Cafe 19 (styled as XIX on the sign, because Seneca Falls does not do anything halfway) sits at 20 East Bayard Street in Seneca Falls and operates as a breakfast-and-lunch spot Tuesday through Saturday. The space is compact, the vibe is neighborhood cafe, and the reason people drive from surrounding towns comes down to two things: the coffee program and the baked goods. This place won Gold for Best Dessert and Silver for Best Coffee House at the 2025 FLX Finest awards, which for a small cafe in Seneca Falls is a serious statement.

The menu covers breakfast sandwiches, lunch items, and an assortment of pastries, celebratory cakes, pies, and cookies — all made in-house with locally sourced ingredients. The espresso drinks are properly pulled, and the lattes are the kind that make you reconsider your gas-station-coffee-on-the-way-to-the-lake habits. They also do custom cakes and catering, which speaks to how embedded they are in the community. Hours are early — 7am to 2pm on weekdays, 8am to 2pm Saturday, closed Sunday and Monday — so this is strictly a morning-to-early-afternoon operation.

Cafe 19 fills the gap that every small Finger Lakes town needs but rarely has: a place with genuinely good coffee, fresh-baked pastries that are worth the calories, and a breakfast sandwich that sets the tone for a day of lake-hopping. It is not trying to be a Brooklyn third-wave coffee shop. It is a hometown cafe that happens to execute at a level that wins regional awards. Stop in before heading to the Women's Rights National Historical Park across town, or grab a box of cookies for the road.