Kafeoke is a coffeehouse-restaurant-karaoke joint-voice school located on the beach in a residential area in south Chennai. The setting is an inconspicuous big house in a quiet neighborhood, nestled between two fishing villages and set back from the street by a long driveway. We visited the place on a sunny Sunday afternoon and it was pretty quiet, filled with a handful of young, fashionably dressed Indian couples. The downstairs area is open to the outdoors, with wicker swinging chairs. No view of the beach though.
Upstairs has a modern interior with photos of musicians framed on the wall. The folks who furnished the place seemed to have been trying hard to encourage people to forget the beach that exists outside the building, fully covering all the windows with a thick fabric. The only place where you can sit and see the beach is from a smallish balcony upstairs.
Kafeoke’s menu has the Indian/Continental fusion items typical of fashionable places catering to the young IT and call center workers with money to burn: paneer burger, chicken tikka pizza and “Serloin Steak” (made out of smoked chicken). The coffee drinks turned out to be a bit of a disappointment as the espresso machine was broken. As a result I ordered a filter coffee and my companion a masala tea (i.e. chai). Both drinks were fair – nearly identical to the drinks one can purchase at tea stalls on every street in the city, but at a fraction of the price of Kafeoke.
Kafeoke is an operational karaoke joint and I’m not sure this is an attractive feature from the perspective of the coffeehouse customer. Probably best to keep the singing inside the insulated voice-school room.
As a side note, Kafeoke coffee shop serves LavAzza coffee beans.
