At Stompin’ Grounds Book Café inside the Billings Public Library, Executive Chef Oscar Andrew Dorantes is doing more than preparing food. He is nourishing a community. In Montana’s Trailhead, where the café operates alongside the Book Nook run by the Friends of the Library, Oscar has become a beloved presence, serving up good food with a generous helping of heart.
It was Oscar’s community that first drew me to this coffee shop and eatery. In all my years of reporting on the food and people under the Big Sky, I have rarely heard such an outpouring of unsolicited praise for a chef, his cooking and community work.
“Have you tasted Oscar’s food?” people asked. “You should go to Stompin’ Grounds at the library,” others encouraged. “We just love Oscar,” they gushed.
When recommendations arrive without my asking, especially with such enthusiasm, my curiosity is piqued. Clearly, there was something special happening at the library, and I wanted to find out what it was.
I first interviewed Chef Oscar in early 2023, when he was cooking at The Granary in midtown Billings. The longtime establishment was undergoing a transformation from a traditional steakhouse into a Mediterranean-inspired restaurant with an emphasis on seafood. An oyster bar and tanks filled with live lobsters and snow crabs were among the new attractions. During that visit, Oscar gave me a primer on the art of shucking and eating oysters, even answering the age-old question of whether to chew or simply swallow the slippery delicacies.
Before The Granary, Oscar had honed his skills at Buffalo Block at the Rex, working under Executive Chef Austin Stewart, who helped owner Rick Larson launch the newly remodeled and revitalized restaurant. Following Stewart’s departure, Oscar worked alongside James Bramlett before eventually taking the reins himself.
By the end of 2023, however, Oscar was ready for a change. He stepped away from the world of fine dining to join his mother, Cynthia Johnson, at Stompin’ Grounds in the Billings Public Library.
Cynthia had purchased the café in 2019 after relocating from the San Diego area, where she had owned Pine Valley Java and the Boulevard Café. When she first told her son about her plans to buy a coffee shop inside a library in Montana, Oscar was less than enthusiastic. “That sounds terrible,” he recalled telling her.
But Cynthia saw possibilities where her son saw uncertainty. “No, the price is right. It’s going to be great. Everyone will come. This is going to be my last stomping ground,” she assured him. As it turned out, Cynthia may have been onto something.
Oscar initially joined Stompin’ Grounds with the intention of working alongside his mother. Over time, however, he took over the operation and began putting his own stamp on the café, rebranding it as Stompin’ Grounds Book Café.
He wanted the café to feel like an extension of the library itself, a place where food, books and community could come together. “I wanted to be closer with the library, closer with the Friends, and we’re just going to have this kind of literary theme,” he explained. That inspiration is written all over the menu.
Coffee lovers can sip a Librarian’s Latte, Novel Frappe Fusion or Narrator’s Americano. Those looking for something to eat might turn the page to Bookmark Brownies, Mac and Manuscript, Hamlet’s Delight or a Morning Prologue Sandwich.
The menu, displayed above the counter, offers an ample selection of food and beverages, each accompanied by playful descriptions that invite customers to linger over the choices. And Oscar, with his quick wit, has a ready response for anyone who finds the menu a little too wordy. “You know, it’s funny. People go, ‘Oh, there’s a lot of words on your menu.’ I’m like, ‘You know, what a shame you got to come to the library and do a little bit of reading.’” At Stompin’ Grounds, it seems, a little reading is simply part of the recipe.
Oscar works his culinary magic in a kitchen measuring a mere 150 square feet, equipped with a portable convection oven, a hot plate, freezers and cold storage. It is a far cry from the spacious professional kitchens where he once cooked, but he has learned to make the most of every inch. “When I have to, I’ll go to a friend’s kitchen here in town when I have large banquets or large parties or mass produce cookie dough,” he explained.
Despite the limited space, Oscar turns out an impressive variety of dishes, including Friday night takeaway dinners that have become a popular offering. Each meal arrives packaged and ready to be warmed in the oven, bringing a little of Oscar’s cooking into customers’ homes.
