MarieBette Cafe and Bakery

Best French bakery we have been in awhile. We had a sandwich and a croque madame for breakfast. The food was fresh and very tasty. The service was excellent.

Being born and raised in Europe, where you can find a bakery with freshly baked sweet or savory pastries at every corner of a street, I have very high expectations when it comes to bakeries. MarieBette is THE ONLY bakery in the US that reminded me of my hometown (with the exception of bakeries in San Francisco Chinatown)! Their croissants just melt in your mouth… and I was very pleasantly surprised to find a ham+cheese croissant here, since savory pastries are not very common in general. And whenever I stop by, I make sure to take a fruit pie to go! If there are any pies left, of course, because MarieBette makes a certain number of pies every day so if you want one, make sure to stop by relatively early. MarieBette pies are made with real fruit and are not super sweet, which is again a rare treasure to find. And don’t leave without a baguette! Baguettes made here are comparable to those you can find in Paris!

Reaal deal French pastries with some very friendly bakers to assist you. You know you’re in the right place when the kitchen walls are covered in flour!
Great candeles.

Unfortunately we didn’t have time to wait on a table, so we grabbed some to go items from the café. It took longer than seemed necessary to order and pay, but it was worth the wait. The quiche was very good, and the flourless chocolate cake was amazing. The pastries also looked quite delicious. We wish we’d had more room in our stomachs!

Good food, poor service.
The food at this café is PHENOMENAL. The pastries are scrumptious and the pancakes and eggs are wonderful.
Unfortunately, the service brought the experience down. It took almost an HOUR to order food (besides coffee and lattes). It then took 25 more minutes to come out by which time almost every single dish was cold. So cold in fact someone I was with had to send theirs back. This experience may have been a fluke but BE PREPARED TO WAIT when coming here. I still absolutely recommend it because it was just so good!

Just stopped in for a quick coffee and pastry– I ate a croissant and apple tart. They were beautiful and tasted delicious!

So so yummy! Wonderful pastries, fun atmosphere, and nice prices. I can’t remember what it’s called, but I had a salad atop deliciously seasoned grilled chicken and it’s one of the best light meals I’ve ever had! The service is also sublime, and the owners seem like great people you just want to support! :)

Above and beyond yummy. Hop in for a quick pastry, my fav is the almond croissant with chocolate, or stay for brunch! The coffee is great and the eggs are local and cooked to perfection. I love the location! It is great for taking a little power walk to work off those carbs ;)
The place is a little small so maybe come on a pretty day to sit out side for more peace.

Found this great spot thanks to Unilocal.My baked eggs (The Nelson) were incredible. My wife was very pleased with her scrambled egg and potatoes. We shared a side of THICK cut bacon and it was delicious. Coffee was top notch. Staff was super friendly. Finally the pastries… WOW. Do not leave without a bag of pastries! They were the perfect snack for our drive home to Maryland. We will be back!

I’ve been here twice and can’t wait to get back. You can stop in for great coffee and pastries or have a plate of buttermilk pancakes and so much more. Favorite items so far… French Onion Soup and the Croque Monsieur. I want to try everything on the menu!

My friends and I came here for breakfast on a week day and I ordered coffee, a ham, bacon, and cheese quiche of the day, and a chocolate croissant. The menu was French inspired and the display of the dishes were artisanal in nature. The ingredients in the quiche tasted fresh although the serving size was enough to fill me, but left me with enough space to eat the croissant. Priorities, amiright? The croissant was decent but hard to differentiate from the normal fanfare of other bakeries. It was delicious with the coffee and I appreciate that they had free refills.
The space itself is quite cozy with the main entrance leading you past the pastry display and the more formal seating in the room adjacent. I noticed this place filled up quickly around 9am, so I’d suggest coming a bit earlier if you’re looking to do a weekday breakfast. All in all, I’d recommend this for those looking for a new breakfast/​brunch spot.

