#4 RHODE ISLAND – The Heat Wave Ends, The Eat Wave Continues

Yeah! After 5 days of temperatures in the nineties, today's forecast is a high of 77.

Before landing in Bristol, Rhode Island for a couple of days, I searched on the internet for possible breakfast options and noticed that there was quite a buzz on Yelp and TripAdvisor about the Beehive Café. Upon arrival, our hostess suggested that we eat lunch at the Beehive, which we did, and it was great, but left me having to look for another breakfast place.  I settled for the Sunset Café because it was in walking distance from where we were staying and it had been named “Best Breakfast on the East Bay” by Rhode Island Monthly.

Sunset Cafe
Bristol, Rhode Island

AMBIENCE:  Sunset Café was an attractive restaurant in an old building.  It wasn’t very big, having only seven or eight tables. Upon being seated, we noticed that we were the only customers. Hmm… was everyone eating breakfast at The Beehive? It did start to fill in as we ate breakfast. The décor included license plates from every state and some countries (including Cuba!) hanging on the wall. Chalkboards displayed the breakfast and lunch specials but the breakfast chalkboard would prove to be false advertising. Fresh flowers decorated the tables. Overall the space was high on the cuteness scale.

I did think that the Sunset Café was an odd name for a restaurant that closed at 2:00 PM and prided itself on its breakfast fare. I later discovered that the previous occupant of the building was the Sunset Bakery and the name carried over. Still, I found myself continually calling it the Sunrise Café.

5 out of 5 stars

FOOD:  The owner/manager of the Sunrise Sunset Café is of Portuguese descent and that is reflected in a number of menu items. I ordered the “Sunset Special” which consisted of two eggs, chourico hash, home fries, and toast. Chourico, pronounced shure-Reet-zo, is the Portuguese version of the Spanish chorizo.

  

Everything was delicious especially the rye toast. The ghosts of the former bakery must be at work in the kitchen.

Upon entering the restaurant, The Healthy One got excited about a Yogurt Bowl with fruit, granola, and almonds she saw listed on the chalkboard as one of the daily specials.  She ordered that but a few minutes later the waitress came back with the bad news that the chalkboard specials were from yesterday and no longer available. The Healthy One then went with the Veggie Breakfast Sandwich that was a scrambled egg, green peppers, and mushrooms on Portuguese bolo bread. After the crushing disappointment of the disappearing Yogurt Bowl, the Healthy One seemed placated, pronouncing the sandwich “excellent”.

5 out of 5 stars

COFFEE:  Very good.

4 1/2 out of 5 stars

SERVICE: There was something curious about our waitress. She approached our table with poise and self-assurance. Her posture was impeccable. Her smile was dazzling. She was both charming and business-like. When she came and told us that the Yogurt Bowl was not to be, it was said in a manner that reflected grief but hope for the future.

As we waited for our food to be cooked we noticed, across the room, a small framed picture of a pageant winner. We recognized the young woman in the picture as our waitress. Yes, our waitress was Daniela Lopes, Miss Fourth of July 2013!

Apparently the Fourth of July is a very big deal in Bristol. The town has held the longest continual Fourth of July celebration in the United States, dating back to 1785. The celebration begins on June 14 (Flag Day) and draws some 200,000 people to the town. The celebration culminates in the Fourth of July parade which is observed by 50,000 people. Bristol’s population is only 23,000! So our waitress is a celebrity, and because of that, and because she did a great job, we are excusing the Yogurt Bowl incident (she did promptly erase the specials board) and rating the service:

5 out of 5 stars

COST: $21.04 with tax and tip. Given the quality and amount of food we received as well as the excellent coffee, this was a bargain.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT BRISTOL:  Bristol, sitting between the shores of Narraganset Bay and Mt. Hope Bay, is a great little town.  Bristol likes to call itself “America’s Most Patriotic Town”. Almost every house we passed had an American flag displayed. Instead of a double yellow line painted on the main highway through town, there is a red, white, and blue line. Many of the houses are festooned with bunting.

