Located inside the Porter Exchange building, Cafe Mami puts you straight on the streets of Tokyo, where side street restaurants are plentiful. Always crowded, Mami has seating available on a first-come, first-serve basis -- but the customers here know how to eat and run. Basically, Cafe Mami offers meals that are quick to prepare and easy to digest. My favorite is the Tokyo Hamburg steak, which comes with a plate of rice, a bowl of miso soup, some iceburg salad with sesame oil dressing, and a tiny little new potato. The hamburger steak comes in different styles -- you could get Tokyo (which is a ketchup-flavored sauce) or teriyaki, optionally topped with a fried egg and cheese for $.50 or $1 more. Other popular dishes are the rice bowls topped with an egg, onion, chicken omelette, some different meat and rice dishes, and fried chicken curry. None of the dishes are over $8.95, and the food comes out quick -- a great place to eat and run, literally.
When it’s a bit quieter, I like to order a green tea milkshake, which comes out so thick that I recommend sharing with another person or getting it in a to-go cup to take with you. Many students from Tufts, Leslie, and Harvard come around here to eat, and there's also a Japanese grocery store and a little bakery with delicious baked goods right outside of Cafe Mami. This place is definitely worth the effort to sit and eat!