Memoirs of a Brunch Fiend (6/29 update)
Jan 29 '01 (Updated Jun 22 '01)
The Bottom Line Johnny's Luncheonette, Johnny D's, Picante and Kelly's are all good choices. Avoid the S&S and Ryles unless you enjoy overpriced food served cold.
Deciding where to go for brunch is a difficult decision. Fancy pants sourdough french toast with spice infused mango chutney, or more basic eggs and your choice of breakfast meat? Personally, I'm obsessed with sweets for brunch, while my partner in breakfast requires savory breakfasts. So, my ideal brunch place has both yummy sweets (french toast, pancakes, waffles, etc.) and savories (omelets, hash, etc.).
Johnny's Luncheonette at 1105 Mass Ave outside Harvard Sq. in Cambridge is probably my favorite brunch spot. They get crowded from 12:30-2:00, so be prepared to wait 20 minutes or so during that rush.
Pancakes are $5.50 for 3 big plain cakes or $6.50 for cakes w/ bananas or cranberries in them. My favorite sweet item is the crunchy french toast. 4 thick slices of challah bread coated w/ crunchy nutty cereal stuff and then fried as usual. A yummy crispy exterior, with a soft interior for only $6.50. Best of all, pancakes, french toast and waffles come with real maple syrup automatically. No icky chemically pancake syrup here. They also have blintzes which I'm told are good, but there aren't enough of them in an order. Their porridge is also amazing. It's thick oatmeal, brown rice, assorted dried fruit, apples and all kinds of healthy goodness. It's wonderful, and very filling.
On the savory side, they have tons of options. Favorites include the Wolfies special which is eggs scrambled with lean corned beef. Very tasty and $7.95 The Wabans frittata which is a flat omelet with mashed potatoes, bacon, scallions and swiss cheese on top, is good but a bit heavy ($7.95). Their hash and eggs are also very yummy (more savory/salty than sweet), but very greasy so beware. It's also $7.95
The homefries are big chunks of potato nicely fried up-quite good. Their reduced fat turkey and apple sausage is also worth getting. It's tasty despite being health. If you want something other than OJ, their smoothies are excellent, but about $4.
Service tends to be friendly and fast. Children are welcome, and often present, as long as they aren't disruptive.
Johnny D's
Johnny D's is unrelated to Johnny's Luncheonette, though they both are yummy establishments. Johnny D's is located in Davis Square, across from the main T stop. They serve brunch on Saturday and Sunday. It's jammed with people on Sunday, but on Saturday you can wander in any time and enjoy a leisurely brunch. It's recently become a regular haunt for my room mates and I.
The best thing about Johnny D's is that the pancakes don't make me violently ill. For some reason, most of the time when I get pancakes out they give me horrible stomach aches and gall bladder pains (or rather, the place where my gall bladder used to be hurts like heck). I suspect because they're practically deep fried in butter at many places. This is very frustrating because I adore pancakes, but don't enjoy hours of stomach pain. Johnny D's serves light, fluffy pancakes that haven't been dipped in grease. They have a pancake special every week, usually with some kind of fruit compote on top. The special flavoring in the pancake usually doesn't shine through very much, but the compotes tend to be tasty toppings so it evens out. They also have excellent french toast. Nice and thick and made with challah. I'd say don't bother with the optional fruit topping. When I got it, it was a small random selection of not very good melon and some grapes. Feh. Your money is better spent on getting real maple syrup (an extra $1.75). The pancakes start at $4.25 and the french toast is about $5.50
They also have a couple specials with eggs, usually a special omlette, some kind of special scramble and maybe something else. These vary in yumminess. The scrambled eggs tend to be done hard, so if you like them soft you're out of luck. My roomies tend to complain about the lack of fluffiness, but I like my eggs hard so I don't mind. The omlettes are thick and filled with huge amounts of yummy filling. Eggs range from $4-$8 depending on what kind of filling/special they're involved in.
If you get one of the breakfast specials, you will offered oatmeal. I suggest trying it. It's become a house addiction. They bring you brown sugar and milk with the oatmeal, which has been cooked with raisins. Warm, yummy and soothing. The only flaw is if you eat the bowl of oatmeal, it becomes harder to finish the enormous amount of food that is their brunch specials.
Kelly's Diner
Kelly's is an old fashioned diner located in Ball Sq, just outside of Davis Square. 674 Broadway to be exact; look for the silver diner car. It's open from early morning till 2pm or 3pm, depending on phase of the moon.
Kelly's is your standard good old-fashioned diner. It's cheap, fast and basic. Eggs are $3-$5 depending on what you want done with them. They have standard omelets (western, plain cheese, etc.) and usually one or two specials. If you're a feta fiend like me, you can request a spinach and feta omelet. Their hash and eggs seems to be the canned kind, but they're still good. The homefries at Kelly's are the chunks of potato fried up variety, and are good.
Friends of mine declare the corn muffin, grilled, is the best way to begin your day. Their pancakes are "eh" (heavy, and kind of underdone. definitely tummy ache potential). However, the french toast is yummy and when it comes with fresh fruit it is seriously tasty. However, the lack of maple syrup is a definite problem.
Service at Kelly's is fast and friendly. I don't see kids there often, but it is family friendly. If you want a simple cheap breakfast, you can't beat Kelly's.
Picante
There are several Picantes in the area. I tend to go to the one in Central Sq. at 735 Mass Ave.
For brunch, Picante focuses on Mexican-American food, especially the breakfast burrito. The breakfast burritos are huge and stuffed with all kinds of goodies. Scrambled eggs, your choice of salsas, beans and other add-ons. They range from $4-$6 and are an excellent choice because they're both filling and flavorful. They have pancakes, which are pretty good, but not amazing. They do come with maple syrup which is a plus.
You order at a front counter at Picante, and pick it up from there when your number is called. They're fairly family friendly, but if the kids are fussy eaters they may be out of luck.
S&S Deli and Ryles
Over priced, and over hyped pretty much sums up my recent experiences at the S&S and its sister restaurant Ryles (which has a Sunday jazz brunch). I live about five minutes away from them, so they've been a frequent brunch stop in my life. In the last year or so, the quality of their food has nose dived. They used to have decent deli food at reasonable prices. The prices have gone up a couple dollars, but the food tastes worse. For instance, I used to be a fan of their french toast. Nice thick slices of challah bread, lightly fried with maple syrup on the side. The slices have shrunk, and they come out either dry, or soaked in egg and grease. If you get the stuffed french toast which has cream cheese and jam inside, the filling is often not heated through. This not very tasty experience will cost you $7-$8. On the savory side, they do have some interesting egg dishes (omlettes and eggs benedict variations). However, they don't arrive at your table very hot, and cold eggs are just nasty. The egg dishes range from $6-$8. Probably the only good deal on the menu is the whitefish platter. You get a huge amount of whitefish and extras for about $6.00 If you eat at Ryles, which is right across the street and functions in part as overflow from the S&S your food will cost a little more and be even colder. The jazz is great, but the terrible food isn't.
Service at the S&S varies wildly. Some waitresses are great, while others practically throw the food at you. At Ryles, they will fill your order incorrectly about a third of the time, so if you come with a group at least a couple of you won't get what you ordered. If you arrive at either restaurant during a peak time, be prepared to wait in a jumbled poorly managed line. Also, the management is even worse than the waitstaff. Once, when someone wanted to send something back, the manager loudly chastised them because the restaurant can't reserve the food and they would lose money. The manager actually refused to have it remade or give the person their money back. My apartment has put the S&S on our "do not eat" list because we've become so fed up with it.
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justjulia
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Location: Cambridge, MA
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