Our guest this week was Kyle. While I was the designated driver, I can’t attest to this week’s mimosas. However, judging by how little both Kevin and Kyle remember I’d say its a pretty decent place for drinks.
House Cut Fries – $8
Priority Public House style fries topped with parmesan, garlic, and gorgonzola.
They also offer sweet potatoes fries as a substitute.
These were some of the best fries we have had.
We weren’t able to figure out the sauce provided but we are guessing it was some type of chipotle aioli. Great combination for the fries.
Breakfast Sandwich – $9
Over Medium Egg on a toasted brioche bun. Basil pesto, baby spinach, applewood smoked bacon, sliced tomato, onion, smoked cheddar with your choice of fresh fruit or breakfast potatoes.
The bun ended up melting, but everything in between was delicious. The pesto was fresh and the bacon was crisp. What more can you ask for.
Breakfast Burrito – $9
Scrambled Eggs, chicken and apple sausage or applewood smoked bacon, potato, jack cheese. Served with salsa, guacamole, sour cream and fresh fruit.
Great tasting dish for an even better price.
Overall
Local food with a local vibe. This place is a must go if you have never been. We recommend also looking into the live music to go see a band perform if you have the opportunity.
You can’t beat the early morning beach walks, and anticipation for good drinks, great food and even better company.
Fries – $8
Pretty Standard Fries, golden brown, solid crunch. Great way to get something in your stomach to accompany some drinks. I may have forgotten to get a picture for this one. I blame it on the mimosas.
Mimo – $15
Bottomless Mimosas or Draft Beers.
Champagne: Opera Prima Brut Sparkling Wine
Pre-made Pitchers
Chorizo Tacos – $13
Two corn tortillas filled with scrambled eggs, chorizo, cheddar cheese, and tater tots topped with onions and cilantro. Served with two house made salsas.
Overpowering flavor from the tater tots, that tends to overshadow the chorizo. The sauces on the side are a necessity and add to the overall complexity of the dish.
Breakfast Sandwich – $13
A sandwhich with english muffin style bread, eggs served any style, applewood smoked bacon, sharp cheddar, with an addition of avocado, which added $3. Served alongside is fruit and house potatoes.
Overall
We weren’t able to find the bottom of these mimosas, some of the pulp made it a bit murky. This place is a must go if there are any games on you want to watch as they have a plethora of TV’s and access to every game.
We decided to forgo the beach walk this morning because we were lazy. We skipped straight to the fun part of drinking and eating.
Brunch hours are Saturday and Sunday from 10am to 3pm.
“Almost Bottomless”Mimos – $11
Champagne, fresh orange juice. What more could you ask for.
Almost Bottomless Mimosas must include a brunch entree.
These have been the cheapest bottomless mimosas we have come across. However, the quality is still fantastic, as you would expect from a specialty wine shop.
Duck Machaca – $14
Eggs scrambled, shredded roasted duck meat, onions, bell peppers, roasted garlic, jalapeños, corn tortillas, home fries (no substitutions)
This dish came with a huge quantity of food, and tasted great! Be wary of some bones from the duck, but besides that I don’t have any complaints.
Overall
This place is truly a hidden gem. We even thought we waked into the wrong place at first as their main floor is mostly made up of the wine shop. Just past this, though, lies fantastic food, excellent service and enjoyable time. Don’t pass up on this place.
The mimosa conspiracy grows. Every place we have visited recently has used the same brand of $7 bottle of champagne. These mimosas were filled to the brim with champagne with a small drop or two of orange juice, maybe even just orange zest. After the waitress saw us slamming the mimosas, she deemed it more appropriate to just bring us the whole bottle. Making us the only table in the place to do so. Wonder what that says about us? We had to ask for a carafe of OJ, however whether it was due to the shape of the glass or the copious amounts of champagne already in our system, it was nearly impossible to cleanly pour the OJ. The other juices they offered were cranberry, grapefruit, OJ and a special blend of blood orange strawberry puree.
Truffle French Fries – $10
Golden Fries topped with Parmigiano Reggiano and Chives. Served with Garlic Aioli and Ketchup
Per usual, we opted for truffle fries as an appetizer. These were served with ranch and ketchup. It was a rather small serving of fries compared to other local places. They added parmesan and cilantro on top which added some much needed color and contrast. Kevin said they are delicious. Freshly fried and we kept going back to them.