I was so excited to try MarieBette since I love a good bakery and pastries, but after my visit I was pretty disappointed. My husband and I went for breakfast and got a few items to go – 2 croissants, a madeleine, and a canele. I was hoping this would give us a good taste of their offerings for a first visit. The croissants weren’t bad, but they were very basic. The flavor was OK but they really lacked a nice crust. I’ve honestly had better croissants (and cheaper ones) at Whole Foods. The madeleine was also just OK, and for $ 1.25, I was hoping to be wowed. Again it wasn’t bad, but it was a little too overpowered by the lemon flavor. I did enjoy the canele, it had a nice caramelized crust and the custard inside was light and fluffy. I’d maybe consider visiting MarieBette again to try their sit down food, but I wouldn’t go back for the bakery.

This is a hot spot
Amazing — was a terrible location for 20 years — One house away from what was a crack house on dale avenue
Serve great food and it doesn’t matter. This place is packed
Get the chicken salad sandwich on French roll
Regular Coffee is great
Specialty coffee comes with yummy mini pastry
Croissants are great — choc filled croissant was disappointing
Crioque sandwiches are amazing
Got kale salad one visit — taste was spot on but the portion was double what it should be — don’t get it because sandwiches aren’t American Fatty super sized so why the salad. Go smaller portions!
Bench seats are very uncomfortable but that’s good. Keeps people moving and no 2-​hour parking at a table. Eat talk go.
Go here for lunch. Great great spot.
My office is nearby so it’s in my top 5 for client lunch

Kouign Amann and Caneles, both in Petit made a Delightful Breakfast!!! Bread, Meringue Pies, Coffee AND
Newly Added: Shark Mountain Chocolate (a New Romance to begin [my Prediction])
Just the name MarieBette conjures images of Paris, Espionage, Clandestine meetings of Secret Agents at a small Bakery to share a meal and exchange Information or a prototype of a new invention…
Buttermilk Pancakes
and
Lemon Ricotta Pancakes
Both wee very good
Spies need Friends too! Maybe more than most of the population, since what they do most of the time carries the utmost discretion !
Inside® Information
When they are BUSY, you need to be eating more than Coffee for a Seat Inside or an Inside Seat! We ate outside.

MarieBette is your breakfast spot in Charlottesville if you’d like to break out of the ‘diner breakfast’ routine, especially if you like kick-​ass pastries.
The lines are very long on Sundays by 10, but if you arrive early on weekdays you’ll be seated immediately. I’ve had salads and carb-​heavy pancakes, and both are equally delicious. The sticky pecan roll is the best one I’ve had in my entire life — no reservations about that statement.
The dining area is small with some benches and some chairs. Servers have always been happy and genuine. The coffee isn’t fantastic but it serves as a backdrop to wonderful food.
Short version: Go!

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways… Oh, that’s already taken?
Well, two visits over three weeks and each visit was wonderful. The atmosphere in this small bakery/​restaurant (or, is it restaurant/​bakery?) is quaint, unassuming, neighborly, continental ala Parisian café. And the staff? Friendly, caring and genuinely pleased that you are there.
And now, to the food…
Coffee = quite good.
Egg dishes = creative, delicious and generously portioned.
Bacon = thick, full of flavor and totally consistent over my two visits.
Pastries = As the old saying goes, «Heaven, I’m in heaven…»
The bakery case up front beguiles you with a marvelous selection of bread, pastries and other baked goods.
This is not a place to be missed. There can be a wait on a weekend morning; but, it is so worth the wait.
Suddenly, I have a craving for a chunk of baguette; so, I’m off…
Visited April 2015

Cute, bright, nice place for brunch or to pick up some pastries and baguette! On weekends there’s not much parking, the wait might be a bit long, and the service can be a little slow, but the food is lovely and the atmosphere lends itself to quiet (but lively) conversation.
Pretty much everything I’ve tried has been good – simple but flavorful – and I can never resist ordering a (warmed up) pastry for dessert. So delicious. Brunch items are usually in the $ 10 range for a good portion, and the pastries are fairly reasonable for the excellent quality offered!

