http://www.bakerstreetbistro.com/ Place: Baker Street Bistro Location: 2953 Baker Street (between Lombard and Greenwich Streets) Hours: open for "Brunch" Saturday & Sunday at 9:00am Meal: Pain Perdu - a brunch favorite!~ two slices of cinnamon French toast, fresh fruit, strawberry coulis & crème fraîche; a side of home fries; and a cuppa (and 1-1/2 refillas) of their house Coffee with a sprig of mint (that someone added to it) ~ à la Turquie (I started doing this on a whim many years before I even knew of Philz Coffee)
(Some more songs from Johnette Napolitano for her birthday weekend celebration. The first one was the closest I could get to a Frenchy-style bistro song[1]. I wonder what Karen would have to say about the second song cover.) Encore une fois, j'ai mangé le petit déjeuner à Baker Street Bistro (see last 'blog-entry from Sunday, April 10th, 2016)... yada, yada, yada[2]... Because Summer has finally arrived in San Francisco, I sat outside on their sidewalk-patio café area. It was actually nice enough early in the morning for me to take off my sweatshirt-jacket even.
Ceci est le Pain Perdu extraordinaire! Of course, this is just my opinion (and, as it is my 'blog-thing, my opinion is the only one that matters here), but this might not only be the best French Toast (Pain Perdu) in All of San Francisco, it is quite possibly the Best Breakfast in All of San Francisco. They also make some of the best home fries in town, too. I love all the dried herbs they make these with (herbes de Provence, peut-être?). Now, I may only go there three to four times a year, but it is the sign of exceptional service when they (in this case, the "they" being Mademoiselle Chantal) ask/remember: "You don't take milk with your Coffee, right?" (Merci beaucoup!) Les fruits du jour: framboises, mûres, cantaloup, pastèque, orange, pommes, et ananas. I had brought along some of my own hot sauces to use as condimentary supplements and went with some El Yucateco®XXXtra Hot Sauce Salsa Kutbil-ik® de Chile Habanero (Thanks, Brian!) on half of the potatoes and some Old St. AugustineDatil[3] Pepper SauceOle Minorcan[4] Recipe Hottern Hell Seasoning (Thanks, Greg & Cindy!) on the other half of the potatoes. the Wild Parrots of San Francisco (non-)Interlude This may have been a first; I was completely shut-out this morning. I did not see neither beak, nor feather of any Wild Parrots of San Francisco. I actually got to the area an hour before the restaurant opened with the specific idea to get some photos of the noisy little chatter-heads. I walked around down by the duck-pond on the Presidio (in the Letterman Campus) and back up to the tall eucalyptus trees by the Lombard Gate. Nuthin'... neech'... tee-po-tah... nada! Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Pain Perdu ~ 8.2; the Wild Parrots of San Francisco ~ 8.4 (8.5 when available) ___________________ 1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer du jour: "Les Coeurs Jumeaux" (I will let you figure out your own pronunciation for that) in French means "The Twin Hearts". 2. I think that "yada, yada, yada" in French translates to: "Ooh-la-la!" (Consider that a freebie stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer du jour.) 3. Also called the "Minorcan hot pepper". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datil_pepper 4. ¿Dónde? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minorca
http://www.dottiestruebluesf.com/ Place: Dottie's True blue café Location: 26 6th Street (on the corner of Stevenson Street) Hours: open Thursday through Monday at 7:30am Meal: Avocado, Tomato, Jalapeño, Corn, Scallion, & Feta Frittata - toast & potatoes; and a glassa grapefruit juice
(Just a coupla Concrete Blonde songs because Thursday was Johnette Napolitano's birthday. Plus, these are both pretty cool covers.) While working my way through my Breakfastary Starting Rotation, I headed back to the Ace of the Staff: Dottie's True blue café (see last 'blog-entry from Saturday, August 13th, 2016). I was the first idiot to arrive this morning (at about 7:05am) ~ it was so early that there were almost no street people milling around on 6th Street even (well, almost none).
