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After eight years of friendship and working together behind the counter at McDonald’s, Ritik Mehta and Parth Patel are swapping fast food for their own specialty coffee and dessert café on North Terrace.
The pair first met while studying a Bachelor of Computer Science in Melbourne after moving to Australiain 2019. Later, they both relocated to Adelaide to complete their master’s degrees.
“We used to study together, work together, everything,” Ritik says.
That included working at McDonald’s, where both eventually became managers. It was there that they began to discuss owning a business together.
“We just wanted to do something of our own,” Ritik says.
“Owning a café was the dream.”
Now that dream is a reality, with The Odd House opening on Friday August 7 at 227 North Terrace.
“We saw the opportunity, the cafe was on lease, and it’s a pretty good spot in front of like uni, and we just decided to take the risk,” he says.
He added that finding the right name took almost as much thought as the business itself.
“We were trying to look for names, but they were all sounding the same.”
“We just wanted to do something like different, so that’s why I had ‘odd’ in my mind.”
The result is a venue that’s less about sticking to one trend and more about offering a little bit of everything – “there is no niche,” according to Ritik.
Coffee will naturally be at the centre of the menu, with both hot and iced options sitting alongside colourful specialty drinks including matcha, taro and ube lattes. The drinks list also includes flavoured Italian sodas and a selection of açaí bowls.
For breakfast and lunch, bagels will be the hero.
“Bagels are our main thing for the morning,” Ritik says.
“They’ll be alongside pastries like croissants and different types of croissants, just to make the menu a bit more visible.”
As the day turns into night, the menu shifts towards desserts designed for social media as much as sweet tooths.
Leading the charge are scoopable cookies — the viral dessert that’s still molten when it reaches the table.
“They’re freshly baked cookies, but they’re still in the melty form,” Ritik says.
“They haven’t got the shape yet, so it’s going to be really melty, and then there’s stuffing inside like pistachio, Nutella or Biscoff. It’s served in a bowl with ice cream, and then you put toppings on top.”
Waffles and brownies round out the dessert offering, with flavours inspired by some of the internet’s favourite treats, including Kinder Bueno, KitKat, pistachio and Dubai chocolate.
The Odd House
When: 7am to 11pm, 7 days a week
Where: 227 North Terrace, Adelaide
To find out more, click here.