Patriotism aside, Bristol seems to be a place where people have a great deal of community pride. We walked by scores of houses that were built in the 1700s and all were in immaculate condition. The waterfront is bustling with restaurants, bars and a great ice cream store. We did drive down to Newport for a day. Newport is fascinating with its large mansions and million dollar yachts. Nevertheless, we preferred the relatively peaceful atmosphere of Bristol to the hordes of summer tourists that crammed the sidewalks of Newport.

  

BURN THOSE BREAKFAST CALORIES OFF:

-          Walked to and around Colt State Park.

-          Did the Cliff Walk in Newport.

August 18, 2016

NEXT UP: MASSACHUSETTS 

#3 NEW JERSEY – Yes, I Would Like A Weenie For Breakfast

New Jersey presented numerous breakfast place possibilities. So many in fact, that I didn’t quite know how to narrow them down. I thought that the governor might be able to help me out. Chris Christie is a man of considerable girth. He probably knows a good breakfast when he sees one, so I googled “where does Chris Christie eat?”. The only results I got were links to articles about Christie “eating crow” so that wasn’t much help. And then there are the New Jersey diners. There’re all over the place. I’ve been to some of these diners in the past. They provide quality food and lots of it. My problem with NJ diners is that the menus can be up to 20 pages long with too many choices for one to cipher through first thing in the morning. I wanted a place less complicated, where the choice of what I was going to order was more of a simple task. Then I saw an article on onlyinyourstate.com about 12 extremely tiny restaurants in New Jersey that are actually amazing. The article listed one of these restaurants as having “some of the best breakfast dishes around”. So that is where we went.

Genie’s Weenies
Branchburg, New Jersey

AMBIENCE:  To say the inside of this bright green building is small is an understatement. It only had two tables and about eight stools at a counter. There are a couple of picnic tables outside but Genie’s sits on a major four lane highway (Rte. 22) and the continual roar of semis and the whoosh of cars is not something we wanted to hear while eating.  We ordered at the cash register from Genie herself, and then we helped ourselves to some coffee while we waited for our food.  We did manage to grab one of the two tables. While sitting there, we noticed that they did a brisk carry-out business. We also noticed that the customers taking away their food were very large men. These men were cops, construction workers, road crew, plumbers, etc.  I took this as a very good sign although I think The Healthy One was a bit intimidated.

4 out of 5 stars

FOOD:  I ordered an undressed weenie as an appetizer. Genie did not bat an eye even though it was 8 in the morning. I then added a two egg sandwich with cheese and pork roll. . Eater.com wrote that this sandwich is arguably New Jersey’s most popular breakfast sandwich. Pork roll, also known as Taylor Ham (to make it sound more edible?), is an iconic New Jersey food. It is processed pork made from coarsely ground pork shoulder, made with a mix of spices, salt, a sugar cure, and preservatives that is smoked before being packaged. It gets its name because of the “roll” or tube-like cotton sack it comes in when you buy it from a store.

The weenie arrived at our table in a matter of minutes.

The weenie was tasty with a nice crunch when I bit into it. I learned that it was a Thumann’s hot dog (motto: SNAP’N GOOD).  I also later read in a Daily Beast article that a Thumann’s hot dog is the third most unhealthy hot dog in the country. Sigh. By ingesting the hot dog, pork roll, and scrapple, all within the past 24 hours, I expected to self-destruct somewhere on that day’s drive through Connecticut.

The breakfast sandwich, which arrived soon after I finished the weenie, was very good. The pork roll didn’t overpower the rest of the sandwich but added a nice bit of spice to the overall experience.  The roll was very fresh and held everything together nicely.

The Healthy One got the Egg Platter. This was quite shocking. Was the Healthy One having a moment of madness or was she just getting into the spirit of the big man experience? In her defense, there was nothing healthy on the menu. Also, I ate all those potatoes.

3 1/2 out of 5 stars

COFFEE:  The coffee was surprisingly good given that it was 99 cents for an unlimited cup. I asked Genie whether I had paid for a large or small coffee. She said it didn’t matter and to just help yourself.  I’m assuming this is a perk of eating in and not carrying out.

