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By Andi Berlin
'Try the cookie dough pancakes," says the bartender in the Art Deco banquet hall, standing underneath bulbous globe lights that hang from a ceiling of shiny tin tile. The handsome space is the newest addition to the popular Toast Coffee + Kitchen chain, a sprawling multilevel brunch cafe on the bottom floor of a historic Long Beach building.
It's opening week and nearly every table is full at 1 p.m. Young women in sundresses sip bloody Marys out of glass mugs as servers wearing "Good morning Long Beach" T-shirts shuttle plates of avocado toast topped with burrata cheese. Even though this is summer in Long Beach, nobody is...