Adorable Cambridge Cafe Expands to Somerville

Somerville welcomed a new cafe this morning, January 3, with the opening of Revival Cafe & Kitchen (197 Elm St., Davis Square), which joins an existing location in Cambridge, near Alewife. Diners got a first taste of Revival with its summer opening in Cambridge, and now the pair of cafes is in full swing, the work of founders Liza Shirazi of Harvard Square’s popular but now-closed Crema Cafe and Steve “Nookie” Postal, chef and owner of Commonwealth in Kendall Square. (Postal had also joined the Crema team a few years back.)

Revival Cafe’s menu spans breakfast through lunch, with a little something for everyone, including house-made breads and pastries. For breakfast, Revival serves egg sandwiches on English muffins, biscuit sandwiches, and overnight oats, while lunch features an extended list of sandwiches and salads, with pastries, pretzels, and cakes always available from the bakery menu. There are also daily specials, daily quiches, a “soup of the moment,” and assorted beverages.

This week, Revival will operate from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. on January 3 and 4 and from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. on January 5 and 6.

The opening of Revival Davis dovetails with the recent closure of Crema, whose building was sold to an investment company in 2017 for $108 million. Postal wrote about the closure of Crema in the latest installment of his recurring column on Eater Boston called “On the House,” warning that all the increasing rents and incoming chains would kill small, local, independent restaurants one by one.

“Crema will live on in many ways through Revival,” Shirazi said at the time. In addition to running both Revival locations now, she and Postal are also working to open a beer hall called Mothership.

• Revival Cafe & Kitchen Opens at Alewife [EBOS]
• Crema Cafe in Cambridge Is Closing but Will Live on in Revival Cafe [EBOS]