Tower 13

The location is right on the 101 with it overlooking Cardiff beach. Although with the recent addition of the beach dunes, it slightly disrupts the normal view of the ocean. Supposedly, it is to help the local ecosystem, so we here at Encinitas Breakfast Tour are all for it.

The mimosa deal is meant for the early bird. From open until 10am the bottles of champagne are $9, and between 10am-12:30pm the bottles are $12, but still a pretty great deal. The champagne was a Brut Opera Prima sparkling wine. The waitress gave us three options of juice, orange (which has pulp so that’s kind of whack), grapefruit, and cranberry all served in a carafe. Then to pour it they offer small champagne flutes with no stems. There are a few rules here, those are, only one bottle per table at a time, must order $10 of food per participant, and there is no to-go bottles.

For starters, we ordered a small plate of truffle fries, as is tradition. Side note: please DO NOT try and kiss anyone after eating these. They’re phenomenally fragrant and flavorful from the garlic, truffle and parmesan. As they were brought to our table the smell of garlic and parmesan filled our sniffers. The fries were freshly fried, golden brown and very crisp. This dish can easily be shared with a few friends if you can find some. The truffle was complimented by the topping of garlic and parmesan.

My breakfast tacos were one of the cheaper things on the menu and they did not disappoint. They came with two tacos, a side of hash browns, and a ketchup. These tacos were very bacon forward in every way. The bacon is chopped up into the eggs instead of the normal strips. I would even say that instead of using butter to cook the eggs, they used the bacon grease, which is a great twist on a rather simple dish. The pico de gallo tasted fresh and adds a great crunch from the onion. The soft corn tortillas are a great compliment, but don’t seem like they are mixing any masa in the back. Overall, the tacos had great flavor, fresh and the parts complimented the whole, the one downside to the dish was the hash browns that are thankfully on the side. The issue was they didn’t seem to have enough oil in the pan when they were cooked which lead to some carbonization and darker pieces which detracted from the flavor.