Q Restaurant and Wine Bar

"Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist should have his head examined." 
~ Samuel Q. Goldwyn

http://www.qrestaurant.com/


Place: Q Restaurant and Wine Bar
Location: 225 Clement Street (between 3rd and 4th Avenues)
Hours: open for "Brunch" Saturday and Sunday at 9:30am 
(Mr. Karl Q. Brandt, please note, they are not open for "Brunch" nor breakfast any other day of the year ~ especially any other day that ends in a "q")
Meal: Zucchini Cake Benedict ~ with tomato, bacon, avocado, poached eggs and Hollandaise on a griddled zucchini cake, served with home fries; and a cuppa Coffee (with lots of refillas)

(Today's EweToobular juxtaselections should be very obvious: the first song is by the Beach Boys ~ which included at that time Brian Q. Wilson, Mike Q. Love, Al Q. Jardine, Dennis Q. Wilson, and Carl Q. Wilson; and the second song is by Jimmy Q. Cliff.

Okay, so maybe I am all out of ideas for actual "Q" related songs.)


Continuing working my way through my Breakfastary Rotation, I went back to Q Restauarant and Wine Bar (see last 'blog-entry from January 18th, 2014). I sat at the "Wooly Willy" table once again this morning. They now have a pretty powerful magnet to use with it (I think I even pulled a muscle trying to pry it off the metal bench frame); however, it is still not quite strong enough to get all of the metal filings into place. The base of the table seems to have sunken a bit since it was first made and is now too low in places to get all the metal filings positioned correctly. Unfortunately, the resulting lycanthropic effect this morning makes it look more like a "Wooly Larry Talbot" (or "Wooly James Howlett" for you younger readers).

There are always a few other decent possible "Brunch" ideas (either off their standard menu or on their ever-changing weekend "Brunch Specials" menu): Luis' Deliciouso Chilaquiles (corn tortilla chips baked with tomatillo salsa topped with scrambled eggs and white Cheddar with black beans and sour cream); Bowl-O-Spuds-N-Eggs (which I would have substituted their Tater Tots for the homefries); and Corn Scramble. If they had offered Fried Green Tomato Benedict (which they have on several past visits) on their "Brunch Specials" for this weekend, I may have opted for that option, optionally. 

Of course I had them omit the offending, dead, decaying porky bits offal from my meal. The poached eggs were actually on top of two griddled zucchini cakes (in place of any of Mr. Thomas' boring baked goods). I was picturing two eggs atop one large zucchini cake; Zucchini Cakes Benedict would have been a better descriptive name. These were good zucchini cakes, but not quite as good as Dottie's True blue café Uova Benedetto, of course (see last 'blog-entry from April 6th, 2014). They seemed to be made with red bell peppers (if there were any green bell peppers in it, I couldn't really tell), red onions, and possibly some whole corn in them (and, of course, lots of shredded zucchini as the name implies). I really think that these could have been griddled/grilled a little more to give them a nice exterior burnt crust and crunch. 

The eggs were poached properly again this morning. If it seems that I am being hypercritical ~ or hypocritical, or Hippocratical, even ~ it is only because I have high expectations for my Breakfastary Rotation. I would much rather poached eggs be way overcooked (without any noticeable runny yolk) than undercooked ~ where the egg whites are more "egg translucents". Luckily, I don't think think that I really have ever had any other poached eggs undercooked in all of the times that I have had Eggs Benedict-style dishes in all of the places that I have ever eaten at other than just the one time a few visits back at Q Restaurant (see 'blog-entry from September 14th, 2013), so that is a pretty good percentage. However, if they slip-up one more time here, it's down to Single A for them, faster than you can say Jack Q. Robinson…

I really thought it was pretty funny that they served this with a special "Eggs Benedict knife" on the plate (well, it was really just a standard steak knife, but it has to be called something else for stupid vegetarians). Yeah, 'cause a regular butter knife could never cut through a poached egg and soft zucchini cake patties.

In the past, I knew that Q Restaurant had a pretty decent selection of condimentary supplementation, but I only noticed bottles of The Original "Louisiana"BRAND The Perfect Hot Sauce and Tapatío® on the tables today. I used a little (probably just six to eight drops) of my own El Yucateco® XXXtra Hot Sauce Salsa Kutbil-ik® de Chile Habanero (Thanks, Brian!) on top of one of the eggs and some (liberally) Pickapeppa Sauce (Thanks, Amy!) mixed with some "Louisiana"BRAND on the homefries. Plus, I used a good amount of their dried spices-shaker all over everything, too.

With the bill this morning was one Green Apple Frooties®, which is always nice.

Another One Bites the Dust ~ a Breakfastary Update:
As I had gotten to the neighborhood about a half hour before Q Restaurant had opened this morning, I walked up and down Clement Street a bit and noticed that cafe barley (see 'blog-entry from February 2nd, 2014) has closed up already. I had only eaten there once before (which was after seeing a "new" place on my very last visit to Q Restaurant). They were barley opened for very long (I think they had only opened for business back in September 2013). There were no signs or anything stating when or why they have closed.


Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Zucchini Cake(s) Benedict ~ 6.9 (this probably would have been a 7.0 or higher if the zucchini cakes had been a bit crunchier)