Until early October, Maugus Cafe closed at 5 p.m. every day. That is changing. The Wellesley Select Board approved license amendments that let the cafe at 300 Washington Street operate from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., seven days a week, with an all-alcohol license, The Swellesley Report reported on Oct. 7. No posted closing time on that stretch of the Hills runs to 10 p.m. The latest is Singh's Cafe, which closes at 9:30 most nights.
So the room that has been the Hills' morning anchor for more than 90 years is now licensed to stay open later than any of the dinner restaurants around it. Whether that matters depends on how evenings on this block already work. They run differently from mornings.
A Breakfast Counter With a Liquor License
The Maugus Restaurant changed hands in 2025 and reopened about a year later under new ownership, with a new name, Maugus Cafe. In its July profile of the reopened cafe, The Swellesley Report described how owner Kostas Saranteas kept the counter stools, the booths and the back seating. He pulled up the red carpet and added counter seats facing Washington Street, plus outdoor tables. The menu still has the classic breakfast and lunch plates, now joined by Mediterranean-inspired dishes and specialty coffee from Atomic Coffee Roasters on a new espresso setup.
After a summer soft opening, the cafe held its grand reopening on Friday, Oct. 9. Before the license change, it ran Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. and opened at 7:30 a.m. on weekends. The new license covers dinner and some special events after 5 p.m. The cafe has said dinner will come on select days "in the coming months," so look up its current schedule before you plan an evening there.
The license sets an outer limit, not a nightly schedule. Still, it means that once dinner starts at Maugus, the place on the block with the longest permitted hours will be a counter that opens at 7 a.m.
Evenings Already Belong to the Ends of the Block
On the short run of Washington Street between Yama at 245 and Singh's Cafe at 312, the places that serve dinner sit mostly at the edges. The coffee and bakery shops in between close by mid-afternoon or early evening. These are the hours each business posts on its own website as of late October:
| Address | Business | Posted hours relevant after 5 p.m. |
|---|---|---|
| 245 Washington St. | Yama Japanese Restaurant | Dinner 5 to 9 p.m. Mon to Fri; 4:30 to 9 p.m. Sat and Sun |
| 259 Washington St. | Jeje's Coffeehouse & Roastery | 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Tue to Fri; 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sat |
| 263 Washington St. | Mortadella Head | 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily, new hours as of Oct. 1 |
| 272 Washington St. | Quebrada Baking | 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mon to Sat; 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sun |
| 288 Washington St. | Comella's | 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sun to Tue; 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wed to Sat |
| 300 Washington St. | Maugus Cafe | Licensed 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily; dinner on select days planned |
| 312 Washington St. | Singh's Cafe | Dinner from 4 p.m. daily; closes 9:30 p.m. Mon to Sat, 9 p.m. Sun |
Coconut Thai Cafe at 257 and Liliko at 268 are also on this stretch. Neither posts its hours on a page this table could draw from, so contact them directly.
Quebrada opens at 6 a.m. and Jeje's at 8, and both do their business before dinner. By 6 p.m. on a weekday, the open kitchens are Yama, Mortadella Head, Comella's and Singh's. The Mortadella Head site lists its 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. hours above all three of its locations, which include Davis Square in Somerville and Newport, Rhode Island. After 8 p.m., the list shrinks to Yama, Singh's and, from Wednesday through Saturday, Comella's.
Maugus sits at 300, between Comella's at 288 and Singh's at 312, at the dinner end of the block. When its evening service begins, that end gets a third kitchen within a few doors, and the only one licensed past 9:30.
Sunday and Monday Nights Are Where the Extra Hour Shows Up
Late hours make the biggest difference early in the week. On Sunday night the latest posted closings on this stretch are 9 p.m. at Yama and Singh's, with Comella's and Mortadella Head at 8. On Monday and Tuesday, Comella's still closes at 8. Jeje's posts no Sunday or Monday hours, and Quebrada closes at 4 p.m. on Sundays.
The Maugus license makes no distinction between a Tuesday and a Saturday. The cafe has said dinner will run on "select days," and those days will decide whether the early-week gap in the Hills gets any shorter. For now, Sunday after 9 p.m. is the hardest time to find an open kitchen in Wellesley Hills, and the Maugus license is the only one on the block that allows service at that hour.
Two More Changes Within a Few Doors
Maugus is one of three ground-floor changes this year on the same short stretch.
Liliko, an Asian convenience store at 268 Washington Street, opened over the summer. This month it received Select Board approval for a take-out common victualler license and began installing a hot-water station and microwave, so customers can prepare packaged food like ramen in the shop and carry it out. The town's Health Department has been working with the store on the setup, according to The Swellesley Report.
Down the block at 251 Washington Street, in the building with Marathon Sports, Pvolve has been preparing a fitness studio with a winter opening target. It will be the brand's first location in Massachusetts, The Swellesley Report reported in August.
Pvolve hasn't published its schedule, so neither business explains the evening question yet. Still, they show the storefronts between 245 and 312 changing hands and changing uses this year, around the 90-year-old cafe that is rewriting its own hours.
November and December Dates, Matched to Posted Hours
Most of the season's big Wellesley events take place outside the Hills. Several end in the late afternoon or evening, when the table above starts to matter.
- The Cashmere Sale, through Tuesday, Dec. 22. The 16th-year pop-up is in the former Dover Saddlery space at 595 Washington Street in Wellesley Square. It runs Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m., with metered parking in front and free parking in back, according to The Swellesley Report. By its 5 p.m. weekday close, Singh's has been serving dinner for an hour and Yama's dinner service is just starting.
- Wellesley Marketplace, Saturday, Nov. 21. The Wellesley Hills Junior Women's Club hosts this at Wellesley High School, 50 Rice Street. The club bills it as more than 200 local businesses and food vendors, with proceeds going to local scholarships and grants. The town calendar lists VIP entry at 9 a.m. and general admission from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Yama's Saturday dinner starts at 4:30, and Comella's is open until 9 that night.
- Festival of Trees, Nov. 25 through Dec. 28. The Massachusetts Horticultural Society runs it at the Garden at Elm Bank, 900 Washington Street. It is open Wednesday through Sunday with added vacation-week hours, closed Thanksgiving and Christmas, and timed tickets are required.
- Wellesley Square Improvement Project, survey through Sunday, Nov. 29, and public meeting Thursday, Dec. 10, at 7 p.m. The town's notice puts the meeting at Hunnewell School, 28 Cameron Street, where officials will review survey data and design options. Comella's is open until 9 on Thursdays and Singh's until 9:30, both before and after the meeting.
For the rest of this season, the Hills will keep the same shape it had in October. Mornings belong to Quebrada, Jeje's and the Maugus counter. Evenings belong to Yama, Comella's, Singh's and Mortadella Head. A single license now lets the oldest of those rooms stay open past all of them. Until Maugus posts its dinner days, 9:30 p.m. at Singh's is still the latest posted closing on this stretch of Washington Street.
Changes in how a village center like Wellesley Hills is used, block by block and hour by hour, are part of what buyers react to when a nearby home comes on the market. If you own near Washington Street and want to know how the Hills' changing storefronts fit into your home's value, Anne M. Kennedy can walk you through it with real numbers. Get Your Free Home Valuation.