“BLT” Eggs Benedict – $14
Eggs Benedict topped with Applewood Smoked Bacon, Tomato Confit and Arugula. Served with house potatoes and ketchup.
I ordered the BLT Eggs Benedict. The eggs were runny, bacon was crispy, and the veggies were fresh. What more could you ask for. The cheese that was paired on the Benedict was similar to a Mexican crema. The tomatoes were seasoned with olive oil and salt, which is rare for a place to season the ingredients individually. Bacon is crispy and thick cut. The potatoes on the side were the only downside to a perfectly balanced dish. They were a little thick for my taste which left them a little too al dente. Normally with an Eggs Benedict the english muffin can get too soggy, but since the ingredients were fairly dry with little sauce on top leaving the english muffin nice and crispy.
Kevin’s Corner
I was whelmed, not underwhelmed and not overwhelmed, just whelmed. $15 bottomless mimosas or bloody mary’s, we appreciated the options but opted for the mimosas, per usual. The waitress realized what we were there for and simply dropped off a bottle for us, which was appreciated by all involved (Mike and I). Sawyer was there but didn’t participate in the fun. He was and is a welcome addition to the debauchery. I ordered the “ABC” omelet but replaced the bacon with mushrooms because health. The omelet was ok, but they have been my fault for replacing the bacon… Our waitress may been the saving grace of the tour stop as she was informed and enjoyable.
Overall
Great place with even better service. Local spot right off of El Camino. Skip the Breakfast Republic in the same centre and instead go to this place. You will not be disappointed!
To begin I want to thank Tyler and Caitlin for putting up with us all week, and letting us bums crash at their place. The Eggs N’ Things we went to was in Ko Olina, yes we are kooks, so it was obviously pretty busy when we went. While it isn’t the most local spot, it’s a great spot, with the Disney Hotel coves right across the street.
Mimos – $7
The juices offered here are very eclectic. I ordered a guava mimo, while Kev opted for a pineapple mimo. The juices were all super fresh, especially the pineapple with the farms a couple miles away. Unfortunately they weren’t bottomless, but that’s probably was for the best.
Kalbi Steak and Eggs – $20
I felt like splurging, so I ordered the Kalbi Short Ribs, and it did not disappoint. The kimchi was a little much for me, but this dish was satisfying, and filling. Eggs were cooked perfectly, and runny. The rice on the side was perfect to soak up all the leftovers from the dish.
Hawaiin Loco Moco – $13
With three loco mocos already devoured at this point Kev opted for another. The nicely caramelized onions and peppers added a sweet compliment to the quarter pound burger patty buried underneath. The gravy on this one, compared to others wasn’t as prevalent, but still satisfied.
Overall
Anything in Oahu is better than the mainland. The only thing to detract here is the cost to get there, but if they ever want to fly us out we can amend their score to a perfect 5.0. You can’t go wrong with anything on the island, with this being no exception.
This fine morning, we decided take a quick stroll to Swamis Café on Encinitas Blvd. We arrived around 11am and the place was packed, thankfully we only had to wait 5 min for a spot inside. Our good friend Natalie was our server, which made the experience that much better. She always kills it on service and today was no different.
Mimosa – $6.5
My favorite drink here is “Natalie’s special”. It works out to champagne, pineapple juice and a shot of pineapple vodka, which can be dangerous. It tastes great and is easy to put back. The glasses are always filled the the brim with bubbly champagne. It was topped with an orange slice and a maraschino cherry. The juice doesn’t have any pulp and it is sweet and aromatic, making it a perfect mix for the drink. To top it off, it is only $6.50 for homies, which is even better!
Chilaquiles Verde – $13
There is no comparison when it comes to the Chilaquiles Verde here. I have been to many places and had many chilaquiles, but this place is above the rest. From the chips to the cotija cheese, it is a great combination.
