Queen Village’s new all-day restaurant is thanks to a Philly restaurant-industry romance

Queen Village has a new watering hole, and it’s all thanks to a classic restaurant-industry meet-cute.

In 2020, Culinary Institute of America-trained pastry chef C.J. Cheyne was delivering pastries to West Passyunk Avenue’s La Llorona Cantina Mexicana when she met Israel Nocelo, a Puebla native, longtime Philly restaurant vet, and La Llorona’s general manager at the time. The introduction sparked a romance and a collaborative partnership that’s blossomed over the past five years into an engagement and, now, a full-fledged restaurant.

Casa Oui, at 705 S. Fifth St., opened its doors Friday. The all-day spot fuses both partners’ culinary backgrounds — French and Mexican — in a contemporary American restaurant just a block off South Street and East Passyunk Avenue.

It’s open 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. for breakfast and brunch, featuring a full coffee menu, Cheyne’s pastries — doughnuts, cookies, beignets, cinnamon buns — plus breakfast sandwiches, burgers, salads, and tacos. There’s also a crudo bar with weekly rotating dishes including carpaccios and tiraditos dressed with house-made oils and seafood sourced from Philly’s Small World Seafood.

The menu shifts after 3 p.m. for dinner: There are ceviches, steak with pepper sauce and cognac, churrasco with chimicurri sauce, tacos (al pastor, asada, fried fish), cauliflower with chili oils, guacamole, chorizo, and green hummus. (“We eat a lot of hummus in Mexico, made with chili powder and veggies,” Nocelo said.) Cheyne’s desserts, including miniature ice cream cakes, will be on the menu, too.

The 60-seat restaurant’s debut comes after both Cheyne and Nocelo wound down their respective previous spots: Oui Pastries in Old City and the Si Taqueria in Point Breeze. “When we knew that the leases were going to expire soon,” Cheyne said, “our goal ... was to find somewhere to bring the two together — have one home.”

The couple had recently moved to Queen Village and found their new address while on a walk through the neighborhood. They took over 1,500-square-foot space that was formerly home to Umai Umai.

Once they secured the lease and a liquor license (a factor Cheyne said was their “biggest objective”), Nocelo and Cheyne started remodeling the space with different textures — marble, cement, and metal — inspired by the design of museums in Mexico City. “It’s very classy, very clean,” Nocelo said. “When you walk [into the restaurant], we want the focus to be on what you get on the table — the cocktails and the food.”

Expect habanero margaritas, dirty martinis with blue cheese-stuffed olives, and Rival Bros. espresso martinis on the seasonally rotating cocktail menu. The wine list includes selections from Spain, France, Italy, and California, as well as local wineries. After 10 p.m., there’s a separate menu of late-night cocktails and snacks; think Libélula tequila and prickly pear-grapefruit sipper and steak tartare tostados.

Come spring and summer, the couple plans to have 30 seats on the patio.

Nocelo explains that there are some aspects of Mexican cuisine that have long been influenced by French technique due to France’s occupation of Mexico in the 1860s. “Croissants and baguettes, all that, are French influences in Mexico, especially in Puebla City,” he said. “Without the French, we would have never had cakes in Mexico.”

The connection between the two cooking styles is what led to the chefs’ initial collaboration. After their meet-cute, Cheyne baked pan dulce Mexican bread and other pastries for La Llorona for about a year. The couple worked together on various food and beverage events in the city. And then in 2022, they ran a pop-up at Oui with cochinita tacos and Mexican-flavored doughnuts. The concept evolved into their takeout hotspot, Sí Taqueria, where you could pick up fresh conchas (baked to order in a wood-fired oven) and al pastor breakfast sandwiches (or tacos) served on Cheyne’s croissants.

Casa Oui is the culmination of Cheyne and Nocelo’s cooking collaborations, the pair said.

“We want to welcome you into our house,” Cheyne said. “Our line is, ‘It’s a place to stay a while,’ so however you’re coming — for a bite, tapas to share, or dinner — we want you to feel welcomed."

Casa Oui, 705 S. Fifth St., 267-654-0016, instagram.com/casaouibar. Hours: 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday. Lunch/brunch 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., happy hour 2 to 5 p.m., dinner 3 to 10 p.m. Late-night menu 10 p.m. to midnight Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Closed Mondays.