Next Cafe

I love it. Food is very delicious and pretty cheap. Best dishes they have, would say: lamb chops, russian style fried potatoes and Foie gras. Every Saturday they have a full house and dance night lasts till almost 4 am! You can bring your own alcohol, eat and dance the whole night — they don’t close kitchen till 2 am!!))) They also do catering and hold big parties: like for my Birthday they did 2 whole suckling piggies — will post pictures in a few)

The cold war has long been over, the Berlin wall came down, and now Russia is one of the richest capitalist countries. The Baltimorean Russians have also seemed to fled the center of the city, where a community thrived for the much more sedate area around Reisterstown Rd.
I ventured out with a girlfriend to do a little bit of grocery shopping. There is nothing better than coming home with a bounty of prepared foods from an ethnic grocery store. I had dreams of beet salads, farm cheeses, pickled veggies, and cured meats for days.
Like every smart shopper knows, never go shopping on an empty stomach. So we popped in to the café next door, suitably called Next Café.
The café is much larger than your average café. With high ceilings and huge banquet tables, I can only assume that this place hosts its fair share of weddings, anniversaries, and christmas parties. Even though the place was large, we were the only customers in the restaurant.
Service at the Next café is a family affair. The hostess is the owner, her boyfriend is the server/​manager, and her son also tended our table. As I said we were the only people there. They even offered us complimentary glasses of wine, although I would be sure to avoid it next time.
The menu is quite extensive, covering a lot of Russian classics. We were hungry so we ordered a lot more than we could handle, plus we had no idea the portions would be as generous as they were.
The standout feature of the meal was not the main course, but the fried potatoes served on the side. How can fried potatoes be so special? They just were perfectly crispy and soft on the inside. Maybe on my next visit I would order just a plate of fried potatoes and maybe a salad as too appear less piggish.
Like all family restaurants, much of its charm came not from the strange atmosphere of plasma TVs and high ceilings, but from friendly staff and the homey food.