Specials Every Day of the Week at Blue Jay Cafe!

Order the mac and cheese. Now that's an order.

Blue Jay Cafe is a happy place, and not only because they give away FREE smiles on Fridays (more on that in a moment).  Like many establishments lining the Divis corridor, the decor at Blue Jay is vibrant, cheery and made complete by the really cool but ridiculously expensive artwork peppering the walls.  The owners are also affiliated with Socha Cafe, Revolution Cafe and Alamo Square Seafood Grill, so they’re legit.  Oh, yeah.  They totally know what they’re doing.  But what’s mostly responsible for Blue Jay being a happy place is the fact that there’s different food/drink specials every day of the week.

Monday – 1/2 price drinks all night

Tuesday – $1 PBRs

Wednesday – FREE second side

Thursday – $2 sangria

Friday – FREE smiles (See, here we are again.  I get that this is supposed to be cute in a cheeky sort of way, and yeah, I sort of appreciate it, but c’mon.  EVERYONE is smiling on Friday because it’s FRIDAY.  What we really need is, like, $2 Fernet shots or something.)

Saturday – 2 for 1 mimosas at brunch

Sunday – 2 for 1 Bloody Marys

Every day from 5:30pm – 7pm – 1/2 off drinks and kids eat FREE (perfect combo)

I wouldn’t call the Cajun-influenced food cheap, but I wouldn’t call it super pricey either.  There’s some good deals, like the $4 mac and cheese with bacon.  At lunchtime, you can order pieces of fried chicken legs, thighs, breasts or wings for only $.90 – $2.50 each, or you can just cut out the child’s play, head straight for heart attack central and get the chicken and buttery, buttery waffles for $6.95.  I’m also into the brunch because if you want pancakes (with strawberry butter!) you order them individually for $2.25 each.  This is great because pancakes are one of those overwhelmingly filling foods that you feel like ordering once in a while, but you’re pretty much done after one or so and then are stranded with this heaping stack that you’ve barely chipped the surface of and don’t want to take home to eat later because soggy round discs make shitty leftovers.

Things I can personally attest to as being good here are the fried chicken (with or without waffles), the mac and cheese, the crispy calamari with garlic aioli, the Reuben, the grilled cheese (hard to fuck up), the pulled BBQ pork sandwich, the pancakes, the sangria, and the refreshingly sweet, attentive and super hot waitress that I always get.  I should also mention that I hear from a Kiefer Sutherland look-alike source (read:  the most reliable source on the planet) that the grilled pork tenderloin with apple chutney is the best “other white meat” he’s ever tasted  (though it’s nothing I would ever, ever order at a restaurant, especially a restaurant that also has fried chicken on the menu).

I just ate, but damn you, Blue Jay, you have too strong a pull.  I just might consider turning bulimic for you.