Black-Owned Eateries in Downtown Oakland Get a Boost a Special Customer Base: OSA Students
By Daisha Williams
Post News Group Intern
When Oakland School of the Arts students get a break from class, they frequently stop at their favorite hangouts for food and drinks in downtown Oakland, including three Black-owned spots, Dusk Coffee, Mama T’s, and Rare Blend Coffee.
Black-owned businesses tend to be hard to find because they are hard to keep around. However students at Oakland School for the Arts (OSA) help keep these businesses around by visiting so frequently.
A high schooler’s day is long, with eight hours of school, and for many, extracurricular activities after school. Caffeine is a much-needed energy boost for many students, and coffee is an easy, delicious, way to get it.
Both Dusk Coffee and Rare Blend Coffee get a significant amount of business from OSA students.
A rose latte is one of the appealing drinks that Oakland School for the Arts students buy at Dusk Coffee. Photo by Daisha Williams.
Rare Blend is a small cafe that sits on the corner in between the school and the parking lot on 19th street. There are tables and little booths inside, but students tend to prefer sitting outside in the alleyway in groups of six to eight, with a few at a time going inside to get drinks. In addition to coffee, Rare Blend offers small pastries and smoothies.
Dusk Coffee is a little farther away, on 16th street, but still incredibly easy for students to go to on their lunch break. There are many tables and chairs outside their cafe, so students often eat lunch here as well. The cafe is decorated in neutral colors, contrasting with Rare Blend’s colorful aesthetic. In this sense, Dusk is a very traditional coffee shop. In other ways it is incredibly unique, one example being their inclusion of fun menu items like their rose latte.
OSA’s high school students are able to go off campus for lunch and a popular spot for them is Mama T’s, named after the owner. Unlike many local restaurants, Mama T’s has been around for almost 15 years, so it has a long-standing reputation with OSA students.
While many small businesses shut down during 2020 and 2021 due to COVID-19 restrictions. Mama T’s was one of the few businesses that stayed open.
When asked about the pandemic affecting her restaurant, Mama T said, “It definitely impacted me, not only not having the school, but also the City Hall workers and everyone else. The thing that saved me was that I got a contract to make lunches for homeless people.”
Formerly known as Catered 2 U, after restrictions were lifted the restaurant rebranded to Mama T’s, named after the owner. Located less than a block from OSA’s main entrance, the business has no seating area, just a kitchen and a counter.
Still, kids don’t mind standing as they wait for their food before going elsewhere. When asked about the amount of business they get from OSA students, Mama T replied, “Enough so that I created the OSA menu. There are several other schools in the area but I don’t do it for them because they come once every three or four months… I get students from OSA every single day.”
The OSA menu has specific meals for the students, as well as discounts on normal menu items. One menu item that is extremely popular with the students is their fries, which is featured on the OSA menu for only $3 a serving. Robert O’Grady, a junior at OSA said, “Their fries were legendary…. There’s no word to describe it, their fries were on everybody’s mind.”
Other popular menu items include their chicken nuggets and their “famous” fish sandwich.
William Truong, OSA’s student body president, called Mamma T’s “the place I go to treat myself to something good.”
If you’d like to visit, here are the addresses for all the places mentioned.
Mama T’s: 1711 Telegraph Ave
Rare Blend Cafe: 555 19th St
Dusk Coffee: 1615 Broadway