Once again, I sat at the table with the Tiki guys salt-and-pepper shakers (which were on Table 22 still). Otherwise, for some other ideas this morning I was also looking at either: Sweet Potato, Caramelized Red Onion, & Gruyere Tart - eggs any style & fruit; or Spinach Provolone Strata - served with Italian sausage (No grazie, Giuseppe!), roasted tomatoes, & fruit. Both of these were also off their weekend specials Blackboard.
I have had this (or a similar combination) frittata before and knew that I liked it a lot. But what's not to like? Avocado - good; corn - good; jalapeño - good; Feta - very, very good! I went with the buttermilk-dill for my choice of toast. Now, this was really a LOT of food again. Even though Dottie's True blue café has a very decent selection for condimentary supplementation, I used some of my own Pope's Whiskey River Full Flavor Hot Sauce (Thanks, Amy and Chef Joe!) on the potatoes and just a little Fan The FlamesSriracha Hot Sauce (Thanks, Mom!) on the frittata. Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Frittata ~ 6.8; buttermilk-dill toast ~ 6.7
Place: Dunkin' Donuts Location: Terminal C (near Gate C20), Logan International Airport, Boston, MA Hours: open at 5:00am Meal: a Reese's®Peanut Butter Square and a Jelly Donut (the sugar-dusted kind); and a medium (14 oz) cuppa Original Roast This is (finally) the last of my 'blog-entries from my Cape Code/Massachusetts vacation (from over a week ago now). Whenever I go through Logan Airport (either coming or going), I always make sure to stop by one of the Dunkin' Donuts kiosks there. The first thing I did when I landed the week before (on Saturday, September 3rd), even before collecting my luggage, was to get a medium cuppa their Original Roast and a Boston Kreme Donut. Because I had an extra early flight outta Boston on Sunday (sorry for the 5:00am wake-up call, Kerry) there were not many other options available for a quick breakfast, anyway.
This breakfast (if two doughnuts and a cuppa can really be called a "breakfast") was completely premeditated. My brother Sean had told me about their Reese's®Peanut Butter Square (which was one of their seasonal "Get Them While It's Fall." specials, along with Caramel Apple Croissant Donut and Pumpkin Muffin) and I knew right away that I was going to pair it along with one of their jelly doughnuts to make it a PB&J two-fer on my way back outta Boston. Other than the sugar-bomb overkill, this wasn't really that bad for an early morning intake. However, calling these "Jelly" doughnuts may be juuuust a bit of a stretch. Hoo-boy! Nowhere on their web-site does it specify which flavour "jelly" is used. I have always assumed that it was strawberry (or possibly raspberry) jelly from the red colour. However, this is the actual list of ingredients: "Jelly Filling: Corn Syrup, Water, High Fructose Corn Syrup[1], Sugar, Apple Juice Concentrate, Contains 2% or less of each of the following: Pectin, Citric Acid, Potassium Sorbate and Sodium Benzoate (Preservatives), Locust Bean Gum, Red 40, Blue 2, Caramel Color, Natural and Artificial Flavor" Ummm, yeah, do you see where they mention any actual strawberries or raspberries at all? Well, I sure hope that their Coffee[2] included some actual Coffee beans in it, at least... Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Reese's®Peanut Butter Square ~ 6.1; "Jelly" Donut ~ 5.9; Original Roast ~ 6.4 ___________________ 1. It's really a shame that they use High Fructose Corn Syrup as an ingredient in their doughnuts. I grew up on Dunkin' Donuts and whenever I am back in Massachusetts, I always like to stop by for a few of their doughnuts. I may have to reconsider that now... Nah! 2. Just in case you were curious like me: "INGREDIENTS: Brewed 100% Arabica Coffee."
"The one with the potato scramble with grilled asparagus tips, balsamic onions, sautéed mushrooms, and gouda cheese."
http://www.ellassanfrancisco.com/ Place: Ella'sNeo Classical American Cooking Location: 500 Presidio Avenue (on the corner of California Street) Hours: open for breakfast Monday through Friday at 7:00am; open for "Brunch" Saturday and Sunday at 8:30am Meal: potato scramble with grilled asparagus tips, balsamic onions, sautéed mushrooms, and gouda cheese ~ with two over-medium eggs laid (placed) on top; and a glassa Ginger Orange Juice Punch
(Does it get any better than early Autumn and the pitch-perfection of Lady Ella?! [Ol' Satchelmouth ain't so bad himself neither.]) Because it is early Autumn (well, almost) and nearing the end of the Regular Baseball Season (Go Red Sox and Giants!!!), I figured this was as good a time as any to work my way through my Breakfastary Starting Rotation one last time for the year. So, I headed back over to Ella'sNeo Classical American Cooking (see last 'blog-entry from Saturday, April 9th, 2016).
