Located in the up and coming area near Pantai Batu Bolong, Crate Cafe is a “too cool for school” cafe serving up a wide range of breakfast and brunch options such as bowls and toasts. Maybe I’m just old because I just don’t get it.
The cafe is bare in appearance with lots of concrete, white tiles and exposed steel beams. It’s a half-built building made into something modern and trendy.I have to mention the seats. They are crap. Really crap. The concrete benches are too tall and your legs just dangle without any support.
Customers here are your typical tattooed westerners riding big motorbikes, wearing oversized headphones and carrying 5 pounds of attitude. They’re not my people, but this crowd will suit some.Food is all cheap by Bali standards with the maximum price being Rp50.000. And it’s a good selection of food too with lots of muesli, bowls, toast and omelettes on the menu.
My French toast was quite good, but far from perfect. Firstly, they’re using strawberries and we all know that strawberries in in Indonesia are hit and miss — usually miss. Today they were sour and pale. Why can’t they used fresh seasonal fruit such as mango, jackfruit, dragonfruit and papaya?Additionally, the egg wash didn’t soak into the bread at all and this made the bread very dry on the inside. The French toast comes in different configurations and both I tried were ok, but I don’t need to try them again.
I really hope I picked the wrong dishes because I want to like this place. But based on what I experienced, I can’t really recommend it.So what’s the verdict? Not bad, but not great either. If you can put up with some of the cheeky crowd and can manage to pick the right dish, you will probably like what’s on offer here.
Crate Cafe
Jalan Pantai Batu Bolong No.64, Canggu
Opening Hours: daily 07:00 – 15:00
Instagram: @cratecafe
Drinks: Rp25.000 – Rp35.000
Food: Rp40.000 – Rp50.000