures), it took very long to be prepared and it was cold. At the time of my visit, they had no license, so no drinks. Worst of all, that small portion I ordered, was $ 65.00 a portion that would have cost no more than $ 30 elsewhere.

Horrible wait time for the food. Waited over an hour for an appetizer. Waiter said that our food would be out in 5 mins after waiting for 45 minutes. That took another half hour when he said 5 minutes.

It’s a great hang out spot, to have a few drinks and hookah. Pretty good happy hour deals (hookah, appetizers, and drinks), and great music if you like a mixture of hip hop, rap, dembow,
Bachata, reggae, reggaeton, and pop (a little bit of everything).
I once came to celebrate my cousin’s birthday during happy hour and we receives shots on the house.
The only downside is it’s pretty small other than that it is a pretty chill place.

I have been to Cavala countless times however, it was my first time having brunch here. I made a reservation for 3:30pm for 5 of Us & we were sited promptly. Our waiter made it very aware that the unlimited drink’s during brunch were timed & they were right because right at 5pm she actually brought Us the check without us asking for it. We informed the waiter that we wanted to keep ordering pitches of Mimosa’s to just add it to the check. The food was ok although, everyone enjoyed their meal mine wasn’t the best. Our fav part during brunch was the MUSIC the DJ played a mix of music which everyone enjoyed. The DJ had the place rocking & dancing until he left. Overall, we will def be back bc the place is nearby plus for $ 30 you get ok food, drinks for 1 ½ hours plus good music.

Great prices on happy hour and hookah. Drinks are great but the fact that you have to wait an hour to be seated discourages people from coming back. The hostess has An attitude which doesn’t help when you go out you want to have a good time and also enjoy the service people are spending money no need for the wait and attitude

The only thing I can say is that the food was really really good. I got the salad as appetizer (it was yummy), the skirt steak for entrée (even yummier). Now, why give them 2 stars? Well my friend made a reservation for her birthday about a week in advance. They even asked her if she wanted balloons and what color. When we arrive to Cavala, they didn’t have any reservation made for her, the tables with balloons weren’t for us, and we were sat upstairs but told that by 3 we had to be done because there was a party coming at that time. Fine, because we started at 1 so okay we followed but that was points off already.
Being sat upstairs gave us little chance to be attended to the right way. Throughout the whole 2 hours we were there we only had out glasses filled twice! When I heard from others that they usually give pitchers. Smh! To top it all off we felt rushed because the party coming after us were trying to decorate the upstairs while we ate and they couldn’t finish it until we all left. In summary, Cavala needs to get it together! Food is as equally as important as the service we should receive.

After renovation it became a hookah room (terrible) the food changed and i stop going, they had really good food before.

I went here two weeks ago and it was an okay experience. Here are my thoughts:
Pros:
— Music: If you’re into a mix of mainstream Hip Hop/​Reggaeton/​Dembow/​Bachata then the music is for you. Pretty typical and what I was expecting for any spot uptown.
— Drinks: The sangria was delicious and strong I particularly enjoyed the Blue Passion flavor
— Food: food was decent; not the best, but pretty good. I had the lobster empanadas
Cons:
— Service: This is the killer. This place is very unorganized and you can barely tell who works there or not. When I walk into a restaurant, I should be able to tell immediately who works there and who is a patron. Now some restaurants don’t have strict uniform policies, but there should be some kind of common attire to distinguish employees from patrons shoot even something as simple as a name tag. Some of the servers were wearing all black, which makes sense, but then I guess the girl who would be the equivalent of the hostess had on a casual bodycon dress. She also disappeared and I was waiting there at the hostess booth for a while before anyone knew what was going on as far as the seating situation. I know they get a lot of business and the music is loud as hell, but there has to be some basic protocol when a guess comes in. I’ve worked in restaurants and I know what is good and what is bad service, so it’s annoying to go out somewhere where the place is disorganized. I also did get that «we treat our kind better» vibe from there (and quite often in Latin spots as a Black woman), but it wasn’t too bad there maybe because the person I was with was visibly Hispanic? Who knows. It’s dumb and my money is just as green as anyone. Restaurants need to stop that BS and get over themselves.
— Ambiance/​space: the venue is way too small and set up awkwardly. The sitting space outside is very crammed, and if you sit upstairs, you will be waiting FOREVER for service. Since they get a lot of business, they should work on getting a bigger venue.
Overall, although I enjoyed my time for the most part, I was turned off most by how disorganized this place is. I feel like they just hired any random person (probably people they know) and threw them into a pack of wolves. Anyone who knows anything about the service industry in NYC is that it’s not for the faint of heart. I don’t care how cute you are, if you don’t have good customer service skills and can’t work fast and efficiently, you will do horribly working in the service industry here because of the volume. They really need to re-​evaluate the ways in which they prepare their waitstaff to deal with their volume. To be honest, I find this to be a problem with a lot of minority owned spots uptown but that’s a discussion for another time. Not sure if I’ll visit again maybe at a low peak time.

Great atmosphere, good food and nice mix of food. Nice spot for a first date or happy hour after a long day at work.
Restaurant serves hookah — so if you’re not a fan of it, I’d suggest you stay away. Sidenote: if you’re a parent, please don’t bring your kids. Nothing breaks my heart than seeing a mom with a 4 year old smooking hookah right next to them. This seems to be a pattern in uptown culture but please don’t subject your children to second hand smoke.

