Millbrae Pancake House

A breakfastary roadtrip:
Millbrae, CA

http://www.millbraepancake.com/


I met with a group of friends this morning for breakfast at Millbrae[1] Pancake House (see previous 'blog-entry from February 13th, 2011), which is right on El Camino Real. This place has been a mainstay in Millbrae for as long as I have been alive (yes, it's really old). It is a very large space with lots of seating, but it was full the entire time we were there. Luckily, there was actually a minimal wait (of less than ten minutes or so) when we all had finally arrived and put our name in for a table, which was very good for a group of eight.

Joining me today (sitting to my left and going clockwise around the table ~ how come no one ever says "tablewise around the clock"?) were: David, Hiromi, Luke, Steve, Laura, Zaria, and Marc. With a group this size you can get a good cross-section of what the restaurant has to offer. Millbrae Pancake House has a great selection of pancakes (as can be expected from their name) and also a great selection of waffles (six different types) and egg/omelette dishes. (Now I am doing this from memory and can't remember what everyone got, but I will do my best.) David got the California Omelette. Hiromi got the Vegetarian Omelette. Luke got Fried Chicken & Waffles. Steve had some kinda omelette (hey, he was at the opposite end of the table from me and had finished it by the time I remembered to try to remember). Laura had Eggs Benedict (I think). Zaria had Bangers & Eggs. Marc had some kinda omelette, too (okay, he was sitting right next to me the entire time and I probably should have remembered what he ordered).

All egg dishes are served with hashbrowns (which they have as two words, but I prefer it as one word) and your choice of toast, two buttermilk pancakes, or two Swedish pancakes (which come with lingonberry butter). Hiromi was very smart and got the Swedish pancakes as her side (she'd been there before and knew that was the way to go). David, Steve, and Zaria all chose the buttermilk pancakes as their side. I pointed out to David (after the fact, unfortunately) that he could have had the Swedish pancakes, too; he might have gotten those instead (you need to read your menus thoroughly, people!). And Marc just had plain ol' wheat toast as his side… Toast(!), when he had a choice of pancakes (buttermilk or Swedish) at an actual pancake house! Maybe he thought the name of the place was Millbrae Toast House. (Don't worry, I warned both Marc and David that I would make fun of their choices ~ and, for which, they will probably never invite me to breakfast ever again.)

However, I was surprised that no one ordered the Fall Special ~ Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Pancakes; I think the chocolate chips with pumpkin threw them. I have had a version of this unorthodox (as in no sensible Rabbi would ever bless the unholy union of pumpkin and chocolate chips) pancake before. I would have ordered it if I hadn't already had my mind set on getting German pancake (singular, but) ~ Extra large French crepe (their spelling on the menu, I much prefer "crêpe") served with lemon wedges and powdered sugar. As noted on the menu: "Our pancakes are made from scratch, the same way we've been making them since 1959.", but these didn't taste a day over 52 years old. I also ordered a side of hashbrowns, and a cuppa coffee[2].

I enjoyed my meal well enough. It really was one extra large pancake and with my side of hashbrowns (a large pile, also) it was plenty of food for me. I simply slathered the pancake with whipped butter (as can be seen in the above photo; I suppose I should have taken the photo first) and squeezed the juice from the two lemon wedges all over the top. It didn't even need any added maple syrup.

Millbrae Pancake House offers for condimentary supplementation Tabasco® Brand Pepper Sauce (both the standard red and green Jalapeño) and Tapatío®. I just used some of my own Palo Alto Fire Fighters Pepper Sauce Habanero version (Thanks agains, Amys and Brian!) on the hashbrowns. Steve and Laura both tried some of this hot sauce and seemed to like it, too.


Glen Bacon Scale Rating: German Pancake ~ 6.3

(I really didn't bother to poll the rest of the table on their meals. There were too many people and it would have been too hard to remember them all, but from the looks of the mostly cleaned plates, they all enjoyed what they had, too.)


1. Millbrae is a city in San Mateo County, just west of San Francisco Bay, with San Bruno on the north and Burlingame on the south.

Darius Ogden Mills purchased land in the 1860's from the Sanchez family to build a country estate. The former Mills estate was bordered by what is now Skyline Boulevard, Bayshore Highway U.S. Route 101, Millbrae Avenue, and Trousdale Drive. The estate became known as "Millbrae" from "Mills" and the Scottish word "brae", which means "rolling hills."

You can consider that the stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day, number one.

2. Stupid, useless cunning linguist/etymological pointer of the day, number two:

I can't believe that I have been doing this stupid 'blog for over two years now and have never really given a breakdown of the word "coffee".

The word "coffee" is pretty universal in many other languages (as opposed to being universal in just English), just like "tea" and "Beer" (see specific 'blog-entries from June 18th, 2012 and October 11th, 2012). It comes to English from Italian "caffè", from Turkish "kahve", from Arabic "قهوة" (pronounced "qahwah", or close enough for Government work).

