Found a perfect lunch.

White table cloths, excellent salad with crunch, a dessert worth fantasizing about, crisp white wine and a charming host dressed to the nines who speaks French. That’s enough to make me really, really happy.

City Cafe, 5757 W. Lovers Lane (thecitycafe.com), has been making people, many of them names well known around here, happy for 25 years. In restaurant years, that adds up to a really long time.

The dessert, a scrumptious cake of which I rhapsodize, has been there the entire 25 years, but the salad is relatively new. Point being that the restaurant has figured out how to mix tradition with innovation in a most delicious way.

The salad, named Cathy’s Healthiest Chopped Vegetable Salad, was added to the menu maybe three months ago. Cathy is a patient whose nutritionist recommended she eat this salad that contains everything but the proverbial kitchen sink. She asked owner Karim Alaoui if he could make it for her, and he decided “It’s not only for her.” So the delicious concoction of fresh green beans, asparagus, red onions, tomatoes, pine nuts, artichoke hearts, carrots, mushrooms, cilantro and a light citrus dressing is available for all of us to reap its healthful benefits. My new boyfriend, Karim, tells me its the most requested item in the restaurant.

Then there’s that fabulous cake. Chocolate fanatics, you’ll have to trust me on this one, but you won’t miss chocolate at all. Mile high layers of angel food topped with this airy whipped frosting and pieces of toffee. Oh, and I did I mention cappucino for the finale?

City Cafe has been doing something right since the spot has been there since 1985. The day I enjoyed lunch, Dallas Bishop Kevin J. Farrell was there, and I’m told that a certain former president and a certain pro football owner also like to frequent the restaurant. Sunday brunch, they say, is wonderful, but reservations are a must.

City Cafe To Go, right next door, is where you spot soccer moms who stop in for the flavored iced tea and maybe something to serve for dinner that night since everything’s offered for take home.

When shall we go? I won’t even have to look at the menu because I know what I want.