The Politeness of Strangers in Oakland

Piedmont Cafe and Bakery is just the sort of unassuming-looking, hole-in-the-wall diner that immediately made my mouth water the first time I passed it. Even on a street packed with every type of restaurant, and literally across the street from the incredible Caffe Trieste (all in due time, my foodies!), the Piedmont Cafe screamed out for a low-key, high-calorie breakfast experience. Just the kind I like! Piedmont is a cool little street, the area between MacArthur and where the street literally dead-ends into one of the most beautiful and sprawling cemeteries I've ever seen, the Chapel of the Chimes. Along this little stretch of street there's three bookstores, five coffee shops, one theatre, any food you could want, a handful of boutiques, and one hundred places to get your nails done. On one of our first explorations of Piedmont, the Lady and I began talking to a local in the A.G. Ferrari's, an impressive Italian deli. One of the first questions he asked of us upon hearing we'd moved to the area was "Have you found your closest Trader Joe's yet?" That's kind of the vibe of Piedmont... lots of chai lattes and North Face jackets.
But not the Piedmont Cafe and Bakery! It is salt-of-the-earth, greasy spoon diner at its best. And by best, I mean they bake their own donuts! I'll wait while you process that.

The Lady and I walked in and stood awkwardly in that way that one does upon entering a new restaurant, when a guy behind us came in and sat down at the bar. We looked at each other, shrugged, and sat in between him and an elderly gentlemen reading on his iPad. We eyed the menu and got coffee in mugs plastered with ads for other businesses, most I suspect are no longer functioning. The Lady ordered a stack of pancakes, while I opted for a chili cheese omelette with home fries because chili cheese omelette.
This would typically be right around the part of the blog where I post a photo of the food, but something happened. I forget how it started, but we ended up striking up a conversation with our bar-mate, as it were, the gentleman named Darryl that had entered behind us and guided us, Moses-like, to our seats. This is a fact about the Bay Area. Everyone is nice here. Everyone will talk to you. Whether it's the guy at Ferrari's asking us whether we'd found our Trader Joe's, Darryl telling the tale of how he stole his dad's comic books back from his mom after the divorce, or the cyclist riding up to me to tell me that I had his name (Read, pronounced like, y'know, the name) on my shirt, strangers will start conversations with you and it does not mean that they are crazy. It's a wonderful thing.

So my omelette arrived, delicious and with two neat slices of melted cheddar on top, the potatoes fabulous if not novel, and the Lady's pancakes floated down from Heaven like a half-stack of clouds, and Darryl got pancakes AND a bacon omelette, I think, because he is a champ and it is a biological law that unless you write a breakfast blog on the regular, if you are a human being you always think you want an entire stack of pancakes but you always, always forget that it is almost impossible to complete them. Also, at least one of the employees had a shirt emblazoned with "Piedmond Cafe," perhaps signaling that he is from an alternate reality.
The bathroom, semi-hidden behind a curtain at the back of the diner, is covered with a pastoral mural, which the Lady and I deduce was executed by the same artist that has painted the entire inside of the Coffee Mill, which if I recall correctly, boasts being the first coffee shop in Oakland. This mural, in turn, has been rather expertly graffitied with unicorns, a couple of creatures which are either flying spaghetti monsters or mi-gos, and a bit of metagraffiti which declares the farmhouse is "HELL." So what I'm saying is, it is awesome.

  Atmosphere: 4/13
Clean: 2/3
Structural: 0/3
Decor: 1/3
Signage 0/2
Service: 1/2

  Menu: 7/8
Variety: 1/2
Size: 2/2
Beverages: 2/2
Prices: 2/2

  Food: 5/9
Presentation: 1/3
Portion: 2/3
Taste: 2/3

  Bathroom: 4/5
Clean: 1/2
Structural: 1/1
Decor: 2/2

  Overall 20/35

Happy 2012!!

A Belated Happy Holidays from the Morning Constitution! I apologize for the lack of recent posts, but the last couple months have been incredibly busy in both the predictable, and some unpredictable ways.
I celebrated Christmas Eve at Tower Cafe with a good group of friends, enjoying their delicious, seasonal, Eggnog Pancakes. Yesterday I celebrated New Year's Eve at Orphan with some Nutella Pancakes! Both varieties were extra delicious.

