Weekend breakfasts are a sacred ritual in our house, so our experience yesterday was like going to church on Sunday morning and finding it closed for remodeling.

Our other favorites are Cornerstone (midtown diner, frequented by hipsters), Mr. Perry's and Original Perry's (family-style diners in South Sac), and New Canton (dim sum). I won't be caught dead in Lucky Cafe, another hipster diner in downtown Sacramento -- it's overpriced and the food isn't that great.

Do you make a big deal out of weekend breakfasts? What are your favorite places?

-- Anonymous, August 29, 1999

Answers

Well, considering the fact that I am rarely up at anything resembling close to time to have breakfast ... no we don't.

However, on occasion we will treat ourselves to brunch and when we do, we're fortunate enough that our favorite place to have brunch, has brunch until 3pm. (We usually roll in there between 2 and 2:30pm)

Copeland's is the place -- New Orleans Style/Cajun resaurant chain, dunno how far and wide across the country they're spread -- and they have scrumptious Eggs Benedict.

Occasionally we'll split a mixed seafood platter -- a mound of crabcakes, shrimp, prawns and fried catfish strips piled on top of hand cut french fries and sides of tiger sauce and hollandaise.

Sabs eats the shellfish, I eat the catfish and we split the crab cakes.

Yum.

I'd like to be up in time to have breakfast on a more regular basis -- but I just can't seem to cure myself of being a nightowl.

When I was little Saturday and Sunday breakfasts were special with my family because that was those were the days of the week that DAD would cook. Mom was a stay-at-home mom and she cooked all week long, except for Saturdays and Sundays.

On Saturday, Dad would make pancakes or French Toast. On Sundays he'd make eggs and bacon or omelettes. Dad makes bar none, the YUMMIEST eggs I've ever had, other than the aforementioned Eggs Benedict. Dad sucks at poached eggs, but every other kind of egg -- he just rules.

Us kids had a Sunday ritual that started in 1982. A new show went on the air on RTL (Radio-Television Luxembourg) very early in the mornings on Sunday. It was called Chocolat Chaud (Hot Chocolate) and it boasted a line-up of all of our most favorite cartoons. It started at 7:30am as I recall and in order to be ready to watch it, we'd all be up at 6:45 padding downstairs in our pjs and blankies. I was in charge of making the hot chocolate (on a gas stove that needed to be lit with matches -- I'm still damn good at that little trick, turn handle, insert match, let handle go, pull away match). When I got a little bit older, I also started making my parents' coffee for them. I'd grind the beans, set up the pot and boil the water, pour the water through the filter and then put the full pot on the small burner on low to keep it warm until my folks toddled out of bed around 8/8:30.

The cartoon show was over just before 9am and Mom would come in and chase us off to get dressed for church. She'd feed us a pastry or two before we went and we had snack at Sunday school and when we got home around noon, Dad would break out the eggs.

It's been a long time since those rituals changed. When we moved back to the States, we held onto it for a year or two -- but there were no cartoons on Sunday mornings the way there were in Brussels, so Tom and Ted and I became less and less likely to get up early on Sundays. As we reached our teen years, we also became less likely to want to go to church at all.

And that's when _I_ started making Sunday brunch;)

Change ... c'est la vie, I guess.

-- Anonymous, August 29, 1999

We've tried to cut down on eating out for breakfast, but Cornerstone is still our #1 destination for the basic weekend breakfast. The Camellia Coffee Shop on Capitol and 16th is second place, merely due to its beautifully moribund decor. It's cheap, too. We'll have to go there again a few times before they knock down THE WHOLE GODDAMN FUCKING NEIGHBORHOOD to build more state buildings. (BASTARDS!!!) There is also a Chinese restaurant on, I think, 7th Street near J that serves a nice greasy cheap two-egg/hashbrown/toast breakfast for under two bucks (coffee brings it to about $2.50) which I stop at if I have to be on J or K Street in the morning for some reason. Despite my vegetarian/healthfood tendencies, I really enjoy genuine ptomaine-pit atmosphere, and there are still a few greasy breakfast joints in the downtown area which fill the bill. The greatest, of course, was the "Chop Suey" place next to the pawnshop on 8th between J and K, but they finally closed down. Even though it has been abandoned for four years, it still looks essentially the same as when it was open: greasy, gray, and sleazy. There's also a place on the K Street Mall that used to be a Japanese lunch place which now serves a cheap two-egg breakfast. They mostly cater to the retirement-age folks who live in the less-scummy SRO hotels like the Capitol Park Hotel, who like their food cheap, cholesterol-laden, and old-fashioned. While I like Cornerstone a bunch and they're still cheap, it's nice to eat in a hipster-free atmosphere once in a while. In Citrus Heights there is a place called the Lodge Cafe on Auburn and Rollingwood; it's an A-frame structure right around the corner from the Harley-Davidson dealership. My family has been eating greasy breakfasts there since 1976. Heck, my brother maggot even bussed tables there for a while. The ultimate greasy-spoon test: A "diet plate" consisting of a hamburger patty, lettuce leaf, scoop of cottage cheese, and a piece of fruit.

