What's Cooking on 1060: The Kawaii Kitty Cafe

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- A new cafe opens this weekend in Queen Village that brings the popular Japanese "cat cafe" concept to Philadelphia.

The Kawaii Kitty Cafe opens this weekend at 759 South 4th Street. Owner Kristin Eissler said it was designed in the Kawaii style, which in Japanese means cute.

Photo credit: KYW's Hadas Kuznits

The restaurant has a cat theme right as you walk in.

Photo credit: KYW's Hadas Kuznits

"We are and we're very excited to get them all adopted."

But don't worry, cats are in a separate room from the actual cafe.

"We have Japanese-inspired cafe foods, so we have salads and soups, smoothies and local pastry and we also have a full espresso bar."

You can take your food and drink into the cat room at your own risk, or just watch through the glass, but she stresses the cats are separate from where they serve the food.

"No cats on the counters, no furballs in your coffee or anything."

Photo credit: KYW's Hadas Kuznits

Eissler said they experienced nearly a year's delay in opening.

"Since it's such a new idea, the city doesn't really know how to categorize us."

The cats are being provided by PAWS.

"We have six rights now but we'll probably max out at 10," Eissler said. "We filter them in slowly so that they can get used to going from a cage to a big room with sun and couches."

She said she has a lot of ideas up her sleeve.

"This will be our focus for a while, but I want to see if we can expand and branch out to like a dog microbrewery or something like that!"

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