Café Olimpico ★9.3

Some cafés are best described by everything they have added over the years. This one is best described by everything it has refused to change. Café Olimpico opened in Mile End in 1970, back when the neighbourhood was a landing point for Italian, Greek and Portuguese families and when hardly anyone in Montreal knew what a cappuccino was. Everything around it has since turned over: the workshops became video game studios, working-class flats became unaffordable, the clientele has changed three times. The room has not. It is still an Italian espresso bar — marble counter, pennants overhead, voices at full volume.

Highlights

• Opened in 1970 by Rocco Furfaro, an Italian immigrant from the neighbourhood who had just sold his small pizzeria. He wanted somewhere to watch European soccer, so he bought a coffee machine, a satellite dish and a pool table, and the rest followed.
• Still family-run, three generations on. The café passed from Rocco to his two daughters, Rossana and Victoria, and grandson Jonathan Vanelli, who started behind the counter as a teenager, now oversees the brand’s growth.
• A house blend whose recipe has never left the family — a slow-roasted Italian blend, seventy per cent arabica to thirty per cent robusta, unchanged since 1970 and pulled on a Cimbali. It is a secret they defend, not a marketing line invented after the fact.
• The room has barely been touched. A marble counter, Italian club pennants, a Canadiens banner, televisions on: the space has crossed half a century without once being redone.
• The terrace doubles the capacity as soon as the warm season arrives, and it is arguably the best observation post in Mile End.
• Open seven days a week, from early morning until late at night — the same room pours the first coffee for people starting early and the last espresso for people leaving the dinner table.

What’s in the cup

Before judging Olimpico you have to place it in the right school. This is not third wave and it has never pretended to be: it is an Italian espresso bar, with everything that implies. The blend is built for milk, not for blind tasting. Cappuccino arrives in a tulip cup, latte in a tall glass, and there is no small-medium-large because the question does not arise. You will not find a V60, a rotating single-lot programme or a tasting card on the counter. Asking for a pour-over here is roughly like asking for natural wine in an old tavern: you will get a polite answer, but you have come to the wrong address.

The house blend is the heart of the whole story. The family describes it as a slow-roasted Italian blend, seventy per cent arabica to thirty per cent robusta — and it is precisely that robusta share, which the third wave banished from the cup, that gives the house its thick crema and its cocoa note. On everything else the family has refused for half a century to say anything more specific. Where exactly it is roasted is not made public either, and that deserves an honest note: Olimpico sells beans and capsules, but nowhere claims to roast in-house. That silence is part of the character. What is genuinely verifiable is the consistency — people who have been walking through this door since the seventies are drinking the same thing today that they drank then.

The summer signature is the whipped iced coffee made to Rocco’s own recipe. The family says so plainly: it is the father’s recipe, done the old-fashioned way. Ice cream and sorbets join it when the heat sets in. And the machine deserves a look of its own: a Cimbali sitting on the marble is one of the handsomest things Italy exports.

Who’s behind it

Rocco Furfaro arrived from Italy and worked the way his whole generation of immigrants worked. He first ran a small pizzeria in Mile End, then sold it to open something else. He was a sports fan to the point of obsession, and what he really wanted was somewhere to follow the Azzurri: in 1970s Montreal, a café built around that barely existed. The satellite dish and the pool table did the rest, and the place quickly became the neighbourhood’s gathering point — a male one at first, since women only really started coming in during the nineties.

After Rocco’s death the business went to his daughters, Rossana and Victoria, both born in the neighbourhood and partly raised behind this counter. Jonathan Vanelli, Rocco’s grandson, started working here at fifteen and now oversees the expansion that began in the mid-2010s. The family holds a consistent public line on price: they repeat that they have no intention of turning a milky coffee into a luxury item, and that staying affordable is part of the inheritance. In a neighbourhood where the price per square metre has multiplied, that is a position rather than a pose.

What it’s good for

This is where honesty matters, because a great many people arrive with the wrong expectations. Olimpico is not a working café. There is wireless, but power outlets are nearly nonexistent, the tables are small and shared, and the noise level is that of a dressing room on final night: the staff call across the room, sing, laugh, and the televisions are on. Opening a laptop for half an hour is fine; setting up a full working day is a bad idea both for you and for the room.

For everything else, though, it is hard to beat. For talking, it is ideal precisely because of the noise — nobody can hear your conversation. For an espresso standing up, it is the most natural gesture in the building: order at the counter, drink, leave, exactly as in an Italian bar. For takeaway, it works beautifully, and the surrounding streets are made for walking. For coming on your own, the counter saves you: nobody stays alone here for long. And on a big match night, the room turns into a stadium — only you can decide whether that is what you came for.

