State Cafe is Serving Fresh Vietnamese Dishes
NORTH ADAMS, Mass — State Cafe has opened at 90 Main St.
State Cafe, a pop-up of State Food and Drink from Greylock Works, recently opened on Main Street, offering Vietnamese cuisine and beverages.
The pop-up cafe opened last summer as 328North and plans to remain open until September. It is offering similar fare, including Vietnamese-inspired dishes like banh mi sandwiches and noodle or rice bowls with a variety vegetables.
"We grow a lot of the food. The mint and other ingredients — cucumbers, we grow those at our farm. We're not only farm to table, we're our farm to table," owner Matt Bertles said.
Bertles and his husband, Tu Le, grow the food on their Williamstown farm, 328North. Le grew up making Vietnamese food with his mother and loves to cook. (They also have a studio at Greylock Works and run Kitchen for events at the Adams Theater.)
"She taught him, the youngest son which is kind of a tradition, how to do all the things mom does," Bertles said. "So he brings that to the table instinctively; [he] doesn't even have to think much about it."
Bertles said they are expecting this year to be like last.
"I think we're still in the pretourist season in North Adams. So we expect more people to be using our restaurants in July and August and September," he said. "That's what we saw last year. But yeah, our goal is really to mimic what we did last year. We had big success here."
The one difference is that this year seating is available inside. Last year, people would eat and drink at the tables set up on the sidewalk and under the former bank's canopy. With interior space, they plan to add more events as well as be open for special events like First Fridays.
"Having an indoor space was necessary because fall came on, so we kind of opened this space last year. But now it's a nicer space, a cleaner space and a better space to host events, big parties," Bertles said. "And so we're incorporating because we do weddings ... . And so we're kind of looking to do some of those evenings here, too. And like pride events, other events that happen, we want to be available for that. And we did some of that last year, too, where we'd have nighttime dinners along with craft sales, things like that, where we just allow the space to kind of dictate what we can create."
Bertles also explained how State fell into their lap. The two were never planning to open a restaurant.
"Everything has been kind of organically coming to us. We didn't plan this, didn't plan State. Just doors open, and we kind of look in and see if we could figure out a way to make this work," he said. " And both of these just opened, it was like, oh, we can make this work. This would be fun. It gives people a different food option."
State Cafe is currently open Thursday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and might extend their hours in the future.
Tags: Main Street, restaurants,
