Seattle Sun Newspaper - Vol. 7, Issue 6, June 2003

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Moo-ve over for Mae's Cafe

By MATTHEW PREUSCH

When Jeanne Mae Barwick first opened Mae's Phinney Ridge Cafe in 1988 she had a "silent partner": Mae.

Mae, a gum-smacking, beehive-topped, horn-rimmed-glasses-wearing waitress of insuppressible sass, is Barwick's alter ego and her cafe's namesake.

She comes out once a year, on Halloween, to shoot back-talk and sling hash at Mae's. The rest of the time Barwick handles things on her own.

Barwick, 56, opened Mae's after five years of cutting her teeth on the Seattle restaurant scene, first as an employee at Julia's 14-Carrot Cafe in Eastlake and later at the Julia's eatery in Wallingford.

Barwick calls Julie Miller, the original owner of Julia's, her mentor.

When Barwick bought her business, then known as the Phinney Ridge Cafe, it was in bad shape, an "authentic greasy spoon," complete with paintings of scenes from the Wild West that were dingy from years of cigarette smoke.

The restaurant, under Barwick's ownership, has been transformed. Today, it sports a whimsical interior decor with an emphasis on cows. Lots of cows, black and white Holsteins, mostly.

One area, the "moo room," features a cow mural and cow sculpture hanging above the bar, covered with cow knickknacks, an obsession from her early days in Wisconsin.

The menu at Mae's swings from the traditional, such as corned beef hash, to the nouveau, like a meatless black bean burger.

But the real show at Mae's is clearly the weekend brunch, when crowds spill onto the sidewalks on Phinney Avenue. The cinnamon rolls have a particularly rabid following, said Barwick.

As a result she is planning to sell a frozen version of Mae's cinnamon rolls in local markets. If it's successful, she plans to launch a retail line under the Mae's label.

Barwick's business acumen has been focused recently on her role as president of the Greenwood-Phinney Chamber of Commerce. Lately she's been trying to educate chamber members' on Internet sales and marketing.

Barwick's own site, www.maescafe.com, has a virtual tour of the cafe and its history. In 1997, she won the Mayor's Small Business Award, and last year the Greater Seattle Business Association named her "Businesswoman of the Year."

Barwick is not all business. Mae's is obviously meant to be a fun place: cooks slide orders through a service window shaped like a mouth, customers huddle in booths reminiscent of caves and, of course, there are all the cows.

Barwick moved to Seattle from her hometown, Beloit, Wisconsin. She and two friends drove here in an old telephone service van they bought for $600, traveling across the country until they hit Puget Sound, where they hopped a ferry for Whidbey Island.

There they crossed paths with a salmon fisherman, who took them out for the day on his gill netter. She said she fell in love right there with the mountains and the sea.

"I said, Oh, my god, I have to move here," she said.

Her customers at Mae's Phinney Ridge Cafe are glad she did.