From the road, Stone’s Café and Bakery looks like one of those tumble-down joints where you’d least expect to get a good meal much less a sweet slice of pie or cake. Yet on my first visit there nearly 15 years ago, its charms were immediate. Then again I’m an easy mark for family-style diner fare that’s well prepared as heartily old-fashioned as Mother Goose and pretty cheap too. I would go there regularly for breakfast or lunch, even though it’s a 20-minute drive from Portland. At breakfast, the sausage gravy over biscuits, the corned beef hash, blueberry pancakes, great home fries and wonderful biscuits made it worth the trek. And when they had their special Saturday night dinners we’d all pile in and stuff ourselves silly with prime rib, pot roast, lasagna, fried fish or whatever the cook’s fancy was that night. That was pre-2006 when it was known as Stone’s Grove Café and owned by the Mason family for many years. Before that it was owned by the Sweetsirs (“Fran’s”), another local family. It’s been around like forever! But beyond its ownership succession this was the quintessential neighborhood constant where families grew up on those wonderfully wholesome meals.
The modest building that houses Stone’s Cafe and Bakery
