When the Last Chance Cafe closed, it seemed as if Rose Creek residents would have to forge outside their community for places to eat out.

However, this is not to be, thanks to the July 1 opening of the Rosebud Cafe.

Owners Lisa and Andy Cheng say a love of cooking, a need to do something different and the desire to own a small business enticed them to leave their jobs in Rochester and open the cafe.

"Cooking was always one of my hobbies," Andy says.

"He cooks everything and anything," Lisa adds. "He's not a baker though."

"That's where she comes in," he says, smiling.

Their menu offers a little bit of everything, from old favorites like spaghetti and meatballs and pork chops, to many unique oriental dishes. "We want to make sure people get a good meal at a good price and that we give them what's familiar, but we also want to give them things that may be different," Andy says. "I'm surprised at how well the oriental cuisine has gone over. They're pretty popular items. I guess not too many small cafes offer oriental cuisine, though."

He says he also tries "to make the flavors as authentic as possible, make everything as fresh as possible," to give customers the best meal he can.

The restaurant also has theme days to add more variety to the menu. Monday, they offer Mexican food; Tuesday, they have turkey; Wednesday, they have oriental food; Thursday, they offer Italian food and Friday, they have an all-you-can-eat fish fry.

The Chengs say developing their menu and opening the restaurant wasn't all magic, though. "We had an awful lot of help from Rande Hemingway (the owner of the Last Chance Cafe)," Lisa explains. Many nights before they opened, she says he "was in here, walking us through everything. He also left us everything from his restaurant, right down to the salt and pepper shakers."

Hemingway even helped them trim their menu to an amount of food that would be manageable for them and that would appeal to customers.

Though the cafe is so new, the Chengs already have plans for the future. Lisa says they'll eventually start catering and will open a banquet room for people to rent and she hopes to offer complete meals at Thanksgiving and Christmas for people to take home. "I'm hoping to have turkey, dressing, pie, everything," she says.

The Rosebud Cafe is located at 101 Main St. SE in Rose Creek and is open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., Monday through Saturday. Breakfast is served from 7 to 11 a.m., lunch is from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. and dinner is served from 4 to 7 p.m. For more information, call 434-0408.

Amanda L. Rohde can be reached at 434-2214 or by e-mail at amanda.rohde@austindailyherald.com