Coffee (universally) in other languages:

"koffie" ~ Afrikaans/Dutch
"kafe" ~ Albanian/Haitian Creole
"qəhvə" ~ Azerbaijani
"kafea" ~ Basque
"кава" ~ Belarusian/Ukrainian (pronounced "kava")
"কফি" ~ Bengali (pronounced "kaphi")
"кафе" ~ Bulgarian/Macedonian (pronounced "kafe")
"cafè" ~ Catalan
"咖啡" ~ Chinese (pronounced "kafei")
"kava" ~ Croatian/Lithuanian/Slovenian
"káva" ~ Czech/Slovak
"kaffe" ~ Danish/Norwegian/Swedish (and what good would a Danish be without a good cuppa "kaffe" with it?)
"kafo" ~ Esperanto (just in case you ever find yourself in Esperantia and want to order a good cuppa "kafo" with your Danish)
"kohv" ~ Estonian
"kape" ~ Filipino
"kahvi" ~ Finnish
"café" ~ French/Galician/Portuguese/Spanish (just in case you ever find yourself in a French/Galician/Portuguese/Spanish café and want to order a good cuppa "café" with your Danish)
"ყავის" ~ Georgian (pronounced "qavis")
"Kaffee" ~ German
"καφές" ~ Greek (pronounced "kafes")
"કૉફી" ~ Gujarati (pronounced "kophi")
"कॉफ़ी" ~ Hindi (pronounced "kofi")
"kávé" ~ Hungarian
"kaffi" ~ Icelandic
"kopi" ~ Indonesian/Malay
"caife" ~ Irish
"コーヒー" ~ Japanese (pronounced "kohi")
"ಕಾಫಿ" ~ Kannada (pronounced "kaphi")
"커피" ~ Korean (pronounced "keopi")
"ກາເຟ" ~ Lao (pronounced "kafe")
"capulus" ~ Latin
"kafija" ~ Latvian
"kafè" ~ Maltese
"kawa" ~ Polish (pronounced "tea")
"cafea" ~ Romanian
"кофе" ~ Russian (pronounced "kofe")
"кафа" ~ Serbian (pronounced "kafa")
"kahawa" ~ Swahili
"காபி" ~ Tamil (pronounced "kapi")
"కాఫీ" ~ Telugu (pronounced "kaphi")
"กาแฟ" ~ Thai (pronounced "kafae")
"cà phê" ~ Vietnamese
"coffi" ~ Welsh
"קאַווע" ~ Yiddish (pronounced "q'aww'")

Millbrae Pancake House

Millbrae, CA (because if it were in San Bruno or Burlingame, the name would not make much sense)



http://www.millbraepancake.com/


Today's breakfast was a peninsular rode trip down to Millbrae Pancake House. It is located in Millbrae, CA right along El Camino Real* (for those of you not familiar with the San Francisco area, Millbrae is about 15 miles due south of San Francisco and it is the city that is due west of Highway 101 and the San Francisco International Airport). Millbrae Pancake House has been family-owned and operated since 1959 (I like that year for some reason). Joining me today for breakfast was one of my oldest San Francisco friends, Amy (and by that I don't mean that she is old, just that I have known her almost as long as I have lived in San Francisco, and unlike most people that you meet that say they are "from San Francisco", she actually was born and grew up here). (Hi, Amy!)

As the name of the restaurant implies, Millbrae Pancake House specializes in pancakes (and seeing as I already used the corny IPOO joke on my Seal Rock Inn Restaurant entry yesterday, I won't say that Millbrae Pancake House was originally known as International House of Other Pancakes ~ or IHOOP for short; besides I am sure that the NBA would take umbrage with this). This place is a very popular local joint with families on the weekends; luckily it is a very large place (about twice the size of your normal IHOP®).

There are several good pancake choices from which to choose (as choices that you can't choose aren't really very good choices now, are they?). I was thinking of going with either the German Pancakes or the Swedish Pancakes, both of which I have had there in the past and knew were good. I decided on the Swedish Pancakes ~ Three French crepes served with powdered sugar and lingonberry butter. I also wanted to compare these to the smaller version 18 silver dollar pancakes served at Sears Fine Food (see 'blog-entry from November 21st, 2010). I also had a side order of hash browns (What the heck do I really care about extra carbohydrates?) and a cuppa the house coffee.




The crepes/pancakes were very good and the portion pretty large. I would guess that this more than equaled the 18 silver dollar ones at Sears Fine Food. Their lingonberry butter was very good and they provide plenty of it; there was more than enough to go around on all three of the pancakes (I did use it all up, as there was no way I was wasting any). Their coffee was about what I expected it to be ~ on par with what I had at Seal Rock Inn Restaurant (because of which, I felt it necessary to get another decent cuppa at the Peet's® in San Mateo later in the day; they were offering both their House blend and Garuda blend ~ as I just had the House yesterday, I went for the Garuda today).

Amy went for one of their omelettes, the Florentine ~ Spinach, bacon bits and onion topped with sour cream. Now the really cool thing is that Millbrae Pancake House gives you the option** of substituting plain ol' boring toast with either two of the German Pancakes or Swedish Pancakes. Amy also chose the Swedish Pancakes as her side; she said the German Pancakes couldn't be as good as the ones her mom makes (don't ever argue with mom's home cooking!). Plus, all omelettes are served with hash browns; it was really an awful lot of food, I had to "force" myself to help Amy finish her pancakes. The omelette had lots of fresh spinach in it and the "bacon bits" were actually large chunks of bacon strips (Sean, you would have loved this one).




As condiments on the tables, they have two types of Tabasco®, the standard red and the green jalapeño version, and Tapatío®. I used some of the green stuff on my hash browns and Amy initially went with a little Tapatío® on her omelette and hash browns, then tried some of the green junk later on (she had never tried the jalapeño one before and liked it better than the normal red version).


Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Swedish Pancakes ~ 6.7; Peet's® Garuda Blend ~ 6.9; (Amy never really gave me a GBS Rating for her meal, but she did seem to like it a lot, too.)


*(Useless cunning linguist and historical pointer of the day:
 
El Camino Real in Spanish means "the Royal Road" or "the King's Highway"; it does not refer in any way to an "authentic Chevy coupe utility".
 
The original El Camino Real in California was the 600-mile trail connecting the 21 missions of Alta California; stretching from San Diego in the south to Sonoma in the north.)
 
**(Is there really a choice? Who would choose toast over pancakes, Eddie?
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAOLOGGftTY
 
"I'll have 'Death', please.")