Rating: 💋 💋 💋 😘
Happy Friday everybody! Well, I don't know when you're reading this, but I'm writing on a Friday, so if you're not reading this on a Friday, I hope you're at least having a Friday kind of day. I adore Fridays because of the anticipation - it's almost the weekend! Anything at work is survivable! You can do anything! Because tomorrow is Saturday, the best day of the week! That anticipation sends positive vibes shooting through the whole day because you get to look forward to your fun weekend plans. Today's post is dedicated to one of the best weekend plans you could have: Brunch.
I love breakfast and I love celebrating, and, as far as I am concerned, brunch is just a big celebration of breakfast.
I'm in.
So, today we are going to talk about the last brunch I went on, at a popular New York restaurant with multiple locations known as Jack's Wife Freda.
We wound up at the Chelsea location and, though I titled this "Saturday Morning..." you have to take that with a grain of salt. When we arrived at the cute little restaurant, prospective patrons spilled all over the sidewalk and we were told the wait for a table of two was thirty to forty-five minutes. Here's the catch: you cannot make reservations unless you have a party of six or more. Deciding to get brunch here then becomes a game of risk, so if you're starving out of your mind, this probably isn't the right place to go. We decided to wait though because the sun was warm and dry, we had no place to be or schedule to follow, and we could spend the time chatting. The staff was super friendly and seated us after that allotted thirty minutes, then we had to peruse the menu, wait for our drinks, then wait for our food, bringing us to one o'clock. So scratch that Saturday Morning and make it Saturday Afternoon.
I will say the restaurant was super loud, but it had a friendly atmosphere, adorable decor, and a great menu with Mediterranean flair. Both of us had a tough time choosing entrees because everything looked so good, but at least we could be sure of one thing: we wanted the cantaloupe mimosas. I mean, one of the best fruits paired with one of the best drinks, what could possibly go wrong?
Now, in full disclosure, this was the first time I ever went to a brunch that wasn't bottomless, but I knew that going into it and bottomless wasn't the vibe we were going for. So this was the only drink we were going to get and we wanted to make the right choice. On one hand, the drink was refreshing and delicious. On the other, it was super tiny, for a whopping $13. Remember that $13 glass of rose I was so pleased with? Well this drink was roughly a quarter of the volume of that glass of wine, for the same price! And there's overpriced Manhattan for you, folks. In conclusion, the drinks might taste good, but they are not worth the price. Next time, I'll stick with water.
And then they served us our food.
Rebecca - the lovely Rebecca, yet again! - ordered the Eggplant Baguette and said it was fabulous. She gave me a taste of her fries as well, because I am such a sucker for fries and she is such a good friend, and they were pretty darn good! They had a nice crisp, a little potato skin action, which I love, and almost an olive oil flavor to them, fitting the Mediterranean theme nicely. I enjoyed dipping them in the green sauce that came with my Poached Eggs with Grilled Tomato and Haloumi. I only wish I had known what the green sauce was, because it was not identified. It was slightly spicy, but hardly, at least to me, and added a nice lift to the dish.
As for my poached eggs - fabulous! I had never had haloumi before and greatly enjoyed how they paired it with grilled tomatoes. I go wild for grilled tomatoes, and in the summer they are just perfection. There was a light drizzle of oily pesto, so the dish wasn't drowning, but had a lovely basil flair. Everything about the dish was super fresh and zippy. The challah bread might have been my favorite part, as it perfectly mopped up the egg yolk with its chewy, dense body. The ratio of bread to oil was perfectly designed as well so that there were leftovers of neither, leaving a perfectly clear plate by meal's end. My compliments to the chef!
What I really liked about the meal was that it was yummy but light, so brunch did not stuff us so much that we were incapacitated for the rest of the day. Another bonus to not doing bottomless brunch : you don't spoil your appetite getting your money's worth of mimosas before the food arrives. Not that I'm knocking bottomless brunch, because it's a favorite of mine, I am just saying there are positive aspects to the dry brunch route as well. I know. Go crazy with shock, it's a wild world we live in.
Overall, Jack's Wife Freda scores in at three and a half stars. The drinks were not worth it but the cuisine definitely was, the wait was a bit long but the restaurant's attitude was super fun, and we got free pens and postcards along with our bill. Clever distraction on their part. All in all, I would be happy to go back, but I am not raving about it to all my friends. This time around, I am not filled with an intense need to bring them to it as a culinary mecca (and places like that do exist for me).
Next trip, I think I'll get the Orange Blossom Pancakes...mmmmmm
Anyway, enjoy your weekends and, if you can, brunch is always a great choice!
XX,
MK
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