The chips are freshly fried and thick, leading to a soft exterior and a crisp interior. The verde sauce is fresh and has a kick, while the mix of cotija cheese and crema makes it creamy and dreamy. The eggs were cooked to a perfect “over easy” and the yolk ran over the eggs. The addition of onion and guac created a symphony of flavor. While my food did come out later than the rest, it was worth the wait as everything was cooked fresh and was hot when it was brought to the table. The verde sauce was even spicier than normal and tickled my lips. The servings here are enough to share between a couple people but can be consumed by a single person, if hungry enough.
Overall
Overall this one of the best brunch spots in Encinitas. Kev, Kiana and I had a great time and were able to follow it up with a BTR visit. This place is my main go-to when it comes to brunch so go out and give it a try!
We’re back again with another breakfast tour review, this time at Union Kitchen & Tap. As is tradition, we always start with a beach walk, but as the weeks go by we seem to get lazier and lazier. Although this time wasn’t entirely our fault. We went to Stonesteps with Kevin’s parents, but the beach was closed due to high tide. We instead opted for two rounds of the stairs, which was brutal. There must be thousands of steps.
After this long and tiring exercise, we made our way over to Union Kitchen & Tap. We were joined by Kevin’s older brother Michael. We got there around 11 a.m., and it was fairly busy. We were seated towards the back of their new patio.
Champagne – $15
The bottomless mimosas here have 4 rules:
2-hour time limit
No chugging
No sharing
Don’t ruin bottomless for everyone!
So naturally we took this as a challenge! The mimosas were served in a very thin glass, which gets more precarious the more you have, they consisted of mostly champagne with a splash of OJ. The downside here is that the waitress refills your glass from a pitcher, which makes it hard to judge how much you are actually drinking… dangerous.
Although we were in the back corner of the restaurant, the waitress did a great job to make sure we always had full glasses. Another perk of sitting in the corner is the lack of supervision. We were able to break most of the rules, which may have led to a rather fuzzy afternoon.
BBQ Chicken Flatbread – $14
We started with the BBQ chicken flatbread. The flatbread itself was soft and doughy, unlike some of the cracker-thin crusts other flatbreads have. It was topped with cherry BBQ sauce, smoked chicken, red onion, mozzarella and micro cilantro. It’s a tried and true flavor combination, and they make it work. We could have done without the cilantro as it just ended up wilting, but the red onion added a great complimentary crunch alongside the crust.
Michael said he really liked it while Kevin would have liked it to be cooked a little less due to some of the smoked chicken being slightly overcooked.
Union Burger– $15
I got the Union burger with fried egg on top. The patty of this burger was cooked a little longer than I would have liked, but since it’s around a half pound patty it remained juicy. The burger comes with aged white cheddar, which was underwhelming as it got lost among the other strong flavors. Two strips of cherry wood bacon were thick cut and adds a fantastic crunch to every bite.
Tomato jam and garlic aioli add a slight flavor profile to the burger, as well as house pickles. The iceberg lettuce was excessive as it bordered on half a head of lettuce. The fried egg was cooked to a perfect point where it held its shape but still had a runny yolk. Last but not least, the bun. It was sweet and light similar to a doughnut. Not my favorite, but maybe someone else would like it. The fries that complimented the dish were okay. They were seasoned with a Cajun spice that added a slight kick.
Farm Egg Croissant – $15
Kevin’s Review
Super solid brunch experience. Any place that offers $15 mimosas qualifies for a solid brunch experience. Jill and Jay paid which makes brunch that much more enjoyable. Bottomless mimos came with a wide selection of juices (orange, cranberry, pineapple). Waitress was generous with her pours, which resulted in a shocked expression on Jill’s face. The farm egg croissant was super dank. It fell apart in my hands which is acceptable due to the dankness level. We also split the BBQ chicken flatbread which is very solid, especially if you are really hungry, which we were after two Stonesteps stairs climbs.
Overall
Overall we had a great time sharing stories with each other, and getting excessively drunk. The food was great, and the drinks were even better. Jay gave it a 3.5/5, Kevin gives it an 8.7/10 and Michael said the food was good and the service was great. What made this brunch even better was that Kevin’s parents paid for it all, so who can complain about a free brunch. Shout out Jill and Jay!
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.
