The Breakfast Club from Moore Street Cafe (Photo by Eileen Mellon)
The Colapranzo at Cafespresso isn’t technically a breakfast sandwich, but it’s on the path. It’s got bread — shatter-crisp focaccia — herby eggs mixed with avocado (you can add truffle or Gorgonzola) and a pile of sliced prosciutto di Parma. The parts make an incredible whole should the eater accept responsibility for building a sandwich. However, if smears and stacks aren’t part of your morning travels, the Breakfast Square features the same excellent focaccia with egg and cheese in a more moveable manner. Expect a line until 11 a.m., when lunch service starts.
The Smoky Mug in North Side also draws a line most mornings during breakfast, which is served until 11 a.m. The bulk of the queue is for the burrito,a hand-sized, house-made flour tortilla filled with scrambled eggs and hash-y potatoes mixed with salsa roja and hatch green chiles. While meats are optional additions, it’s the smoke-scented, tender pulled pork that feels most at home tucked into the pocket of eggs and enjoyed under the tented outdoor dining area flanked by their smoker, Esmerelda.
Moore Street Cafe’s flat-top grill cranks out a weekday breakfast till 11 a.m., but on Saturday and Sunday, it’s an all-day affair. Their Breakfast Club could be eaten by hand if your hand is large enough to palm a basketball. Otherwise, you’ll need fork support for the cheese, two-egg, three-meat and three-Texas-toast-slice behemoth.
At Dot’s Back Inn, brunch (Saturday and Sunday until 3 p.m.) comes in the traditional form, with a choose-your-own format, along with Dot’s Famous Breakfast Club. But it’s their pigs in a blanket, Richmond’s version of the McGriddle, that is the heart stopper. Two lengths of andouille sausage are wrapped hog-in-a-quilt style by a large and fluffy pancake and topped with a scoop of butter. —Robey Martin
Ham biscuits from Homemades by Suzanne (Photo by Eileen Mellon)
Going Ham
The great ham biscuit debate isn’t over what sort and brand of ham to use — that’s Edwards Virginia Smokehouse country ham, duh — but rather what type of carby vessel to put it on.
At Libbie Market, slider potato rolls are piled with thinly shaved Edwards country ham and nothing else. Grab a couple packs of mustard and pickles to round out the picnic basket.
Supper Club frequently sells out of these tangy, salty snacks of Virginia ham smeared with their signature Dijon sauce on parkerhouse rolls.
Homemades by Suzanne offers the ultimate party biscuit with a tough choice: Do you want your ham on a pillowy, yeasty angel biscuit — like the love child of a biscuit and a yeast roll — or on the heartier sweet potato biscuit? The answer is both.
The airy, buttery ham biscuit at Pearl’s Bake Shoppe heralds one’s best flour-free life. Made with gluten-free all-purpose flour, the sweet potato biscuits rise high, painted with butter and stacked with thicker slices of country ham. —Genevelyn Steele