I’m gonna start by saying that the food is worth the visit and if I was just to rate the food, it would absolutely be a 5. What kills this place was the lack of service we received and the fact that some of these items are a tad overpriced for what you get.
Let’s begin…
Got here on a Sunday and decided to have brunch inside. You go inside and to your left is the bakery side of things if you want to order something to go. The right of the bakery is an entrance to be seated. There’s nothing, but a sign over head saying wait to be seated. The place has there electronic ordering gizmo there so about 3 people used the thing before someone looked at us and took us to our seats.
Our waitress, India, took our order of drinks, I got a shot of expresso that came with this cute mini canele that was absolutely tasty. The boyfriend ordered some orange juice, but the juice was not served until the very end of our meal since our waitress seemed to forget that bit. As for the food, I got the lemon ricotta pancakes and some original baked eggs. Boyfriend got his eggs over medium with some breakfast potatoes and a side of bacon. Food got served to us by a really nice guy. He was about to serve me some regular pancakes until we told him what I ordered. I ended up getting my baked eggs first and started eating it. I definitely love the way it’s served in it’s own iron cast ramekin and served with some awesome french bread. I can’t think of a place that serves eggs like this so I find it quite unique. When I finally got my lemon ricotta pancakes, my boyfriend and I decided to split them between us. It was quite light and yummy. Boyfriend enjoyed it enough since it was more of a subtle lemon flavor. Meanwhile, his meal was alright except the over medium eggs he ordered was actually over hard since some of the yoke was cooked. He had no complaints about the meal and the bacon was excellent.
After we had eaten the majority of our meal, we reminded our waitress, India, of my boyfriend’s orange juice he had yet to receive. We also had not received any refills of our water the entire time we are there, but after our glasses being blatantly empty — we got our refills. The orange juice came in such a small glass. It was smaller than the glass of water we got. It didn’t bother me until I saw the bill and saw that we got charged $ 4 for the late orange juice. Pretty ridiculous to me if you see the pictures I’ve posted. In addition, it took forever for us to get the check from her. It’s a shame since we really did enjoy the food.
So I find my self quite conflicted. Great food, but shoddy service. It’s important for me to say that it’s not the entire staff since we really enjoyed having the guy (I wish I caught his name) serving us as he was helpful getting us our order. The system they use seems to be displaced as they had the ordering unit right by the entrance for all the waiters to block when they put orders in and the printer for receipts on the other side of the room.
After leaving the dining area, we decided to get the much talked about pain au chocolat that we ordered to-​go. Quite the bite of flaky awesomeness. Overall, I hope the place is just suffering some new growing pains because the if they kicked up the service, this would be an exceptional place to go to.

Perfect French-​styled bakery !
I’m in the US since April and I was missing my croissant and my hot chocolate… I was SO happy when a friend told me about this place !!!
The staff is really friendly, you can take your time to make you choice without feeling pressured, and the decoration is lovely.
I had a pain au chocolat (by the way, the price is really cheap: I expected to have to pay a fortune for french bakeries but no !) and it was de-​li-​cious. Like at home ! Approved !
The hot chocolate was delicious too, not too sweet, like it should be !
Congratulations MarieBette, you are wonderfull !!!

Lovely lovely place, went there on a sunny day, glad to find this place during my first trip to Virginia, definitely loved it.
I am a French toast lover, I really like their banana cream stuffed french toast, it’s perfectly done, soft and creamy inside, not overwhelming at all with the sweetness, and the chocolate on top of it was just a plus!
I also love the croquet Madame, the cheese was well selected, the way it was cooked and presented will just make you smile.
We also ordered a side sausage, nice nice too, recommend that too.
Highly recommend this place, seems it’s still quite new, but I can see it’s known by more people and will require reservation to guarantee seats soon:)
I will definitely visit next time, for the flourless chocolate cake? Yes I do, and for everything