Ella'sdoes not have a standard "Brunch" menu; it changes every weekend and highlights whatever is seasonal. Their weekend menu is really not that extensive (usually twelve to fifteen items from which to choose) and even less-so for stupid vegetarian choices. This weekend's other offerings that I might have gone with were: orange-yogurt pancakes with gingered pear compote (in case you haven't noticed, Ella'slikes to type their menu-entries in the minuscule); open faced omelette with bacon, grilled onions, avocados, sun dried tomato, chives, and goat cheese (I liked the sound of this one and would have ordered it without the bacon); folded omelette with grilled chicken breast, roasted garlic, diced tomatoes, and white cheddar cheese (I also would have 86-ed the poultry product); breakfast burrito ~ with house made chorizo, black beans, tomato relish, ranchero sauce, and monterey jack cheese (again, I would have had to ochenta-y-seis-ed la salchicha de cerdo muerto en descomposición); or kale salad ~ olive oil-softened kale slices with sliced grape tomatoes, roasted almond slivers, Feta (Sorry, there is never any reason for "Feta" to be in the minuscule!) cheese, and housemade strawberry vinaigrette (this was going to be my second back-up choice; and if I had gone with this one, I would have asked if they could have laid [placed] a couple of poached eggs[1] on the top of the heap).
I mainly went with this choice because asparagus trumps (or hillaries, even) sun-dried tomatoes and avocado any day. However, kale + Feta was a tough one to pass-up, but I have already had Feta several times in the past few weeks in my breakfast dishes and knew that I wouldn't miss it for one day. I was happy to see that there was a very good amount of asparagus in the dish, too. Many places will say they have asparagus in the description and then go all cheapo-bastage on you and include maybe one spear entirely. I have yet to have had a bad potato scramble combination at this place. I was skeptical at first with Gouda as the cheese choice, but it worked very nicely with all the other ingredients and provided a nice melty-gooey base. For my choice of toast, I did the boring (but sensible and very tasty) selection of their house baked (well, restaurant/bakery-baked) honey oat raisin bread. I made sure to apply several spoonfuls of their good homemade (well, restaurant-made) strawberry jam/preserves on the slices, too. For condimentary supplementation, Ella'sonly has Tabasco®Brand Pepper Sauce, both Original Red Sauce and Green Jalapeño Pepper Sauce. I used some of my own Hot Licks®SerranoHot Sauce (Thanks, Brian!) on top of one of the eggs and some Golden PagodaJalapeñoHot Sauce (Thanks, Mom!) on top of the other egg. (Unfortunately, if I had forgotten to bring any of my own hot sauces with me this morning, I wouldn't be able to blame it on Sean again.) Glen Bacon Scale Rating: potato scramble with grilled asparagus tips, balsamic onions, sautéed mushrooms, and gouda cheese ~ 6.8 ___________________ 1. For about five years after becoming a stupid vegetarian, I would not eat any cooked eggs by themselves (exempla gratia: scrambled, omelettes, quiches, soft/hard-boiled, sunny-side up, over-medium, fried, eggsetera*), but I would eat cakes and other baked goods that had eggs as an ingredient in them. A very sage (or parsely) friend that was stationed with me in Greece at the time informed me that as a "rabbit-food-eater" (and those were probably his exact words ~ there may have been an expletive-deleted or two attached to the phrase) I should go back to eating eggs to supplement the lack of protein-intake in my diet. Back then, most of my protein would have come from milk-products ("Everything's betta with Feta!"™). Keep in mind that this was wayyyy back in the early 80's when there was no such thing as Tofurky® and you try finding any tofu in a Greek αγορά; plus, I didn't "discover" hummus until a few years later while still living in Greece. Thanks once again, for the good advice and push in the right direction, Doug! *(Okay, maybe that was an awful lot of work just to use that silly pun.)
