Neil loves his breakfast. When I say loves, I means LOVES.
When we lived in Vancouver, there was a little diner on 41st called, "Art's Place" that we became regulars at. Now this place didn't have a to-die-for breakfast but it did have a decent selection of cheap, fast, and generally served hot breakfasts to choose from. We also became great fans of Pannekoeke's or Dutch Pancakes at De Dutch Restaurants (a chain).
Since moving to TO, we have tried (in vain) to find a decent diner for breakfast. Hell, we've even tried some of the breakfast chains (Over Easy, Golden Griddle) and have always left disappointed. The first diner we tried showed merit... It was rundown (the norm in TO) and was packed on a Sunday morning. No lie, not only was the food subpar but the ketchup was disgusting. We actually saw a guy get up and go next door to the McD's and return with ketchup cups from the McD's dispensers. How do you screw up ketchup????
The next place we tried was down on College -- was recommended to us as TO's best breakfast. Here's what we had...
It doesn't look bad but it took 30 minutes for someone to take our order (including coffee), another 40 minutes to get our meal and our meal was COLD.
Top that off with in the 70 minutes we sat waiting we notice this on the window:
Yummy, a conditional pass from TO Public Health. Mmmm bring on my breakfast! We laughed because we think the conditional pass might have had something to do with the fact that there were clearly too many people in the place (fire hazard). Case in point, the couple sitting next to us couldn't get out without Neil and I lifting our table over a foot because the tables were butted up next to each other trapping the person sitting against the wall. We either physically moved our table or they had to crawl out from under theirs. What fun!
We've tried scoping out our neighbourhood and have discovered that there are more bakery type, grab a coffee and a croissant places than actual greasy spoons. Now, that might have been ok for me, but Neil loves his eggs. To demonstrate this love, I will tell you a short tale. One that seriously pissed me off at the time....
Once a upon a time, in a small city called Regina, lived a girl and a guy who had just started dating. Said girl really wanted to treat her new guy to a nice meal on his birthday and she asked him where he'd like to go.... She was thinking out for a nice juicy steak... he replied, "Smitty's." She said, "You can't be serious!" He said, "Mmm mmm mmm that's what I want." So what's a girl to do, she begrudgingly took the man to Smitty's.
Back to the main point of this blog though... I have a tendency to ramble.... As a result of having terrible luck finding a decent breakfast, we've been cooking our own breakfasts. Which are always better than eating out but lack the whole "going out experience." I have even learned to make a killer quiche. That said, this past week we took it upon ourselves to learn to make Pannekoeke's. Oh My God!! SUCCESS!!
Here's a picture:
Besides the best part about cooking at home:
