The Bee-Stro café is co-located with the Honey Heaven store on the Lawrence photo strip center on South Campbell. I’m still not exactly sure why I visited the Bee-Stro except that I was told that I was taking my wife, sister-in-law and mother-in-law out to lunch and that was where they wanted to go.
We arrived during prime lunch time and the place was pretty busy but they found us a table right away and we settled in. It took quite a while for someone to come back for our drink orders.
The Bee-Stro café fits into the tea-room category of places to eat and so the menu is pretty typical tea room with salads, sandwiches, quiche and soup. The twist here is that most items include honey in some form or the other as part of the dish.
Two in our party got quiche and the other two got sandwiches. My selection was the ‘Tracy Special” which was a grilled honey-mustard chicken sandwich with Muenster cheese on a ciabatta roll for $8.99. Sandwiches come with a small salad on the side as do the quiche. Sandwich & quiche prices are all $8.99, salads run $6.99 and a bowl of soup will set you back $4.99. Link to menu.
While we waited for our food – our server dropped by a couple of small plates of Lay’s chips drizzled with some honey-mustard salad dressing. It was sort of a tasty way to start things off.
When our food arrived, I was a bit disappointed with the size of my sandwich – it was on the smallish side. But then again, that was probably good as I’m supposed to be eating less anyway. The salad consisted of nice fresh greens with a small bit of tomato & onion. It also came with a small slice of watermelon and a grape.
I chose the parmesan peppercorn dressing and thought it was a very good rendition. The menu says they make all their own salad dressings. The sandwich was ok – but I’m pretty sure that the chicken patty wasn’t freshly grilled. The chicken breast was also a bit on the dry side, but it did have a nice coating of honey-mustard sauce.
There was more honey-mustard on the side for spreading and that helped moisten things up. The ciabatta roll was good and had been warmed. To finish off the plate, was a tiny chocolate chip muffin – which was pretty good.
Others in the group all liked their meals. The “Ricks Special’ sandwich looked pretty good with a nicely toasted marble rye bread encasing the turkey & cheese. We didn’t try any deserts – but several of the choices mentioned by our server sounded good.
Service was non-existent at first and we waited quite a while before a server came over to take our drink orders. It was better after that. It seemed like they were short-handed on our visit and our server apologized for our long wait. I also had a long wait at the front counter for someone to appear to take my money. Diet Coke is served in cans – so I didn’t attempt any refills, but water & tea refills were offered several times.
There are several dining areas in this combo tea room & honey-themed shop. I was shocked and pleased that they didn’t cram in as many tables as possible like some other tea rooms I’ve visited. The décor is honeyfied – with honey stuff everywhere you look. Clientele is made up of mostly the female of our species – but there were a few gents dining including a Lieutenant Colonel from our very own U.S. Armed Forces (Go Army!). As we left I noticed the ladies at the 2 or 3 tables in the front room of the place all having a good time playing some kind of card game after finishing their lunch.
I think people that like tea rooms will like the Bee-Stro café. I thought it was a bit pricey for what you get, but my wife likes the Bee-Stro so we may be back at some point.
2516 S. Campbell Ave – (417) 869-0233
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