http://narrowscrossingrestaurant.com/ Place: the Narrows Crossing Restaurant & Lounge Location: One Narrows Road, Wareham, MA Hours: open every day (which they have incorrectly as the one-word adjectival form "everyday" on their web-site) at 7:00am (except when they aren't) Meal: (Me) Vegetarian & Cheese Omelette ~ green peppers, mushrooms, and tomatoes, plates include toast and choice of home fries or baked beans; (Kerry) Two Egg Special ~ two eggs, choice of ham, bacon, or sausage (they must have also offered a turkey version, because Kerry went with this choice), with home fries & choice of toast; (Sean) Bacon, Onion, Cheeseburger Omelette ~ this is not on their standard menu, so I can't be 100% sure, but I think that it included some of that grounded-up beef stuff, bacon, cheese (prolly just the fake 'merican-kind), onions, pickles, and tomatoes (no lettuce or ketchup, though), served with choice of toast & homefries or beans; (Mom) just an English muffin; and to drink I had a cuppa Coffee with one refilla (I forget what everyone else had to drink)
The original plan was going to be to eat breakfast at the Narrows Crossing Restaurant & Lounge on Wednesday morning; however, when we drove over there that day, there was a sign on the door stating that they were closed. That doesn't sound very "everyday" to me; perhaps Wednesday is not considered an "everyday" day on Cape Cod. Luckily, Cranberry Cottage Family Restaurant was on our way back home, anyway, and it ended up being a good back-up plan. Like Riverside Cafe on Sunday,Narrows Crossing is located alongside (and overlooking with some great views) the Wareham River.
Some other good breakfast ideas off their everyday (and here is where it is correctly used adjectivally) menu: Hash Heaven ~ 2 eggs on corned beef hash with Hollandaise sauce on toast; Hobo & Cheese Omelette ~ hamburg [ sic ], green peppers, and onions; or Greek Omelette ~ spinach, tomatoes, onions, black olives, and Feta cheese (now this really wasn't all that different from what I ended up ordering, anyway, but I didn't want to order the exact same dish as I had on Wednesday). Some other choices off their weekly/daily specials menu-insert: Linguiça, Tomato, Mushroom, & Cheddah Scramble ~ served with choice of toast and homefries or beans and French Toast, Belgium Waffle, or Pancakes w/ choice of topping ~ that day's topping choices were: Blueberry, Pineapple, Walnut, Strawberry, Chocolate Chip, Coconut, or Cranberry.
I went with Feta again for my cheesy choice. "Feta cheese again, Brian?" Mainly because I could and "Everything's betta with Feta!"™, anyway. There was actually more Feta in this one than at Cranberry Cottage. I went with homefries as my side-choice and pumpernickel toast. I thought about going with baked beans instead of the homefries for a change, but this time (Sean be damned!) I remembered to bring a few hot sauces with me and (rightly) figured that the homefries would be a much better receptacle for one of them. Apparently, the Massachusetts/Cape Cod version of the Standard Triumvirate (Duomvirate?) of Hot Sauces includes Tabasco®Brand Pepper Sauce (Original Red Sauce) and Frank's RedHot®Original Cayenne Pepper Sauce, because it seems that most restaurants we visited that week offered those choices. I used a little Coqui Fire Flaming Frog Sauce (Thanks, Sha!) on the omelette (this one was a bit espicy and needed to be tested first before overdoing it) and some CheslseaFireWicked. Hot. Sauce. (Thanks, Kerry!) generously all over the potatoes (I had been using this one most of the week already and knew its/my limits ~ lots of flavour, not overly so much heat). Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Vegetarian & Cheese Omelette ~ 6.4 (Once again, I didn't poll the rest of their group for their GBS Ratings. If they want to start their own stupid li'l 'blog-thing, they can do so themselves.)
(No official web-site.) Place: Cranberry Cottage Family Restaurant Location: 246 Marion Road, Wareham, MA; phonicular contact: (508) 291-1515 Hours: open from 7:00am, 7 days a week Meal: (Me) Greek Omelet ~ Feta cheese, black olive, tomato, and spinach, (and per their menu) "home fries 'n toast accompany these creations"; (Sean) New England Benedict ~ homemade (well, "cottage"-made) fish cakes, English muffins, 2 poached eggs, Hollandaise sauce, & home fries; (Mom) raisin toast; and to drink (Me) a cupppa Coffee, (Sean) orange juice (???), and (Mom) a cuppa tea (I can't believe that none of us ordered cranberry juice) I have eaten at Cranberry Cottage Family Restaurant a few times in the past (because I can't be sure if I will ever eat at Cranberry Cottage a few more times in the future yet) (see previous 'blog-entry from Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011). This restaurant is probably the most popular local place for noshing breakfastarily; Sunday to Saturday the parking lot is usually full all morning long. For being just a small "cottage" joint, they do a very decent breakfast and offer many nice selections from which to choose. Some other good ideas (for vegetarians and/or meatetarians alike): Apple and Sausage Omelet ~ diced fresh apple with diced sausage (now if I ate of the dead, decaying, grounded-up, then stuffed into intestines porcine flesh, I would definitely have wanted to try this one); Cottage Chili Omelet ~ our homemade (again, "cottage"-made) chili and shredded Cheddar (which, of course, in Cape Codese is "Cheddah"); Great Hill Omelet ~ Great Hill Blue[1] cheese, bacon, and sliced apples (this would have been another one that I would liked to have tried, even without the bacon, Glen); Philly Cheese Steak ~ cheese, sliced beef, onions, and peppers (however, they don't state whether there is a "Whiz wit" option or not); Pizza Omelet ~ Marinara sauce and cheeses; Vitamin K Omelet ~ onion, "the vile weed", spinach, and cheese (with the inclusion of "the vile weed", I can only assume that the "K" stands for "Kill me now, please!"); Cottage Skillet ~ home fries topped with scrambled eggs (I think that poached eggs or over-medium eggs would be a better topping, though), bacon (or not), shredded Cheddah cheese, and toast (which I am sure comes on the side and is not also topping the pile); Fireman's Toast~ Texas toast topped with eggs, bacon, chili, beans, and Cheddah cheese w/ home fries (I am not so sure that a vegetarian-friendly version of this would be worth a go, though); and, besides Sean's choice, they offer five other "Benedict Selections". Additionally, on their "Specials" board over the diner-counter area: Portuguese Benedict (they didn't list what it entailed, but I can only assume it had some form of linguiça or chouriço in it in place of the standard Canadian bacon-stuff, eh?!); Bacon, Scallion, + Cheese Omelet (they don't list what is in this one either, but even I can figure this one out); or Asparagus, Ham, + Cheese Omelet (which I may have ordered [sans the ham, of course] if Sean had been astute enough to point out the "Specials" board to me before I had already ordered what I did![2]). However, for a restaurant that has "Cranberry" right in its name, I would have liked to have seen a few more cranberry dishes on the menu. There were only two that I noticed: Cranberry Stuffed French Toast ~ made with Texas toast (which I had on my previous visit and really enjoyed) or Cape Cod Pancakes ~ w/ cranberries and nuts. I found this last line (or lines, whatever) of their menu pretty funny: "We reserve the right to add 18% gratuity to tables of 6 or more. Shared meals will incur a $1.00 per plate charge. (Does not apply to children under 10)" Well, of course. Everyone knows that children under 10 are notoriously terrible tippers, anyway. Besides, if you have to wait on a group of more than six under-ten-year olds at a table, you are taking your own sanity in your hands in the first place.
