Location: Hamby, on Hamby street on the west side, a couple blocks south of San A. In the same building as Tan Tan
Hours 11a - 9p closed Tuesday http://www.caracalla.jp/
Either the owners had a lot of expensive stuff just hanging around, or someone spent a lot of money to get this place up and going. There is matching leather furniture, designer throw pillows (seen for sale at Cafe Unizon), framed artwork, glass sculpture, fresh flowers, venetian glass cups, fancy ceramic plates, and, most impressively, a TOTO toilet which has an automatic lid that is raised as you enter the bathroom. There is also classy jazz music (although we like Jack Johnson, his CDs are played at virtually every cafe on Okinawa). They have a selection of artsy Japanese magazines. Natural light streams through picture windows looking onto Araha beach park, the quiet end where almost no one goes.
There are two lunch sets, one "Asian" (900Y) and one "salad." The Asian set included a small cup of beef broth with a couple beans, a small salad, a Japan-ised Tom Yum soup, stir fried asian greens, and rice. The meal was good, but not spectacular. The soup needed more chili, lemongrass, kaffir lime, fish sauce...all the Thai ingredients that are hard to source here. And really, Tom Yum should have straw mushrooms, not cabbage, as the main vegetable. The greens were simply prepared, but would have been better with more kick - garlic, ginger, chili, something. For an extra 200Y, cake may be added to the set. We had the mango cake, which was angel food layered with whipped cream icing, with small chunks of mango. This, again, was good, but not smashing. The set comes with choice of hot/cold tea/coffee; the iced tea served in an interesting orange venetian glass.
The favorite item, which we ordered al la carte, was salad pizza (1000Y, expensive given the size of the dish) - a thin crispy crust, flavourful tomato sauce, topped with fresh green curly lettuce, walnuts, ham, and cherry tomatoes. Light and yummy.
Given that the food is not cheap and not mind blowing, and there is a lot of cafe competition in Hamby, I hope the owners did not spend a fortune on the cafe decor, or they may find it difficult to meet their rental payments. However, the view and classiness are different enough from other local establishments that they may attract a unique clientele.
