A newly opened café is all set to charm Cebuanos with its array of meals, snacks and pastries. Opened last April in a growing food strip in Lahug, Tazza Café & Patisserie is a must-try destination for those who want to hop on board an appetizing food trip, amid a casual and relaxing ambience.
Owners Dexter and Jessica (nee Sy) Chua said that the café’s quirky name symbolizes the kind of experience they want diners to have. A play on the Spanish word taza, which means cup, the café is pegged to be a hangout spot for people to unwind with good cup of coffee in hand, and perhaps a salad or pasta, or both.
The café is roomy yet cozy, designed under and industrial and rustic concept in mind, and accentuated by the overturned cup-shaped lamps hanging from the ceiling.
The owners shared that the inspiration for the café started when Jessica, a cake artist under the trade name “Pastries by Jessica,” has decided to move her home-based venture a step further. The initial plan was for a bigger commissary and display shop, where clients can place their orders for customized goodies and do take-out of readymade ones—but bigger plans got the best of them.
“Though many people are already familiar with Pastries by Jessica, we didn’t keep the name because we wanted to expand our menu to meals as well,” Jessica said. Apart from her applauded crème brulee and blueberry cheesecake, Tazza’s salads, pastas and entrees that are just as delectable, are worth a try.
House specialties are the beef stroganoff pasta, a creamy concoction topped with slow-cooked beef strips, and the beef salpicao, a mouthwatering marinated beef dish topped with garlic chunks. While on the lighter side of the menu, they recommend the Tupplenut salad, which stands for a mix of tuna, apple and walnut sprinkled with honey mustard vinaigrette.
Jessica has been in the baking biz for six years. Though she dabbled in selling as brownies and cupcakes to her classmates in college, it was only in 2008 when she started it as professionally, adding in customized fondant cakes to the mix.
Prior to that, Jessica, who’s a med tech graduate, pursued culinary studies in the International Culinary Arts Academy Cebu, and apprenticed in Makati Shangri-La and later in the Hyatt Regency in Georgia, USA.
Tazza Café & Patisserie is located on the ground floor of Tsai Hotel and Residences on Wilson St., Lahug, Cebu City. It is open from 2:30 p.m. to 12:00 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays, and from 2:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. on other days.