-- Anonymous, August 29, 1999

Oh, I completely forgot one. Mary's on Broadway and 65th. Great place, looks like it still has the original 1940s decor (except for the 1970s Scholastic Books posters). Run by two Chinese-American ladies. They make the best fried eggs in town, and there isn't much on the menu that's over $3.

For some reason I forgot that Greta's serves a good breakfast, too. We just had lunch there. Greta's is a perfectly adequate Marshall Grounds substitute, although I'm still pissed that the latter isn't open at all on weekends now.

The benedict florentine (eggs benedict only with spinach and tomatoes instead of ham) at Cornerstone rocks my world.

-- Anonymous, August 29, 1999

Breakfast? What the hell is that?

~

On the aquarium thing, though- do it. It's soooo cool. I bought Meg an aquarium last year, and it's turned out to be one of those gifts you give someone but make your own. Who knew fish could keep anyone's attention this long? Got a 35 gallon freshwater, and am contemplating the 60 gallon salt soon.

It's not toooo much work, but I have killed a couple of snails along the way. I feel guilty, but not overwhelmingly so.

Anyway, just thought I'd pipe up to state the obvious- you need more animals.

(in general, not in your sex life).

Speaking of . . .

(as if I'd pass on my sole subject of expertise- sexual relations with older women)

He just likes the attention. But you knew that. In fact, it doesn't really even bother you, but you feel you should get upset anyway. Otherwise he'd think it's okay to go around having hotties call him.

And you couldn't have that.

-- Anonymous, August 30, 1999

I don't eat breakfast.

Well, I do sometimes eat breakfast foods, and I remember Original Perry's being just great for pancakes at midnight (or tapioca with strawberries, or a bay-go). Since I'm back in the area, I might as well try them again sometime. I really like their coffee, too. Although I learned pretty quick not to drink 4 cups of truck stop coffee at midnight unless I'm planning on not sleeping.

(And I really don't like aquariums. Nothing like waking up in the middle of the night when your 10 years old and watching the dead fish draped over rocks in the aquarium at the end of your bed...)

I do have to say that I had some really good fish and chips on Friday night at um... the "streets of London" pub on j (i think?). (Note for the uninitiated: I hate fish). This fish was soooooooo good, and the coating was nice and crispy and tasty. I would definitely eat it again. Even if it was a loud, fake pub atmosphere.

-- Anonymous, August 30, 1999

Before we moved, my favorite place in Kalamazoo was this snobby little restaurant called "The Food Dance". It was actually rather un-Rob, very granola crunchy earthy happy, and yet I loved it. They had a chicken apple sausage that was to weep for. Sunday morning, you could find Julie and I there, eating with the other heathens while everyone else was at church. (Why worship a god who lets all the bad people eat first?)

Now that we live in Detroit, I just look for a place with a minimum of gunfire...

-- Anonymous, August 30, 1999

The Mercantile Tea Room in Oberlin, Ohio. This was before the flavored coffee thing really got started -- in the mid-80's. It was a tiny store, with maybe four or five tables in it. I always ordered the potato pancakes with applesauce and sausage. Yum. Black coffee with a little bit of brown sugar. It was heaven. While others were across the street at the Campus Restaurant, eating greasy eggs, I was experiencing gastronomic Nirvana.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 1999

God, I love breakfast. It's my favorite meal. On weekends I feel entitled to eat out and if for some reason I don't get to, I am bitter about it till Monday.

My favorite place in the world is Louis' in San Francisco. It's near hte Cliff House and has been there forever. They have classic diner food and do scrambled eggs just right, as well as lovely pancakes, waffles, etc. If you're not in the mood for breakfast for some odd reason, have a club sandwich. They also have this waitress named Rachel who has been working there for literally about 50 years and is a real character. "Loffly, loffly blintzes...what can I bring you dear?" Now that we don't live in SF any more and can't feel superior the the tourists, I don't know if we'll have as much fun going there as we used to.

But for me, the scrambled eggs are the cornerstone of the meal. When we first moved down to the South Bay, we tried out a bunch of places. One that had great pancakes had terrible scrambled eggs - more like fried eggs with the whites all separate. Ugh. I sent them back and they were returned to me in almost hte same condition. Like they didn't know what scrambled eggs were. It was all I could do to keep from going in the kitchen to show them.

We have two favorite places now. One is The Original Pancake House, which has all kinds of flavored pancakes. Diane writes about going there in Nobody KNows ANything, but I knew about it even before I read about it there. I like the buckwheat pancakes. They have clam pancakes and the waitress told us there used to be a father and son who came in and ordred them every day, till their doctor told them to cut it out. Sad, huh?

Across the street is a place called Bobby's or something like that. It's just as good but less popular somehow. It has less comfortable seating, but it has a great old milk shake machine and rack for small boxes of Kellogg's cereal. The waitresses are just as friendly.

I'm happy thinking about breakfasts this weekend...

-- Anonymous, August 31, 1999

Best breakfast in SF - Ella's, on the corner of California & Presidio.

It was more fun before it got written up in the paper a few times - now there's usually a long wait on the weekends during brunch dog hours.

Weekdays are better, for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

I love the staff thee too, and they love me back. :)

-- Anonymous, September 02, 1999