The Encounter Cafe

Encounter is the best! Great people and amazing food! Love love love the chicken caesar salad

I really encountered a nice cafe in Iowa City. The atmosphere is so lively and I can have healthy homemade muffin sandwich!! People are so nice and smiley!

Great location, greater coffer, and a decent sandwich.
Place and staff looked very clean.

Great vibe in this place. Kind and helpful staff, lovely seating areas with lots of natural light, and quality fare. This may become a regular spot for me.

It's been hit or miss in Iowa City for me. But this place did NOT miss. Wife had the French toast with what seemed to be the most strawberriest strawberries that ever strawberried. She even liked it. I had the avocado toast. Whole grain toast with avocado spread, bacon, spicy, folded egg, tomato and feta cheese. Absolutely delicious. I also had the biscuits and gravy. The biscuits were light and fluffy, but filling. The gravy was on point with big bits of sausage. We were definitely not disappointed. We will be coming back.
*Edit* We were back again today. The wife had the biscuits and gravy and I had the breakfast burrito. I forgot to mention, if you come here to eat, bring your appetite. They do not skimp. I absolutely love how fresh everything tastes. We have yet to try the basket side. And I intend to, but I also want to work my way thru the rest of the cafe menu first. 😂 Maybe we'll start on the bakery on Thursday.

Great food! Best omlet ever, and they have gluten-free options!!

Friendly staff, spacious cafe, impeccable iced mocha, and the food is great too! Seriously the iced mocha is so good

Tourists from states with any sense of hustle, SKIP THIS PLACE. Good coffee and probably good for pastries but incredibly SLOW service for anything else. Granted we came during a busy Saturday but the service was so slow that we decided to leave without eating. I believe our order was forgotten as we ordered two of the simplest things on the menu, an egg sandwich and avocado toast. We also removed all meat as were vegetarian, so only the eggs needed to be cooked… After 31 minutes, food was not ready and wasn’t even in the process. Simply told “oh, I though I said it was 30 minutes wait” (which wasn’t communicated as we would’ve gone somewhere else) and “Sorry, it’s cause we’re so busy”. Well, I would suggest working on service times and simplifying line production because that’s a serious problem when you can’t get out an egg sandwich and avocado toast in less than 20 minutes.

Great food! Friendly staff! Clean/ awesome decor! Highly recommend

I want to give this place a better review because the owners and staff are just so nice, and the atmosphere is lovely - but the wait times and overall quality of the food have ended our relationship with The Encounter Cafe. We have tried to give TEC a few chances, but I think this last weekend did us in. We waited in line for over 20 minutes to place our order, and then another 30+ minutes for the food to arrive. The hashbrowns were practically raw and the eggs were not seasoned. Maybe after some time apart, we'll come back and do some grab and go items (muffins, cinnamon buns, pretzels), but this past Saturday was just so bad that it'll take us awhile to forget.