Chooo chooooooooo!
Welcome to the Woodinville Cafe. The portions are big, but after 16 miles everyone cleared their plates.
The interior is decorated in charming train themes. Think Cracker Barrel but for train conductors. Old railway signs and advertisements and luggage racks (complete with actual luggage!) adorn the walls.
The great mystery is: Who’s luggage is this? What’s inside of it?
Some say the luggage comes from SeaTac, drawn from every corner of our great globe, the stuff that no one claimed after a few weeks of the poor bags slowly and sadly circling the luggage conveyor. If that’s true, then this luggage may be the luckiest to have ever been abandoned. In its new life, a suitcase or duffel bag now sits high on the wall, surveying the joy and happiness and bustle of a vibrant diner ecosystem. No longer does it need to slave for ungrateful travelers who barely notice its existence, indeed who had completely forgotten and abandoned it. Instead each day is filled with smiles and laughter bubbling up from customers and the friendly chit chat from servers and hosts as they take care of their patrons with a smile and prompt service.
This was our first time up in Woodinville, so we asked the locals what they thought of the place.
Susan Suitcase (a blue 40 year veteran of the luggage racks with a smart chrome finish) felt that the Woodinville Cafe is experiencing a golden age in omelets:
Look kids, I’ve been here a while and what you may not appreciate is the level of fluff that this joint has been able to pull off. You go to any other diner in this neck of the woods and you aren’t going to get this kind of fluffy omelet. Don’t get me wrong, even the Denny’s down the street can get a couple of light air bubbles, but this establishment is really taking things to the next level. I heard that last week in some new experiments they actually had an omelet that was so light, it FLOATED. Seriously, floating omelets! The kitchen went berserk. It was like trying to eat on the International Space Station or something. Eggs everywhere. I mean, I love light fluffy eggs, but things may be getting out of hand here. As our technological progress accelerates, it’s important that our reach not exceed our grasp!
Derek Duffel (a brown, heavy canvas fellow from the Nixon era) seemed disturbed by Susan’s account and tried to provide some more context:
Susan has been here a long time and seen some shit. You have to recognize that a diner is a busy place, lots going on, all sorts of folks coming in and out at all hours; weird stuff happens. I mean, we love Susan, but she’s coming unhinged. Literally. Like, they had to bring in the luggage repair guy and he ordered new hinges for her. I think we’ll stop hearing about all this space station nonsense once she’s back from the doc. At least, I hope so or they’ll have to retire her to the Value Village on the other side of the parking lot…
Logan, a rising star on the host staff, reassured us that the luggage, while quite friendly, was not actually sentient and that delirium and dehydration due to running 16 summer miles were more likely explanations for our experience. Logan was extremely friendly, got our food out promptly, kept the ice water flowing, and checked in frequently to make sure everyone at the table was recovering all right.
Food: 3 diners out of 5
Not-too-loudness: 4 gentle nighttime clickety-clacks of the rails out of 5
Train-themed-ness: 5 “loco”-motives out of 5
Chill Factor: 5 delirious runners out of 5