The Cochrane Cafe
This story of the Quan family appeared in the Cochrane Times March 28, 1979. The article written by Paula Barnhart.
It’s a long way from Hong Kong to St. Walburg, Sask., and a long way, too, from there to Lloydminster and Cochrane, Alberta, and it took Charlie Quan from 1956 to 1972 to start the Cochrane Cafe on Main Street here.
Charlie went to high school at first, and picked up the trade from grandfather Tim, who had a restaurant in St. Walburg. (Near where Don Wigton is from). Later, Charlie started a little place much like the Cochrane Cafe in Lloydminster and married Nancy Ang from Vancouver. They moved to Calgary five years later and operated a grocery store in NW Calgary.
Charlie didn’t like the big city life and so came out to have an ice cream cone (honest) and spotted his present location. He looked over the old 7-Star and Range Grill, and decided this was the best place, even though nobody wanted it and the local pundits gave him six months to go belly up.
He opened January 2, 1972, however, and is still going strong, recently purchasing the building next door and enlarging the cafe seating capacity greatly.
For the past seven years Charlie and his family have worked exceedingly long hours in the cafe, and the only break was when he decided to work just ‘eight hours instead of 24’ a day and be the chef for old friend Eddie Myer, who had purchased the Crowchild Inn. This was just after his third son, William, was born, and during these two years, Charlie leased the Cafe to his brother-in-law.
The Quans, another ‘downtown’ family, live above the Cafe. In addition to William, 3, they have sons Harvey, 13, and Paul, 9.
Helping in the Cafe are Charlie’s grandfather, Tim, who even at 97 is still busy nearly every day, Charlie’s mother, Mrs. Wai Quan, his sister, Janet Quan, wife Nancy, Aileen Payette, Sharon Coleman, Dorothy Foley, and Rick Wong.
The Cafe is almost always busy, with breakfast crowd, coffee drinkers, huge lunch bunch and regular dinner customers.
Available are both Canadian and Chinese cooking, and moderately priced specials on business days. Charlie also caters to parties, weddings and meetings, and has a take-out service as well. Most dishes are on demand, but some, like his delicious garlic ribs, need advance notice of at least two days. Charlie calls these ‘old country style cooking – Chinese ribs’.
He has MacKay ice cream cones, too, and a brisk Sunday trade of visitors and local people in after Church. The Cafe is open from 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day except Wednesday, when it is closed at 2 p.m.
Charlie Quan owes his success not only to hard work, but to a friendly countenance that encourages people to relax while eating or drinking coffee.
Coffee drinkers often get up and switch booths, yelling to Charlie they have moved so their cup doesn’t get missed. When it gets extremely busy at the till or counter, it is not unusual for a customer to pop over to the coffee pot and pour a round for his boothful, with Charlie yelling they had better put an apron on.
All the friendliness and hard work in the world wouldn’t help, however, if the food wasn’t, as one lunch customer put it, ‘darned good, and you don’t have to pay an arm or leg for it’.
Charlie is an avid supporter of the Cochrane & District Chamber of Commerce, of which he is a Charter member, and is considered a good neighbour by everyone who knows him. We hope the Cochrane Cafe will continue as a home-style restaurant for many years to come