4 out of 5 stars

SERVICE: Genie was both friendly and efficient.  As busy as the place was she handled it with ease. She made sure that The Healthy One had a fresh pot of de-caf and that we were happy with our food.

5 out of 5 stars

COST: $20.00 with tax and tip.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT BRANCHBURG:  Nothing much to say about Branchburg. I know it straddles two major New Jersey highways: Rte. 22 and Rte. 202. I don’t think there is any downtown, with most retail located on the major highways. Janet Reitman of Rolling Stone described Branchburg as a “not-quite-rural, not-quite-suburban, decidedly middle-class town.” Quaint it's not.

BURN THOSE BREAKFAST CALORIES OFF:

We awoke early and walked around the lovely campus of Lafayette College and the surrounding neighborhood. The college is in Easton PA and overlooks the Delaware River. Here is a picture of the Marquis.

August 16, 2016

NEXT UP: RHODE ISLAND  

#2 DELAWARE – Scrapple Is Not A Word Game

I wanted to try the Mid-Atlantic breakfast delicacy known as scrapple. Delaware is the nation’s largest scrapple producer and RAPA, located in Bridgeville is Delaware’s biggest scrapple company.  Bridgeville has a big scrapple festival in the middle of October in case you’re interested. The RAPA website does not try to hide the ingredients in their scrapple recipe:   Pork Stock, Pork Livers, Pork Fat, Pork Snouts, Corn Meal, Pork Hearts, Wheat Flour, Salt, and Spices.  The mixture is then deep fried. How can you not get excited about that?

I needed a breakfast place in Northwestern Delaware that served scrapple. The choices were very limited but I decided on:

Drip Cafe
Hockessin, Delaware

AMBIENCE:  The Drip Café sits in a strip mall somewhere among the housing subdivisions of Hockessin. The restaurant is modern, airy, and visually appealing. It was about 25% full when we got there on a Monday morning and included a number of hipsters. Most people were drinking coffee and eating a pastry. We were seated in a little elevated section away from the main floor next to an elderly man. I’m guessing this was the non-hipster/dweeb sitting area.

4 out of 5 stars

FOOD:  I ordered the “Breakfast Bake” which was a dish made up of peaches, toasted almonds, and oatmeal baked in a spice custard, and served with maple syrup. Even though I had done my research I wanted to know the waitress’s opinion of scrapple. When I asked what it was, she grimaced and said that “people in Delaware seemed to like it”. She left and went to ask the chef about scrapple. She returned and said that the chef told her it was “sausage in a low form”. I ordered it.

I had a hard time finishing the Breakfast Bake. It was way too sweet for my tastes, especially for breakfast. It reminded me a lot of a peach cobbler.

Scrapple Close-up - Crispy on the outside, juicy on the inside.

The scrapple, on the other hand was quite tasty. Probably something you don’t want to eat every day but I finished it with a smile rather than a grimace.

The Healthy One, who I think called the scrapple “disgusting”, had a Greek Yogurt Parfait with house-made granola, fresh fruit, and a honey drizzle. She thought it was quite good.

3 1/2 out of 5 stars

COFFEE:  The coffee, coming from a place called the Drip Café, was very disappointing. The menu listed coffees from Congo, Kenya, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Columbia. But rather than pay $4.00 for a cup of one of these coffees we opted for the “house blend”.  Our pours tasted very bitter and worse than cafeteria coffee.

1 ½ out of 5 stars

SERVICE: The waitress was pleasant enough but not exactly the Usain Bolt of servers. She checked in with us every once in a while but seemed not exactly happy to be working that day. I did appreciate the fact that she went and asked the chef about scrapple. It took a long time to get our check and when it finally came, it was the wrong one. As I scanned the room to get her attention, I saw her going into the Women’s room while pulling out her smart phone. That was not a good sign that she would show up in the foreseeable future so I went to the counter and got things straightened out.

2 1/2 out of 5 stars

COST: $22.00 with tip. No sales tax in Delaware!

A FEW WORDS ABOUT HOCKESSIN:  Hockessin is a strange place. You drive along the road and see names such as Quail Ridge, Horseshoe Hills, and Valley View on brick facades with a road leading up to what I assume are houses and neighborhoods. I looked it up later and found that Hockessin has 45 of these subdivisions. There is no downtown that I could see, just a lot of these individual, well-manicured fiefdoms on what was once beautiful farmland.