Once at Tower 13, it was decently packed for Sunday football. The place is known for entertainment, as there are about 50 TVs setup with every game on at once; trying to find which one is playing audio is a fun game, especially after a few mimosas. We were seated in a corner booth overlooking the whole place and the beautiful Encinitas coast. Even though the place was decently packed we still received great service from our waitress.
Champagne
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.
Truffle Fries
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.
Tower 13 offers a special brunch menu along with their normal menu. We all opted for the brunch menu Michael ordered eggs benedict, Kevin ordered the breakfast sandwich and I ordered the breakfast tacos.
Breakfast Tacos
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.
Kevin’s Review
With regards to the breakfast sandwich, solid dankness level, the eggs with the muenster cheese and aioli was a beaut of a combo. Hash browns weren’t as dank, a little burnt on the underside. Solid mimos although the glasses are small so you drink a lot less than you should. Older person (35-60) atmosphere but you can make it your own with a big group in the back area.
Overall
Overall it was a great place to spend a Sunday morning and watch some football with some friends. Also, GUYS if you come here and have to use the restroom always use the left urinal. You’ll thank me later.
With all of our breakfast mornings the best way to work up an appetite is to take a leisurely 20-minute walk on the beach. This way in case anyone asks, we can say we did exercise that morning. The walk was from Stonesteps to D-street and back through high tide. Sawyer was able to join us for the walk this morning.
After this grueling walk, sawyer was able to drive us over to Beirgarden. Yes, I understand the irony of trying to exercise and then driving to Biergarden. When we arrived we were greeted by welcoming staff and took a seat outside. Kevin and I started off the day with a bottle of champagne, while Sawyer opted for the bloody mary. When the bloody mary came out it was huge and had no practical way to attack it and added some great entertainment.Once there we met up with Sara, Sean, and Karen.
Champagne $15 a bottle
The champagne was a Governor’s Cuvee Stanford Brut, served along with a carafe of orange juice, that thankfully didn’t have any pulp. Pulp is gross, it’s a fact. As with any mimosas the perfect ratio is about 20:1 of champagne to orange juice, so the one carafe lasted us two or three bottles, although they had no problem when we asked for them to refill it. The champagne was pretty mellow and didn’t seem over the top bubbly. Solid mimosas for a pretty reasonable price.
Garlic truffle fries $6
To accompany our mimosas, we of course opted for garlic truffle fries because we are adults, and no one can tell us we can’t. Good thing we did because these were fantastic. As soon as they were brought to the table you could smell them. The fries were thick cut square fries, cooked to a perfect golden brown. On top was extra helpings of parmesan cheese, garlic, and charred rosemary. They smelled absolutely fantastic and tasted even better than they looked. On the side was some ketchup, which helped to mellow the taste between the three strong flavors in the bowl. This could easily be shared between two and is a must if you go here!
Chicken Chilequiles with Tomatillo sauce$16
Last but not least is breakfast. I opted for the chilaquiles verde as they are one of my favorite dishes no matter where I go, and yes, I know I spelled it wrong in the title, but that’s how it is on the menu. These chilaquiles came topped with fried tortillas chips, 2 fried eggs, pickled onions, crema, cotija, pinto beans, cilantro, and chicken. The tortilla chips were made from actual tortillas which made them the perfect texture to be thick enough to be a little soggy on the outside from the tomatillo sauce, but thick enough to retain a crunch on the inside. The two eggs accompanying the dish were cooked to an over-medium, where they still had a partially runny yolk, and partially cooked yolk. The only two gripes I have with the dish, was that the chicken seemed halfway between cooked and overcooked leading to a chewier bite, and the other being a lack of tomatillo sauce. To combat the lack of sauce, a solid dose of any hot sauce will create a solid dankness level. The spice brought out some of the more subtle flavors of the dish, and made the dish lighter. The servings size for this was huge, and this one dish could serve at least two and would even work as an appetizer to share with the whole table.
Overall, we had a great experience here, and the company made it even better. We stayed for a couple hours, and leisurely ate, drank, and enjoyed each other’s company. It had been a while since we all had to time to meet up and we are glad we did. The food and atmosphere was splendid and the bottle special made it even better. I would highly recommend this place for breakfast/brunch while they are still serving their early menu and have the champagne special.
Beach, Breakfast Budz 