(it's all very confusing)
http://cafeflore.com/
Café Floré* is over on Market Street right in the heart of the Castro. There is really nothing fancy about this place at all. You order at the back counter, they give you a number to put on your table, and they bring out the meal when ready. You order and pay for your drinks separately at the bar. The main attraction seems to be the good, hearty food and its location along "Main Street Castro"; a place to see and be seen. Another big attraction is having Prima Colazione al Fresco** in their large outdoor patio area (plus there are several additional sidewalk tables, at least 10-15 or so, available outside the fenced area); this was a great thing on such a sunny Sunday Fall morning.
I had the Flóré Bénédíct ~ poached eggs, homemade cornbread, oven-roasted tomatoes, mushroom ragoût, hollandaise sauce, and garlic fried potatoes. The use of of cornbread instead of English muffins in this Benedict was an interesting concept; however, their cornbread was a little on the sweet side and it really didn't work for me. The roasted tomatoes are a nice touch, if not a bit chunky/unwieldy on top of the cornbread and under the poached eggs (I don't know if it would be feasible to slice the tomatoes first, then roast them; probably not). The mushrooms were plentiful and chunky in the ragoût (sorry, Skip) which is a plus in my book***. Most breakfast dishes come with garlic fried potatoes; they were good, but not as good as yesterday's Excellent! home fries with the huge tracts of roasted garlic cloves. Overall, it was a nice breakfast combination.
Because 'tis (almost) the season, I decided to go with their special Eggnog Latte****, with some ground nutmeg, Ms. Whitman (from a shaker only, though, fresh-ground would have been much better; and they did not have any Cardamom to sprinkle on top ~ neither fresh, nor in a shaker ~ I asked). It was okay, but I still prefer plain ol' black coffee. Their coffee selections are all from Peerless® Coffee.
Just like Eats yesterday, they also offer Tabasco® (again the standard red), Tapatío®, and Cholula®. This is not a bad selection, but I had brought some from my own collection just in case. I went with some Trees Can't Dance Tree Fire Sauce (Thanks again, Greg and Cindy!) on top of the hollandaise sauce on the poached eggs and with some Roland® Piri Piri with Lemon (Thanks, me!) on the potatoes.
There was one breakfast choice on their menu called Bear's Breakfast ~ I figure they must be either Cal fans or fans of the Chicago NFL franchise.
Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Floré Benedict ~ 6.4; Eggnog Latte ~ 6.3
*(I am going with this spelling avec accents aigu at the end of each word just to make it easier and because it's my 'blog. They actually had this spelled three different ways throughout the restaurant and on their website: Café Flore, Cafe Floré, and Cafe Flore. I know this is the Castro and things can sometimes seem ambiguous, but I did ask and didn't get told what the correct spelling should be.)
**(This is simply Italiano for "breakfast in the fresh air/outdoors". It is not one of the goombahs from "Godfather I", "II", or "III".)
***(Unfortunately my book is just a 12-page colouring book, but I do try to stay inside the lines.)
****(Completely random, useless cunning linguist note of the week:
This is the correct spelling of this coffee drink. It is of Italian origin, not French. It is sans accent aigu; it is sometimes incorrectly spelled as Latté or Lattè ~ see last week's comment on hyperforeignism.)
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