Foto Friday # 56

The Full English. A work of art.

Breakfast Club @ Artillery Lane

My hangovers are not what they used to be. I now wake up feeling fine and as the day wears on it kicks in, and by the end of the day I am as rough as I should be in the morning. Must odd.

I totally believe the best hangover cure of all is a good fry up. My aches and pains seem to vanish away with the consumption of mounds of fried food. Some of the best fry ups I’ve ever had have been eaten whilst I have been at my most worst.

I am a big fan of the Breakfast Club, as they do one thing and do it so bloody well. I’ve visited all of their branches now, including the branch close to Spitalfields Market, which unlike their normal feel of being at home in your front room. This one has an industrial feel to it. I quite like it actually. The starkness of the room fitted well with how I felt. I especially love the Roland Rat wallpaper in the toilets.

Thankfully and amazingly this was the first one we never had to queue up to get a table. I really wasn’t looking forward to that. As this is a new branch and it is down a very quiet street parallel to the market entrance, unless you knew it was there you would not come across it. This was to my benefit.

I really don’t know why I even bother looking at the menu, as I always have the same things every time. The Full Monty, flat white and an orange juice. It works a treat on my soul and I don’t see the point of deviating from it.

As with all the other branches the Full Monty is fantastic, although they did forget my mushrooms, which I only noticed as I was looking at the menu by the front door as I was leaving. I thought something was missing. Hey ho.

Thankfully with further expansion their standards have not dropped and they still deliver a fine breakfast on a large scale to an eager audience.

For a hangover cure the Breakfast Club cannot be beaten, at least they seem to understand what a hangover does to a person, unlike some other places that seem to look at you with disdain when you are dying in our seat.

E is for English @ The Breakfast Club in Soho

This is the third outlet in this small mini breakfast chain I’ve eaten at. They have just expanded to one more in Spitalfields, which I guess one day soon I will be eating the Full Monty at.

The Soho branch is, as I prefer, small and cosy. Not many tables and mostly in twos and fours. Six is a pain as there is only one table to eat at. Which if you rock up just after another large group, you are stuffed for well over an hour. Like the large group behind us. Hahahaha.

We were 6, and thankfully we only had the average 20 minute wait. The evil vibe we were sending out worked pretty good. Their are places I do not mind queuing for. Randall and Aubin is one, and the Breakfast Club is another, most other places I get peeved if it’s more than 5 minutes, unless of course I have a drink in hand. Then it’s all aok. Think Polpo.

Onto the food. Well if you’ve been to one, you’ve been to them all. Service is with a smile and at a good Sunday Brunch speed. They understand what a hangover does to a person and are patient with you. The menu is the same as the others, the food you eat tastes the same, all damn good. Sometimes I like to know that I will get the same food at which ever one I goto, then again I only ever eat the Full Monty. One of the best brekkies in London.

I like the Soho branch a lot, but for me Angel is still the best. It’s the cosiness of the place that wins me over. Probably why I won’t be returning to the Hoxton branch, as it is too large, to unfamiliar, too empty.

The other good news with the Soho branch (not sure if it is the same as the others) is that they have a BYO in the evening. Always good, and I do like their burgers.

The Breakfast Club in Hoxton

I’ve eaten at the Angel outlet of the Breakfast Club on many a Sunday morning, and for me it is still the best place to have brunch, although Caravan is giving it a run for its money.

The Hoxton branch is a lot bigger and has the feel of a diner rather than a small quirky novelty that the Angel place has. But thankfully that does mean shorter queuing times, as on cold days like these the last thing you want to be is waiting outside for half an hour or so.

Everything else though is the same, the menu, the service, the juices and the coffees.

The food wasn’t up to the same standard of my beloved Angel.

I’ve never had the Green Eggs and Ham before so different place, different choice. Normally it’s the Full Monty I have, but today I felt like a change.

Maybe I should have stuck with the normal, as my scrambled eggs were a tad more overcooked than I like them. The eggs had started to form lumps and were bordering on dryness. The chunks of ham mixed in were nicely cooked. The potato wedges were the best I’ve eaten outside of Cusco. Where Los Perros, if it still exists has the best potato wedges on the planet.

Lina Eggs Benedict wasn’t up to it’s full potential. Sorry but after serving a million and one Eggs Benedict, Florentine or Royal I know how they should be. Runny yolk on a perfectly formed poached egg, the hollandaise has to be slightly but not over tart, and the muffin has to be toasted.

Her eggs were part runny, part set. The hollandaise was a tad too buttery and the muffin was not toasted. Disappointing. But when it comes to Eggs Benedict. I am an unforgiving soul and demand perfection. But she was happy with it, and that’s all that matters. I was told that until I regularly make her Eggs Benedict, I cannot complain about anyone else’s. But I will.

I’m doubting whether this winter I will ever venture back to the Breakfast Club in Angel, as those damn chilly mornings are putting the fear of god into me. Maybe I should try the third instalment in the trilogy. Soho.

The Breakfast Club

What do you expect from a place that calls itself the Breakfast Club, apart from really good breakfasts. Well, that’s what you get. There is normally a queue outside with people waiting to get in. Which is always a good sign… For me, I don’t mind queuing but for others who have no patience it is a problem. Their loss.

It’s a fun, quirky place, lot’s of 80’s memorabilia on the walls, which was my teenage decade. Good and bad memories…. There are two other branches, one in Soho and one in Hoxton.

They have a varied menu, consisting of all the funtime breakfast favourites and a few other ones thrown in for good luck. The afternoon menu has a lot of burgers, jacket potatoes etc. The burgers are made in house and are really good. Disappointing are the lack of potato wedges that came with it. I want more.

But it was just the breakfasts that kept me coming back. Well actually I only ever had the Full Monty. I’m a sucka for a good breakfast, and when I find something I like, I stick with it. They have the largest sausages ever and some quality black pudding.

Lina has varied her menu, well she is the experimental one after all. The Eggs Benedict were well cooked, the eggs had that perfect tear drop shape that everyone likes. The Hollandaise was not as good as mine, but I have made several thousand litres. Kinda perfected it now. The Huevos Rancheros were not as I remember them in Mexico, but for this small corner of North London they were perfect.

Now, I wish I had eaten there more often than I did as in all my visits to Colombia, I have never seen sausages or good bacon on sale anywhere. What they call sausages is a hot dog sausage. So my full English in Colombia is gonna be a tad short. Or maybe I make then myself. This is an idea I have been playing with for a while. I’m not sure if they have Heinz baked beans either. Can life get any worse? Hahaha.

Well at least I know if things do not work out here, there is a Full English waiting for me …..