Every Sunday evening, a weekly newsletter posted on the café’s Facebook page recaps the happenings at Stompin’ Grounds and offers a taste of what is coming in the week ahead, including the menu for Friday night’s dinners.
The offerings range from comforting lasagna and enchiladas to salmon fillets and braised steak dinners. Protein-centered meals are typically accompanied by a starch, such as creamy mashed potatoes, and a serving of vegetables that might include broccoli, Brussels sprouts or asparagus. For those craving something sweet, a pumpkin cheesecake is priced at $8, while a comforting bowl of Roasted Tomato and Basil Bisque sells for $8.99.
With dinners priced around $10, including delivery, Oscar makes chef-prepared meals both affordable and accessible, bringing the flavors of his kitchen directly to customers' homes. Word has spread, and as demand has grown, he has enlisted the help of DoorDash to bring meals to hungry customers.
The weekly newsletter offers more than a preview of Oscar’s culinary creations. It also keeps readers connected to happenings at the library and throughout the community.
Tucked behind the checkout desk in the lobby of the Billings Public Library, Stompin’ Grounds shares its cozy corner with the Book Nook, operated by the Friends of the Library. Here, a rotating collection of gently used books—fiction, nonfiction, children’s stories, biographies, Westerns and more—invites visitors to browse for their next good read. The intimate space accommodates about a dozen diners, with additional seating spilling into the library lobby.
“We just have a symbiotic relationship,” said Sue Bach, a Friends of the Library volunteer. “People come in, they come in to buy a book. They sit down, they leaf through it, then they’ll go over and talk to Oscar, and they’ll get a cup of coffee and a pastry.”
Sometimes the experience unfolds in reverse, with the aroma of coffee or the promise of a delicious bite drawing visitors to the café before they wander over to discover a book.
For longtime Friends of the Library volunteer Clare Young, one menu item in particular, has earned her devotion. “He makes probably the best Reuben I think I’ve ever had in my life, bar none,” she declared. Oscar takes pride in the sandwich, giving the deli classic his own thoughtful touches.
“I’m really proud of the Reuben that we do. I get the sauerkraut from the Hutterites. I make the Thousand Island dressing,” he said, admitting with a smile that he may have borrowed the dressing recipe from his days cooking at The Field House.
Assistant Library Director Megan Thomas sees the café as more than a place to grab a bite. It has become a destination in its own right, drawing people who might not otherwise visit the library. “Some people are making the Stompin’ Grounds Book Café a destination. And I have seen people come in who are coming in just for the café but then now they’re in the library and making a connection with us.”
For Jeannie Tracy, Executive Director of the Library Foundation, Oscar embodies the library’s mission of welcoming everyone and fostering connections. “We say the library is this community space where every single person is welcome. There’s nothing that happens at the library that can’t connect with people in some way, shape, or form, and that’s what Oscar is. He connects with people in a way or a shape or form that’s best for them.”
Perhaps nowhere is that spirit of generosity more evident than at Thanksgiving, when Oscar will prepare holiday dinners for about 250 people in the community. The tradition began two years ago as a quiet gesture of kindness toward those who might otherwise go without a holiday meal. “I quietly just put together some meals for the homeless around town, and a lot of the people who come in here. I know them. I see them every day. The first people who come through the doors are the people out in the cold,” he recalled.
What began as a modest effort has grown into a community undertaking. In the days leading up to Thanksgiving, Oscar will welcome helping hands with food preparation and deliveries, as well as financial contributions to make the meals possible.
For Oscar, the move from the bustling kitchens of fine dining to a tiny café tucked inside a public library has brought rewards that extend far beyond the plate. “I get to know my community. I can come here and I know my regulars and I see them multiple times a week,” he shared.
Gone are the grand kitchens and elaborate trappings of fine dining, but in their place Oscar has found something perhaps even more satisfying: the opportunity to nourish people he has come to know, one meal and one conversation at a time. “It’s humbling. It’s fulfilling, and I couldn’t ask for anything better.”
In a small space, Chef Oscar has found room for something much bigger than food. He has found a place to belong, a community to embrace and a way to give back to the people who have welcomed him into their lives.
