Going off campus

Finding fresh food in an unlikely setting

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The location seems a bit out there, but Off Campus Cafe was there when we needed it.

It was breakfast time on a recent Saturday morning. In Boulder, Lucky’s Café was four parties deep on the clipboard; Walnut Café was so flooded we got back in the car as soon as we got out; and the Village Coffee Shop had a line so long we just scoffed and drove right past it.

Not wanting to hit up Parkway Cafe for the seventh weekend in a row, nor fuss with popular spots in Louisville like The Huckleberry, or in Lafayette like Morning Glory Cafe, we just kept on driving down South Boulder Road. When we got to the Northwest Parkway, a micro city of hospitals to the left, that’s where we found Off Campus Cafe — a little breakfast and lunch joint hidden in an office complex.

Location influences food in myriad ways and Off Campus Cafe is no exception, even if the rule’s enforcement is not so apparent. Dishes here are clean and healthy, no doubt the result of being located next to the medical campus, where health-conscious doctors, recovering patients and guilty people returning from annual check-ups make up what must be a sizeable portion of the patronage.

Case in point: the breakfast burrito. It looks like a pulsing cartoon time bomb, but careful examination and violent forking reveals a lighter and refreshing version of the dish. Topped with avocados, fresh pico de gallo and sitting in a pork and green chili sauce, the burrito is packed with eggs, vegetables and the choice of bacon, sausage, chorizo or more vegetables.

Of course it’s all relative. A burrito with cheese, bacon and pork chili still isn’t, let’s say, blehck, oatmeal, but it’s not going to put you into the hospital next door.

Same goes for the house-made corned beef hash. It’s made without nitrates and consists of far less salt than what you might get elsewhere. The potatoes were diced in small cubes and though a little under seasoned, were not greasy and let the rich corned beef shine. Off Campus Cafe is one of the few restaurants in Boulder County to make corned beef in-house, and when I’m told this, I instantly start putting together all the Irish wall fixtures and the hard New England accent being hurled in the kitchen and the fact the dish was called “The Irish”: this plate of food has some roots is what I’m saying.

Elsewhere, pancakes were light and sweet. The coffee was extremely good. The service was friendly, and the prices were very reasonable. The interior feels like a homey walk-up deli.

Off Campus Cafe also caters — in fact, they started as a catering company — and offer a variety of hamburgers, salads, soups and sandwiches at lunch. I’d take a chance on the Aussie burger, made of local ground beef, bacon, house-pickled beets, grilled pineapple and a fried egg.

Well come to think of it, it is St. Patrick’s Day soon, which would explain the Irish decorations, and that New England jib could’ve been Australian. But then again this barely feels like Boulder County. In fact, it feels like the damn moon out here in the middle of dead yellow foliage and empty parking lots, with hospitals that look like space-age carbon refineries.

In the end, whatever and wherever Off Campus Cafe is, it’s a nice place to find at the end of the road.

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