BURN THOSE BREAKFAST CALORIES OFF:

-         - Four mile hike in the Valley Forge National Park. When George Washington and his troops spent the winter here it was cold and miserable. When we were here it was hot and miserable with a “real feel” temperature of 110 degrees.

-          -Walking in circles at the King of Prussia PA Mall. Maybe we should just visit a mall in every state.

-   -An evening walk through downtown Easton PA, including a round trip walk across the Delaware to NJ. 

August 15, 2016

NEXT UP: NEW JERSEY  

#1 MARYLAND - Setting the Breakfast Bar Pretty Damn High

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single bite”. – Chinese Philosopher Laozi

Actually Mr. Laozi wrote, in second century BC, that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step but I invoke artistic license. I chose our first breakfast restaurant located only 35 miles from where we live in a town a never heard of.

Willy’s Kitchen
Ferndale, Maryland

If you google Willy’s, you’ll find that it has a Glen Burnie MD address, but customers will tell you that it is really in Ferndale. In fact, they will insist it is in Ferndale. Who is Willy you may wonder, as I did? Willy’s is named after the owner’s late grandfather who owned a local bus service company and was her inspiration in establishing the restaurant.

AMBIENCE:  Willy’s Kitchen is a small, busy, and homey place having maybe 15 tables and a small counter. We arrived on a Sunday morning and the place was just about full. Around 25% of the male customers wore some sort of Baltimore Orioles apparel. We were definitely clear of Washington Nationals territory. It became quickly apparent that this was a true “locals” place. Customers had their own personalized coffee mugs, knew the servers by name, and many seemed to know each other. The very friendly couple sitting next to us were certainly locals; their house was right around the corner. The walls had the ubiquitous breakfast place cute sayings and knickknacks. Everyone in the place seemed to have a smile on their face. Maybe it was the food or maybe it was because the Orioles won the night before.

5 out of 5 stars

FOOD:  Willy’s Kitchen is no greasy spoon. It prides itself in serving fresh, local, natural ingredients.

Being in Maryland, the menu had a number of dishes with crab – crab omelets, crab Benedicts, and something called the soft-shell crab bomb.  I passed on these, feeling that crab and other creatures of the sea don’t belong at the breakfast table. You eat crab later in the day with beer.

We made our decisions, but first they had to pass muster with our friendly next table neighbors. They wholeheartedly approved of what we chose but added that I MUST get the hash browns as a side.

I had the Liberty Delight Farm Bacon Omelet with American cheese with rye toast, and of course the hash browns.

The omelet was delicious, the toast was incredible, and the hash browns received the first Breakfast Across America Certificate of Excellence. Thank you friendly table neighbors for the suggestion!

The Healthy One ordered the Healthy Omelet which contained “3 cage free egg whites, 1 cage free whole egg, tomatoes, mushrooms, and spinach”. I don’t understand why anyone would keep eggs in a cage. Do they think the eggs will escape? She also got a side of fruit. I ended up eating her multi-grain toast.

5 out of 5 stars

COFFEE:  4 out of 5 Stars but real fresh cream on the table pushes it up to a 4 ½.

SERVICE: These ladies were professionals. They were both friendly and efficient. Kept the coffee cup filled. They didn’t botch the orders.  Reflecting their all-star status each employee had a professionally done, framed caricature hanging above the counter.

5 out of 5 stars

COST: $31.35 with tax and tip. It was a little steep but that’s the price you pay for locally sourced food as well as bacon from a hog that died with dignity.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT FERNDALE:  Ferndale sits adjacent to the Baltimore Washington Thurgood Marshall airport. It is a community of about 17,000 and I suspect that many of them commute to work in Baltimore on the Light Rail. We walked the main drag and found that in the short space of 4 blocks there was everything a town would need to be sustainable: a tavern, a deli, a tattoo parlor, a Chinese carry-out, and a gas station.

