Grocery Café Will Drop Tea Leaf Salads on Jack London Square on May 29

Grocery Cafe, the popular, low-key Burmese restaurant, will open its doors in a tony new location in Jack London Square, a vastly different neighborhood than its first iteration in a deeply residential East Oakland neighborhood. The original location closed in December of 2016 for health violations related to its aging building— anyone who visited will certainly recall the unique environs of the original restaurant, which felt more like a bodega than a destination for some of Oakland’s best Burmese.

Now, owner William Lue is back again, in the former Hahn’s Hibachi space at 63 Jack London Square. Lue signed a nine-month lease with the option for a five-year extension to try operating in a larger, 2,500-square-foot space.

Grocery Café is known for Lue’s flavorful Burmese dishes, including the ever-popular tea leaf salad; this time, his new space will include charcoal grilled meat skewers, Fabula tea, and more additions to the menu that weren’t a possibility in his old, cramped quarters in East Oakland. That also includes a banquet menu with dishes like mon hin ga (fish chowder with rice noodles), and new items like osso bucco.

Lue also closed his restaurant, Tender Loving Food, in SF’s Tenderloin neighborhood in December to focus on his other banquet-style restaurant Laphet, which is currently open only for events, as well as Grocery Café.

When it opens, Grocery Cafe will be open Monday through Saturday for lunch and inner, and Sunday brunch (the new location is only steps away from the very popular Sunday farmers market in Jack London Square). Stay tuned for more details.