I liked my omelette well enough, but I woulda liked to have seen more Feta in it (but that is my normal complaint with most places: "Mo' Feta, mo' betta!"). Plus, I would have rather seen the inclusion of authentic Kalamata olives instead of the plain ol' (canned) sliced black olives. I also went with the raisin toast(because no one offers craisin toastthat I know of). Sean's choice looked pretty interesting; I always like it when a restaurant offers a different take on Eggs Benedict (see my many, many, many 'blog-entry praises on Dottie's stellar Zucchini Cakes). I mentioned to Sean that the bed of English muffin (which I am writing in the singular ~ because it was just two halves of one ~ but they had in the plural on their menu) seemed a bit of a superfluocity. I would have thought that using the fishcakes as the base would have been a much better option, but Sean pointed out that the fishcakes were a bit too crumbly and really needed the English muffin underneath for support. (It still all looked rather unwieldy to me.) When I asked for some hot sauce, the waitress/server lady-person brought out a bottle of Frank's RedHot® Original Cayenne Pepper Sauce and I used some of that on my homefries. I was planning on bringing the three other hot sauces that I had with me on Sunday, but once again Sean forgot to remind me to bring them with us![3] Glen Bacon Scale Rating: (Me) Greek Omelet ~ 6.5 (mo' Feta and real Kalamata olives would easily have added another 0.2 to 0.3 GBS points here); (Sean) New England Benedict ~ 6.8 (I did not poll Sean for his actual GBS Rating, but from the way he seemed to enjoy this more than the time he ordered their Irish Benedict ~ which he rated at 6.6 ~ I am assuming that this was a bit higher; besides, I think it's a great inventive take on the plain ol' Eggs Benedict routine); (Mom) raisin toast ~ 8.5 (again, I really didn't get Mom's GBS input, but knowing her, she would have overrated plain ol' toasted raisin bread thusly) ___________________ 1. http://www.greathillblue.com/ (Did anyone else happen to notice that right under their address on their web-site there is actually the link "www.greathillblue.com"? Can you say "Department of Redundancy Department"?) Marion, Massachusetts is the next town southwestward from Wareham. http://www.marionma.gov/Pages/index 2. As the youngest in a family of five kids, Sean gets to take the blame for everything and anything. Sorry, those are the rules... I should know, I was the youngest for almost fourteen years before Sean came along. 3. I also forgot to pack sunglasses and a swimsuit for this trip for which I am trying to figure out how to blame on Sean, too.
(No official web-site.) Place: Riverside Cafe Location: 189 Main Street, Wareham, MA; phonicular contact: (508) 295-2050 Hours: open daily 6:00am Meal: (Me) Monkey Bread[1]French Toast and a side of home fries (noted as two words); (Sean) Hawaiian Melt ~ ham, pineapple, egg, & Mozzarella cheese on Texas toast, served with your choice of homfries (now here they had it as oneword), fruit, or baked beans; (Kerry) Florentine (Omelet Style) ~ spinach, tomatoes (or mushrooms), and Mozzarella cheese, served with homefries or fruit and toast; (Mom) just an English muffin and a slice or two of Sean's bacon; and (Me) a cuppa (and one refilla) New England Coffee®Blueberry Cobbler (I kid you not) (I don't really remember what everyone else had to drink; it's hard enough for me to remember what they all had to eat) http://www.newenglandcoffee.com/product/blueberry-cobbler/ My first breakfastary stop while I was on vacation last week was to Riverside Cafe in Wareham[2], Massachusetts. There aren't that many breakfast-style restaurants in town, but the few that they do have are all pretty good (or so I have found). Wareham is known as "the Gateway to Cape Cod" (and hence the Cape CodBaseball League[3]Wareham Gatemen[4]) because it is one of the last towns before you head over to Cape Cod (via either the Bourne Bridge or the Sagamore Bridge). One of the notable people to have been born (not Bourne nor Sagamored, though) in Wareham is Hollywoodland actress and international archer Geena Davis[5].
