Cafe Alma to Expand to PUMA’s “House of Portugal” at Waterplace Pavilion

The pastel de nata latte at Cafe Alma in East Providence. Photo by Jamie Coelho.

Portuguese-style pastries and coffee are making their way downtown. Cafe Alma, which started in East Providence, is slated to be the exclusive food, drink and coffee vendor inside the new PUMA “House of Portugal,” Portugal Futebol Experience at Waterplace Pavilion in Providence ahead of the FIFA World Cup. The cafe will run during Rhode Island’s Summer of Soccer events from early June through Aug. 1.

After successfully opening the popular Portuguese-style East Providence cafe on the same street where Madeira and Campino’s restaurants are located, owner Kevin Matos was tapped to extend the Cafe Alma brand in downtown Providence. The retail store will sell soccer-related merchandise and gear. “We’re running the Puma cafe seven days a week, so we’ll have our basic Portuguese-style coffee drinks and the bakery items,” Matta says. “I’ll be running the upstairs beer garden as well.”

The original Cafe Alma opened in March to lines wrapped around the block for freshly baked sweet bread, pasteis de nata, egg and chourico sandwiches on bolo levedos, bolacha Maria desserts and coffee drinks, including a phenomenal Pastel de nata latte topped with whipped cream and the signature pastry snack. Kevin Matos and his family also own Matos Bakery in Pawtucket where many of the pastries and chourico are still made.

Some of the artwork for sale at Cafe Alma.

Outside the East Providence cafe, there’s a sprawling white and blue brick mural that says Cafe Alma and looks like traditional Portuguese tiles, and inside, another mural pays tribute to the “Queen of Fado” Amália Rodrigues, painted by the artist/owner of Victoria St. Louis Tattoos. An original tin ceiling is painted blue while rattan chairs circle around tables for gathering. The East Providence cafe has a full bar with Portuguese liqueurs and wines provided by Brands of Portugal, Portuguese beer brands and more. It serves morning breakfast sandwiches and bakery treats, and sandwiches for lunch Tuesday through Sunday. On Friday and Saturday nights, a dinner menu with small plates and five entrees is also served. “I just applied for a music license too so we can have fado music,” Matos says.

Cafe Alma focuses on highlighting local artists by hanging artwork for sale on its walls, gallery style. “Any artist that does an art gallery show here, I just want them to do a commissioned Portuguese piece,” Matos says. “The artists make all the money on their own art.”

Inside Cafe Alma in East Providence.

The significance of Cafe Alma’s name means “soul” in Portuguese. “It’s kind of like the Portuguese soul,” Matos says. “It’s bringing in stuff that we grew up on, and then adding some little twists. I call the food that we make here ‘New England Portuguese,’ because a lot of the food that’s around is not native to Portugal. Bife a casa actually originated in Fall River.”

The dinner menu includes the house specialty, bife a casa, which is a steak topped with a fried egg, Portuguese peppers and gravy, and served with tomato rice and duckfat-fried crispy potatoes. There’s also grilled octopus, shrimp mozambique, and bifana, steak and cacoila sandwiches. Matos makes all the chourico himself, using techniques he learned while previously working as a cook at Nicks on Broadway, before returning to help run the family business.

“Chef Derek Wagner has literally the best concept of how he works, how he runs his business, and I was like this is exactly how I want to run my own place one day,” Matos says.

Inside Cafe Alma in East Providence.

Matos looks forward to expanding the East Providence cafe to include fifteen to twenty more seats and he plans to build out the kitchen. He’ll continue to run the downtown location at Waterplace Park temporarily through the World Cup and has hopes to open another location someday in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Matos credits barista Andy Bowen for the creativity of the coffee menu, which includes topping the drinks with the pastel de nata pastries. “He came up with this whole coffee menu, tinkered it, and made it what it is,” Matos says. “He played a huge part in the success of the coffee menu.” instagram.com/cafealmaep