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Cafe Sereno does great breakfasts, dinners and snacks. I eat there a lot, and have yet to be disappointed. Great atmosphere, food and service. The main meals have a great Italian touch - the meatballs have to be tasted to be believed.
www.cafe-sereno.com
Albany Road
Another recommendation to add to the 'used by Bondi locals' list. Full breakfast here comes on two plates for the really serious to keep your toast free of egg or tomato leakage. This is the king of breaky that keeps you going all day - the veggie one comes highly recommended as well... Mmmmm.
The menu for the rest of the day is pretty good too, but in Bondi breaky is king - after a swim and before a trip to the Sunday markets.
Gould Street Plaza (leads onto Campbell Parade), Bondi Beach
I'm a Bondi beach local and am saddened when I see the Brits packing the cafes on Campbell Parade (the slightly dingy strip behind the beach) when no self-respecting resident would ever stop there. Get with the locals and try Jeds, Gusto, Le Paris Go, Speedo, Wet or Three Eggs for your morning bacon. You won't regret the change!
At a time when so many hotels no longer include breakfast, St. Martins in the Fields is truly a bargain. This church is slap bang in the centre right beside Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery. The cafe hidden in the crypt does a full English breakfast with tea/coffee for a mere £6.50. A bargain!
JD Wetherspoons pubs and bars offer free wi-fi connection to their customers. Just enter username 'Spnsored' and password 'Service' when asked.
Good food can be quite hard to come by in London (particularly when comparing to Asia), however, one gem famed for both celebrity spotting and for its delightful high tea and breakfast is the Wolseley at Green Park. Located next to the Ritz, this restaurant is the premier destination for anyone who wants to enjoy good quality food as reasonable (around £50 a head) food.
One great tip is to start your business day off here with a meeting. Breakfast is sublime with excellent bakery from the kitchen. Its central location makes it great for anyone staying in the city. High tea is also a great treat. Speciality teas, fine finger sandwiches, moist scones and the most delicate pastries found this side of Paris.
Green Park, London
www.thewolseley.com
This hidden gem serves the best cooked breakfast in Leicester.
Situated upstairs at The Barley Mow pub, the welcome is always warm, the service efficient and the food unpretentious and freshly prepared.
A full English with toast and tea comes in at around £4.25 and never fails to satisfy.
Highly recommended.
(Upstairs at The Barley Mow pub)
149 Granby St
Leicester,
LE1 6FE
(2 minute walk from Leicester BR)
Raju's serves south Indian breakfasts in the mornings and banana leaf tiffins (the Malaysian BLT - a pile of rice and curry served, as everything is at Raju's, on a banana leaf) in the afternoon.
Now, it is not on the tourist beat, it is not within sight of the Twin Towers, it's not even technically in KL but it is one of the best restaurants in the world.
It is situated next door to La Salle school on Jalan Chantek which is off Jalan Gasing which is off the Federal Highway heading towards Shah Alam. This is not the reason it's the best restaurant in the world though. It has a large outdoor dining area shaded by trees and with a charmingly bubbling storm drain running down one side. But this is not the reason it's the best restaurant in the world.
It is situated in a stand of shops which includes a picture framers, a photo shop and a barber's in a suburban residential area, populated by rather well off Malaysians, with Indians rather more plentifully represented than is perhaps the average. But this is not the reason it's the best restaurant in the world.
The reason it's the best restaurant in the world is because it serves, in the mornings, roti canai - which is the best breakfast in the world.
Basically a paratha-style flatbread of many calories, it is griddle fried freshly so that a crisp, friable crust forms on the dough, which is then punched and broken up before serving. Fairly boring, really. But then add some dal, some fish curry kuah (the gravy, not the actual fish) and perhaps a small piring (dish) of mutton curry, or a piece of fried tengiri, then add to this a teh tarikh (tea made with condensed milk which has been "tarikh'd", i.e. "pulled" through the air from one vessel to another to aerate and cool) and heaven, my friends, is a place on earth.
So. Be seated. There is no reservation, there is no plate captain, no "This way sir" - this is Malaysia old-style. There are many south Indian waiters in white shirts and blue trousers however. Call one over and ask for "roti canai" (pronounced "rotty chan-eye") and a teh tarikh. The dal, some carrot chutney and some coconut chutney are dumped unceremoniously in front of you along with a damp banana leaf. It is perfectly permissible to dry off the leaf with a tissue. I don't bother. And wait. A short time later (longer if at the weekend) and the roti, steaming, fragrant and - a sticking point for many - slightly smaller than average disc of bread is casually clapped onto your leaf. Serve yourself with dal, chutneys in small pools around the circumference. Some pour great ladlefuls of dal all over the roti, mash it into a mush and devour it sloppily in handfuls. A perfectly acceptable way to eat it in my opinion.
But we will choose the dainty option (though not the daintiest - forks and spoons are available, and widely used).
