Success is as sweet as the decadent pastry at Asia’s Café. In its 10-month span, business is solid at the eatery inside York Pharmacy found along the super-busy Half-Way-Tree Road thoroughfare, and the hot spot’s operators are keeping pace with the groundswell of customers.

“We have tripled our clientele since the first quarter of the year,” Asia’s manager Steve Beckford divulges.

Taking a break from assumed duties behind the cash register at the height of lunchtime traffic on Tuesday, he informs that it’s more than a near-ideal location that has helped to boost the profile of the eatery. Pointing to a carefully crafted menu of diverse savoury and sweet fare, and an insistence on making customer service paramount, the manager believes Asia’s fast ascent is by no means incidental.

Truth is in the pudding — and trust us, the eatery’s Cuban bread pudding is to-die-for — and our weekday visit verifies Beckford’s articulated service checklist as there’s steady patronage (many regulars, but equally balanced with first-timers, some on prescription-filling trips to the pharmacy).

Transport Authority human resource officer Judine Colley is an avowed Asia’s faithful as lunch is had nowhere else.

“The food here is consistent,” Colley tells Thursday Life. Today, she’s having a take-out of Southern-fried chicken and pasta, but her typical faves are their linguine beef pasta, and the OMG burger with potato wedges. “I love their customer service, and the fact that they treat me with a pleasant familiarity when I come in, and go that extra mile to make sure I’m happy,” she adds.

It’s a to-go order of curry chicken roti wrap and chicken and pumpkin soup for real estate appraiser Tarike Reid, who makes Asia’s a must-do stop twice-weekly for lunch. “I’m partial to the fish and chicken options here,” the sharply dressed gent discloses, in-between sips of his watermelon juice, further noting that the aesthetic of the restaurant has kept him returning.

Meanwhile, for Nastasia Bryan, credit and collection agent at Digicel, it’s an introduction to Asia’s and she’s sufficiently impressed. “I had a bite of a lunch a friend had here, and I was passing by today and decided to give them a try,” Bryan relays to us. The telecoms staffer’s take-out is fourfold: jerk chicken pasta, a curry shrimp roti wrap, a fusion slush drink and a fruit tart for dessert. She gives a thumbs up for the eatery’s done-to-order mantra and service. “I would definitely return,” Bryan says.

Open 24 hours, the pharmacy-set restaurant is a well-oiled, full-service machine with its menu options — be it pancakes and omelettes for breakfast, beef lasagne or oxtail for lunch, Greek or chicken composed salads, and all of its pastry selections, from sweet potato pudding to white chocolate strawberry or cherry cheesecakes – done on-site in the constantly abuzz kitchen space. With a time-shifting staff complement of 19 that includes two pastry chefs, a salad chef and six chefs, the manager says the unseen effective behind-the-scenes operation is a credit to having a good team that deftly handles challenges.

And what’s next given the runaway success of Asia’s?

“People have been repeatedly asking us to open another location, whether in or outside of Kingston,” Beckford tells us.

Our eyes remain peeled for expansion mode.

— Omar Tomlinson

Asia’s Café is located at York Pharmacy, 91 Half-Way- Tree Road, Kingston 10.

Telephone: 754-3707.

Instagram: Asiacafejm.

Facebook: Asia’s Cafe

(PHOTOS: KARL McLARTY)