Vaulted ceilings, a papier-mâché poet at a table by the door, and a queue outside that Trotsky did not have to join.
Café Central opened in 1876 in the Palais Ferstel and became, for about forty years, the address where Vienna thought out loud. Peter Altenberg used it as his postal address. Karl Kraus, Adolf Loos, Arthur Schnitzler, Stefan Zweig, Egon Friedell and Leon Trotsky — who played chess here while living in Vienna before 1917 — were all regulars.
There is a well-worn Viennese joke that when told revolution might break out in Russia, an Austrian minister replied, “And who will make this revolution? Perhaps Herr Bronstein from the Café Central?” Bronstein being Trotsky. The story is almost certainly improved in the telling and is repeated in the café’s own literature anyway.
The papier-mâché figure at the table by the entrance is Altenberg, along with his motto: If you have no time, go to the Café Central.
What it is now
A very beautiful room — Gothic-revival vaulting, marble columns, a glass roof — that receives a great many visitors and has organised itself accordingly. There is a queue outside for much of the day. The coffee is fine, the cakes are fine, the prices are high, and the service is brisk in a way that is not the point of a coffee house.
Go once for the room. Do not expect to linger.
The coffee house properly
The Viennese coffee house is on the UNESCO intangible heritage list, and the listing is about a specific practice: you buy one coffee, you are brought a glass of water with it, and you may sit for as long as you like with the newspapers. Nobody hurries you. That is the institution.
For that experience go elsewhere:
Café Sperl (1880, sixth district) has the billiard tables, the worn banquettes and no queue. Café Hawelka is small, dark, smoke-stained and famous for its late-night Buchteln. Café Prückel near Stadtpark is 1950s rather than Baroque and is full of locals. Café Landtmann by the Burgtheater is grand and functions as a political canteen. Café Bräunerhof was Thomas Bernhard’s.
Ordering
Never just “a coffee”. A Melange is the standard — espresso with steamed milk and foam, closest to a cappuccino. A kleiner Brauner is a small black with a jug of cream. A Verlängerter is lengthened with water. An Einspänner is black under whipped cream in a glass.
Cakes: Sachertorte if you must, Apfelstrudel with vanilla sauce, Esterházy, and Topfenstrudel, which is better than all of them.