The room

Dark wood, a long marble counter down one wall, padded booths facing it, small wooden tables in between, a round tiled table by the fireplace. Outside there are benches and the terrace, which completely changes the logic of the place from the first mild days. On the walls and overhead: pennants of Italian clubs, a Canadiens banner, and during major tournaments the flags of every country represented in the neighbourhood.

The atmosphere is warm and loud, in that order. The music swings between eighties classics and old rock. The crowd is frankly multigenerational: regulars who have come since opening day cross paths with students, with visitors who came to see the Mile End café, and with local families. The service is theatrical in the literal sense — you watch the crew work the way you watch an act — but familiar faces are treated as relatives. The indoor room stays compact; it is the terrace that lets the whole thing breathe.

Beyond the coffee

Here the answer is simple and binary: there is no kitchen. Olimpico is a coffee bar, not a brunch room. What sits on the counter is pastry and dry biscuits, classic Italian sweet baking, with ice cream added in the warm months. Nothing is cooked on site in the sense of a menu; the solid side is an accompaniment and the house makes no secret of it. Before the winter holidays, artisanal panettone appears, and the address turns up regularly in Montreal round-ups devoted to exactly that. If you want eggs and a plate, you will have to step outside and walk — which, in Mile End, takes very little effort.

When to come

The café opens very early, well before the office day begins, and stays open late into the evening, which is rare for the format: the same room pours the first coffee for morning workers and the last espresso for people leaving the dinner table. Weekday mid-morning is the quietest stretch and the closest to what the place originally was. Midday on weekends brings a crowd and often a queue, especially once the terrace is open. On European match nights an entirely different crowd arrives and the volume jumps. And there is no closing day to plan around: the doors open seven days a week.

Getting there

This is Mile End, the north-western corner of the Plateau, a couple of blocks from the two most famous bagel bakeries in the country — the most reliable landmark in the district. The nearest metro stations are Laurier on the orange line and Outremont on the blue line, and it is a solid walk from either, which is normal here: the neighbourhood was never well served by the underground. Several bus routes pass nearby, and the district is thoroughly cycle-friendly, with racks on practically every corner. By car it is another matter: street parking is a competitive sport and residents’ permits cover most of the surrounding blocks.

Good to know

A few practical points that save unpleasant surprises. The house was famous for years for taking cash only; more recent visitors report that cards are now accepted, but the local habit is still to arrive with money in your pocket. There is no table service — you order and pay at the counter. There are no reservations. Outlets are effectively nonexistent, so do not plan a long working session. The terrace is seasonal. And the most useful point of all: the family now runs four Montreal addresses and they are not alike. This is the original, and it is the only one with fifty years of history built into the walls.

Questions and answers

Is this the same Olimpico as the one in Old Montreal and downtown?

Yes — same family, same blend, but not the same café. The Mile End room is the 1970 original; the others opened far more recently and are smaller and more contemporary. If you are coming for the history, this is the one.

Can you work here on a laptop?

For half an hour, yes. For a working day, no. There is wireless, but very few outlets, small shared tables, and noise that never lets up. The place is designed for conversation, not concentration.

Do they roast their own coffee?

The family does not say. What is public is that the blend is a house recipe kept deliberately secret, a slow-roasted Italian blend of arabica and robusta unchanged since 1970, and that beans and capsules are sold to take away. No in-house roasting is claimed anywhere, and we are not going to invent it.

Is there filter coffee or any brew methods?

No. This is an Italian espresso bar: espresso, lungo, cappuccino, latte, and the iced versions in summer. No V60, no lot of the month.

Is the terrace worth planning around?

It is one of the main arguments for the address. It doubles the seating and looks onto one of the busiest stretches of Mile End; in summer everybody wants to sit there.

Should I bring cash?

It is the safer bet. The place built part of its reputation on being cash-only, and although cards appear to have been accepted in recent years, nobody wants to find out otherwise after ordering.

Does it work for a group or with children?

Yes, if you are comfortable with noise and shared tables. There are no bookings: you either find a seat or wait. In summer the terrace absorbs larger parties far better than the indoor room.

Can you eat here?

Not in the sense of a meal. Pastry, Italian sweet baking and ice cream in season; no kitchen. For breakfast or lunch you will need to walk a few blocks.

Should I avoid match nights?

It depends on what you came for. On a big tournament night the room is loud, packed and euphoric: the most authentic experience the place offers, and the least restful.

Opening hours