(And just to prove that it truly is "riverside", here is a photo from behind the restaurant of the Wareham River.) I was very impressed with the amount of interesting items that Riverside Cafe has on its menu (for both stupid vegetarians and dead, decaying animal-fleshetarians). Some other good ideas were: Irish Style (Benedict) ~ with hash (which I am pretty sure meant "corned beef" and not plain ol' "potatoes") River Rat ~ (which can be made as either a "Scrambler" or "Omelet Style") ground beef, onions, American cheese, & topped with ketchup, mustard, & pickles (I tried talking Sean into getting this one; this was disgusting sounding enough that if I ate meat, this would definitely have been my choice) Garden (which can also be made either as a "Scrambler" or "Omelet Style") ~ tomatoes, peppers, onions, and mixed cheeses Santa Fe (another "Scrambler" or "Omelet Style") ~ avocado, tomato, onion, black beans, pepper [ sic, in the singular ], & cheese with salsa Green Pig (another "Scrambler" or "Omelet Style") ~ spinach, sausage, and mixed cheese (I wonder what Theodor Seuss Geisel would have to say about this) Irish Breakfast Melt ~ hash, egg, and cheese on marble rye (ya ol' bag!) or (simple enough, but still interesting sounding to me) Beanie Breakfast ~ baked beans, 1 egg, & corn bread or a biscuit (I wonder if this was a regular meal at the Sussman household when little Herbie was growing up[6]).
I was happy to find that my Monkey Bread French Toast was shockingly good, Mr. Gabriel. This was a different and interesting take (and taste) on your standard (or not-so-standard) French toast. The only thing that I could have done without was the jimmies/sprinkles on top of the whipped cream; not that I don't normally like jimmies/sprinkles, I just didn't find them necessary on my French toast. Sean's Hawaiian Melt turned out to be a sorta Hawai'ianese Monte Cristo, bra'. Pineapple in anything is always a good thing. Kerry went with the "or mushrooms" option in his Florentine (Omelet Style), but they offered to have both the tomatoes and mushrooms in it (which is what I would have gone with personally). I don't remember if the omelette had any Hollandaise sauce on top of it, but that would have been the way I would have liked it. As for my Blueberry Cobbler (or Cobblah in New Englandese) Coffee, there was no need to add any sugar (and I normally don't add any, anyway) to it as the blueberry flavour was sweet enough already. However, after taking a few sips, I did go with Sean's suggestion to add some half-and-half to it; this was a good idea and it greatly improved the experience.
I asked (but have forgotten now over a week later) what Riverside Cafe had in the way of condimentary supplementation; I think they had Frank's RedHot® Original Cayenne Pepper Sauce and possibly one more. It really didn't matter as I had come well-prepared with three new (well, for me) hot sauces that Kerry had provided (actually, one was brought all the way back from Isla de Vieques, Puerto Rico[7] by my sister Sharon earlier this year): Maine Man FlavahsBlueberry Habanero; ChelseaFireWicked.Hot.Sauce.; and Coqui[8]FireFlaming Frog Sauce. I used some of the Blueberry Habaneroon half of my potatoes (mainly because I wanted to try to complement the blueberry in my Coffee) and some Wicked. Hot. Sauce. on the other half of my potatoes. (Curiously enough, I left my Monkey Bread French Toast un-supplemented, George). Of the two, I much preferred the Wicked. Hot. Sauce.; it didn't contain any chipotle peppers, but was very reminiscent of that style hot sauce (with just a little more heat perhaps). The Blueberry Habanerowas sweet, but not really that hot and I can't imagine using it on many other breakfastary items (I bet it would go nicely on top of some Ice Cream, though). http://www.mainemanflavahs.com/ http://www.chelseafirehotsauce.com/ http://coquifire.com/ Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Monkey Bread French Toast ~ 6.9; New England Coffee®Blueberry Cobblah ~ 6.6 (Sorry, I didn't bother asking anyone else at the table for their GBS input. I know that Sean is well-versed in the intricacies of the GBS, but I would have had to explain the whole kitten-and-poodle[9] to Kerry and Mom... besides, my mother would probably have rated her English muffin as an 8.5.) ___________________ 1. Yeah, I had no idea what the heck this was either. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_bread 2. http://www.wareham.ma.us/ 3. http://www.capecodbaseball.org/ 4. http://gatemen.org/ 5. Did you know that Geena Davis is probably smarter than you or me? Well, probably smarter than you. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000133/ 6. Maybe one person reading this from the Red Sox Fan Forum Message Board will get that stupid joke. 7. ¿Dónde? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vieques,_Puerto_Rico 8. ¿Qué? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coqu%C3%AD 9. Like any of you really know what the heck a caboodle/kaboodle is.