I came to Cavala for my sisters birthday on a Thursday afternoon, the male waiter was really nice, he gave us free shots. I love their coconut mojitos. I will definitely come back for happy hour.

I came over for my graduation in celebration. We were a group of 8 girls. They attended us extremely well needless to say the service was great! The wings are delicious. Thank you JP and Jennifer! Will definitely come again !!

One star because I have no choice. The music was SO loud. The service was TERRIBLE. We waited for about 20 minutes and not one server came up to take our order. Not even our drink order. To top it all off as we waited a HUGE bug fell from the ceiling and just DIED on our table. Luckily we had no food yet. We walked right out. If you want a meal don’t go to CAVALA CAFE.

Staff is great, food was better before they remodeled, prices are decent. I love the churrassco with mashed yuca.

Before i went to Cavala Café i read the reviews and most of them were not good but I gave it a try anyways. I went to have some drinks and food with my boyfriend and it was great !! The food was good, Drinks were strong & the server was very friendly and the service overall was good.
Note: They do include gratuity/​tip on the bill. No matter if it’s only 2 people..

Cavala Café tiene la mejor comida, mejor servicio y mejor todo! He visitado este lugar varias veces y los tragos mixto son los mejores. El mojito de chinola lo recomiendo!

Came here for the first time with a few friends a couple of weeks ago and I loved it. I had the pollo a la reina and it was DELISH. I’m not a big fan of spinach but this was really good. Their mojitos are yummy, the hookah was decent.
If you want a chill place with awesome music this is the place for you. If your a Plain Jane and prefer a mellow and quiet dinner, walk the other way. This place is full of energy and the waitresses are awesome. Totally coming back!

Like this place, have definitely came here a couple of times. Every time I have gone the service is great. The food is delicious and so are the drinks. The staff is very attentive and are always coming to check up on us. The only reason why I don’t give it 4 starts is because of the waiting time and also I’ve had a few problems with reservations. Other then that it’s a cute little restaurant and the hookah is also good. Btw their happy hour is amazing !

So I come here very often did my birthday here and everything, after their renovation I must say the place is nice but then again is so small and it’s forever packed… It’s so hard to get a seat by the bar or just to sit at the bar… They will just throw u upstairs which is horrible low music, and it’s so tiny. On behalf of their food it’s cheap and it’s very good their hookah it’s good, I’ll recommend this spot on a Monday to Friday not on weekends or for a special event, it’s cool just to hang out with a couple of friends but nothing special.

If only 0 stars was possible.
Basically the food was a little less than mediocre and the service was just horrendous.
First off, the server took about 10 – 15 minutes to take our order. When the server brought out the food, we informed the server that my bf did not order what she had brought him. She went on to argue that he did and that he had pointed to an item she wrote down. Which was a complete lie. When asked to change the order to what he had initially order, she had incredible attitude and stated that we would still be charged because the order was made. She didn’t make any effort to remedy the situation.
In other words, she just sucked at her job.
When speaking to the manager, she looked as if she could care less.
Don’t come here. There other places with better food and better service.

The ambiance is VERYimmature and loud. This is def not a nice place to just come and have dinner/​drinks. It is like a party with a bunch of grown people acting like teenagers
The food was OKAY, nothing to write home about. The appetizers came with our entrees… wtf? And it wasn’t even addressed; as if it should be that way.
The service was fine UNTIL they found out that we had a Groupon. Then it was attitudes and took 20 min to get the check back. I guess the staff didn’t realize that we were Latin and spoke Spanish because they were blatantly speaking about people that have Groupons and how they are «cheap» and that they don’t want to spend money and aren’t welcomed (IN SPANISH RIGHT IN FRONT OF US)
Some wise advice to the owners, either take down the Groupon or teach your staff on proper customer service and etiquette because at this time all this place is doing is turning away A LOT of potential business.

Now majority of the time you see low reviews and think… «hmmm… let me be skeptical and actually give this place a try». Well, I have to agree with the low reviews given to Cavala Café. I wanted to be optimistic and think I could have a great experience, but I was wrong.
Last night I went with a girl friend to Cavala for a happy hour event organized by an organization. Now, I’m all about going out and supporting a good cause so I was hopeful I would have a somewhat decent experience. Upon arrival we realized that this place is IN fact tiny. A large party of 6 or more can be seated somewhat comfortably in the downstairs area. The upstairs area is the size of my bathroom (let’s just say it’s really small) and fits about 4 tables. Once again, it is hard to fit a couple of large parties in the upstairs area due to the size.
The entire restaurant was packed to capacity due to the happy hour event. It seems that the wait staff is not accustomed to dealing with that many people. Having found a seat with a few friends upstairs the waitress announced after a while that she would be closing ALL tabs on that floor. The reason? She was overwhelmed with the amount of people.
In terms of service, one friend of mine waited almost 20 minutes plus for a pitcher of sangria, while the other had been overcharged for drinks. Service is a bit lacking.
Now onto the drinks… if you are a sangria aficionado steer clear of their regular (red) sangria. It tasted like cheap wine mixed with juice. Actually, cheap wine might be a bit of a stretch. I had a pitcher of sangria and it was just watery and lacking flavor (as well as fruit).
I think I stayed for a total of an hour and a half before I decided to head out. A total revamping needs to be done in terms of their drink menu if I ever were to consider stepping back into this spot.