BURN THOSE BREAKFAST CALORIES OFF:

-          - Walking tour of Ferndale. It didn’t take long and we didn’t see any ferns.

-          - Toured the Baltimore Museum of Industry. Much, much better than it sounds.
   - Hike in Gunpowder Falls State Park

-          -Walking in circles at the Christiana Delaware Mall. Give me a break, it was 100 degrees outside.
        
        August 14, 2016

      NEXT UP: DELAWARE 

 

BREAKFAST ACROSS AMERICA:  A Journey Through America To Discover What There Is To Eat With Your Morning Coffee.

“One should not attend even the end of the world without a good breakfast” – Robert A. Heinlen

Pictured below is what I have had for breakfast pretty much every morning for the past 20 years. Exceptions were when I was out of town and during the occasional weekend when I was feeling adventurous and would scramble up an egg or two. If I was feeling really bold, I’d get out a couple of slices of American cheese and attempt an omelet.

Obviously I’m in a breakfast rut and it’s time to step up my game. It’s time to eat Breakfast Across America!

This blog’s aim is to chronicle a journey in which my wife and I plan to eat breakfast at a restaurant, diner, or café in every state in America.  Well, not every state. Since the trip will be made by car, Hawaii and Alaska are out. Macadamia nut pancakes and moose sausage will have to wait for another time.  I am including the District of Columbia, although not a state, it should be.

As I contemplated my upcoming retirement from work, I decided it would be fun to combine my love of travel with my love of those “mom and pop” restaurants where the locals ate. Thus, the idea of eating breakfast across America was born.

When I first came up with this cross country cholesterol crusade idea, I thought we would hop in the car and crank out all 49 breakfast stops in about 2 month period. Since that thought, some logic has prevailed. There seemed to be a number of reasons why the idea would have ended up being filed under “it seemed like a good idea at the time”.  First, we have been married for 26 years and thought that being in the car together for almost 15,000 miles in a single trip might make 27 years iffy. Second, I plan on giving each restaurant due diligence in terms of what they have to offer. That means eating a “full breakfast” (a term which I plan on taking literally). Of course, 49 full breakfasts in 60 days have health implications and I don’t mean positive ones. And aren’t all those miles sitting in the car an invitation for literally developing a pain in the rear? Finally, between stuffing our faces, and driving from state to state, there wouldn’t much time left to enjoy a lot of what America has to offer in terms of its natural and unnatural wonders.

So if the digestive tract holds up, the plan is to divide the breakfast tour into five separate regional trips:

Northeast (planned for Summer 2016)
Southeast (planned for Fall 2016)
Southwest (planned for Spring 2017)
Northwest (planned for Fall 2017)
Midwest (planned for Summer 2018)

After much extensive research, breakfast stops have been identified for each state. Some states have two or three options to choose from. My list is by no means set in stone. In fact, it changes quite a bit. Restaurants shut down, fall out of favor, or new places are discovered.  One establishment I thought that looked very promising ended up floating away in a flood but I read it has been rebuilt and is now open for business so it’s back on the list. If you know of a great place for breakfast, please pipe in!

I used Yelp, Trip Advisor, Roadfood, Chowhound, local newspaper reviews, and magazine “best of” lists, as well as individual restaurant t websites to identify my tentative choices. The Food Network put out a list of the best breakfasts in each state http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/photos/50-states-50-breakfasts.html which I’m totally ignoring.

I had three main criteria when choosing where we might go.

1) The restaurant has to be of the “mom and pop” type. No chains, no places with “other locations”, no hotel breakfast rooms with a waffle maker and cereal in tubes, and no bed and breakfasts.

2) The restaurant has to be in a town or city that I have never visited. I have been to all 50 states but there are plenty of places within the states that I have not set foot.  My favorite thing is to go where I have never gone.

3) The restaurant should be geographically “convenient”.  In other words, we don’t want to be driving to the far north of Maine just to have the blueberry pancakes or to Key West FL for a seafood omelet. The less time in the car, the better.

I think we are ready. I have a full tank of gas in the car and a full hunger in my stomach. I have my official Breakfast Across America hat. I have my Lipitor. Let’s go. 

August 14 2016