Tear off a small piece of roti, drag it through the dal (whilst arguing with your friends about whether or not the best nasi lemak is to be found in Ipoh or Penang) and pop it in your mouth. There is a faint cuminy, asafoetida tang to the dal, a faint sweetness (not too sweet, oh no) to the roti and a mouth feel (as Mr Blumenthal would have it) which is crunchy, soft, full-flavoured with mild spice (but not too mild, oh no) and completely satisfying. Tear off another piece. Pick up a perfectly tender piece of curried mutton - and although I never had a bad mutton curry when I lived in Malaysia, Raju's has to be the best - and once again, those curious contrasts are there. Crunchy/soft, spicy/bland, tangy/sweet. Take a sip of your scaldingly hot teh tarikh: it is foamy, sweet, strong and in combination with the roti and the curry as precisely perfect as any of the great pillars of Malaysian food when made perfectly. nasi lemak, laksa, prawn mee, char kway teow - roti canai. These are the five. Now you know one. Seek the rest.
Raju's Banana Leaf Restaurant, nearest LRT Taman Jaya, but it's quite a hike in the heat. Take a cab and ask for "Jalan Gasing, PJ" (pron. "gassing" pron. "peejay") then take the first left after the elevated LRT line. Raju's is at the end of the stand of shops on the right hand side of Jalan Chantek.
A real little local gem of a website that suggests the best places to stay and the best places to eat in Hastings. We plumped for Black Rock House - fantastic place.
The market is fab to wander around anyway, but you can eat a lovely breakfast at one of the stalls at the back of the market and watch the shopping activity from the comfort of your stool.
Mercado Central
Plaza del Mercado, 6, Valencia, Spain
The best place to get breakfast in SB - old school decor and huge portions, with a menu bigger than the table!
1450 Collins Avenue, South Beach, Miami;
tel: 305 532 8030;
www.jerrysfamousdeli.com
Go to Beauty's for brunch or breakfast. I love the mishmash of this place, which has been operating since 1942 and has consistently been voted best place for breakie and brunch.
93 Avenue du Mont-Royal Ouest;
tel: (514) 849 8883
Superb place for breakfast. I notice that one of the owners is a westerner: if he's not Australian, I'd be very surprised, because this place has a really Sydney feel about it. Decent coffee, papers from Bangkok to read, and a 'hang around as long as you like' vibe. Don't leave without trying the Bagel Egger: it'll set you up good for a day of cycling around temples.
Th Chao Fa Ngun (in the centre, and Luang Prabang is small, so you'll find it easily);
tel: 071 252292
Traditional diner near Union Square. Very well known, grumpy staff, but genuinely great breakfast - especially pancakes and corned beef hash.
439 Powell St, near Union Square; tel: (415) 986 1160
Breakfast. Forget those spartan breakfasts with a few dodgy rolls and luke-warm coffee. This was it. Everything for the cosmopolitan traveller, including as near to an Ulster fry as you’ll ever get.
Are your taste buds beginning to tremble at the thought of such seductive fare? Is the saliva flowing? The sheer joy of savouring the smell from a plate with rashers of succulent shavings of bacon beside plump juicy sausages and carefully fried eggs. This, complemented with those hallmarks of excellence, soda bread and potato bread, and black pudding and grilled tomato cooked properly, with the tomato beginning to blacken and the pudding just on the verge of crisping. Which of us has not succumbed to temptation at some time?
And as for the philistines who claim that a fry does not fix a hangover… let them feel the soothing balm of such fodder on a morning when the hands shake and the pulsing head yearns for pity and even death is seen as a welcome release. When eternal promises to never again indulge in the demon drink are made. When even the Almighty is invoked in an effort to remove the awful consequences of over-indulgence. It is then that the magical restorative properties of the fry come into their own.
To witness such a miracle is to visit any early opening restaurant on a Saturday or Sunday morning when pathetic specimens of humanity, who, the previous night, ready to take on the world, now cringe at the sound of a closing door. The secret is to find The Right Place. And here it was. In the breakfast room of the St James Thistle.
St James Centre, Edinburgh;
tel: 0131 556 0111
Walk away from Brighton towards Hove along the seafront, the Meeting Place Cafe is on the border between the two. Great on a Sunday morning for watching everyone bike, blade and walk by and much better breakfasts than most of the overpriced fish restaurants along the front between here and the Pier. It's not that sophisticated (not a bad thing in Brighton) but the location's perfect.
Brighton & Hove Boundary, Kings Road, Brighton;
tel: 01273 206417;
www.themeetingplacecafe.co.uk
This bakery/cafe just off Grand Place has friendly staff and great continental breakfasts and salads. Good value, and tasty!
35, place Rihour;
tel: 03 20 42 88 70
www.painquotidien.com
Joe's Grill is the one of the best breakfast/brunch places I've ever been too. The service is quick and friendly, the prices are cheap, the portions are big and most importantly, delicious!!
It's a perfect place to sit and watch the world go by, read the papers or eat away a hangover!!
1031 Davie St.
Tel: 604 682 3683
Traditional and delicious. The hot chocolate, eaten with little doughnuts (bunuelos), natch, is thick enough to remind you of school days’ chocolate custard. If you're hot, drink horchata (orxata in Valenciano), icy-sweet and refreshing drink. Particularly nice drunk in the traditionally tiled horchaterias around town.
Great place for breakfast – never “brunch,” kay? – in the Village. So good in fact that people happily queue to get in on a Sunday morning. But the retro diner decor, buzzing atmosphere and not-too-phony great service make it worthwhile. Oh, and the food: all manner of egg dishes, bacon, coffee from the bottomless jug … let’s do breakfast, man.
Hours: Sun-Thurs 8:30am-10:30pm; Fri-Sat 8:30am-11pm
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