I received two Christmas gifts which will directly contribute to the awesome ratio of this blog; a new camera with better.... everything, that actually focuses, and a notebook with two tigers on it (important!) to take notes during breakfastses. I'm excited about being able to make the blog more entertaining and far prettier due to both of those!
It's been a year already, and I'd like to offer a truly heartfelt thank you to all of you who have followed or otherwise enjoyed this blog. It's been a true pleasure, and I hope to continue it for a while to come.

Here are some fun facts from the first year of the Morning Constitution;

Two people found the blog by searching for "Stephanie Hyden" (thanks, Steffie!).
One person found it by searching for "person in the wolf suit!"
As of this moment, the page has been viewed 550 times! Twice in Latvia, five times in Ghana, and 43 times in Malaysia, certainly largely due to the fact that my last name translates to "Gecko" in Malaysian.
French Toast, Pancakes, and Omelettes tied for the most tagged food items this year.

Lots more to come in 2012; a new mini-Constitutional coming soon, new reviews, and lots more excitement! Thanks for sticking around!

It's A Circus Out There

As soon as I stepped foot into Pancake Circus last month, it felt strange that I'd never been there before. One reason is that I've lived in this town my entire life, (obviously) love the hell out of breakfast, and here's a restaurant that includes two of my favorite things, pancakes and circuses, in one breath. The other is that it's a strange sort of diner feel that refuses to acknowledge the passage of time. I felt like I was in a Twilight Zone episode, suddenly roadtripping across the country in the 1950s.

Pancake Circus is endearing exactly because of its strangeness. It's decorated with several circus animal heads, including Winnie the Pooh. No joke, Winnie the Pooh's clearly-a-stuffed-animal face is all over the place. Also Magilla the Gorilla, and a poorly traced Tigger. And scary clowns! The entire register area is a shrine to some terrible Clown deity. I feel like lighting a candle to Nyarlathotep in grease paint when I pay my bill. All of this is executed without the least bit of irony, which makes it simultaneously more horrifying and more awesome. The entirety of the serving staff seems like a bunch of truck-driving grandmas that would be the toughest gang in a Warriors sequel. I never knew tough love was a style of customer service. They may not be the most attentive, but you know they'd have your back in a fight.
"But Morning Constitution," you ask yourself, "what about the food?" They have a pretty big menu, owing partially to the fact that they serve steaks, seafood, and salad, as the sign can attest. My first venture out I ordered the apple waffle, with whip cream. I got some eggs and bacon to round it all off.

I couldn't include a human skull for scale, but this waffle was larger than my face. The whip cream obviously came out of a spray can, and the apples themselves also had an out-of-the-can flavor. Upon a later visit, I ordered the eponymous pancakes, which were pretty darn good, and likewise huge. As an added touch, the back of the check has a bizarre series of clowns with balloons that allow you to rate your service. Here's where I just say it all outright; Pancake Circus is not a place where you go to get the most delicious breakfast in town, but who goes to the circus for the food? It is a place to get a decent, late breakfast, and enjoy a totally demented atmosphere.

Oh, an a cautionary post script; not only is the staff transplanted from a truck stop, so are the bathrooms. Avoid them if you can!

Atmosphere: 6/13
Clean: 1/3
Structural: 0/3
Decor: 3/3
Signage 1/2
Service: 1/2

Menu: 7/8
Variety: 2/2
Size: 2/2
Beverages: 1/2
Prices: 2/2

Food: 5/9 pts
Presentation: 1/3
Portion: 3/3
Taste: 1/3

Bathroom: 0/5 pts.
Clean: 0/2
Structural: 0/1
Decor: 0/2

Overall: 18/35 pts.

When Hot Cakes Attack!

One of the other recommendations I got from my Portland ex-pat friends (can you be an expatriate of a city?) was the Hot Cake House, a twenty four hour pancake extravaganza. This sort of thing, is obviously impossible for me to pass up. I'd also picked up a copy of Breakfast in Bridgetown, a celebration of Portland's breakfast restaurants! A bookstore that hands you a map, and a book about breakfast spots? Portland is definitely my kind of town.
I took a couple of buses down to where the Hot Cake House was located, being forewarned that it would sit heavy in my belly. The sign had a vintage look to it, sun bleached and simple. The whole restaurant sits heavy in the greasy spoon vibe, although a couple of bubbled alcoves keep it a little more interesting. I immediately felt a bit like an outsider, that there was some code I didn't necessarily know that I should follow. The place was surprisingly empty, but sported a big open kitchen, and a juke box. I ended up getting two 'cakes and a side of hash browns, treated with a bit of that "outsider" I felt at the front door. A large group came in shortly after me, with at least a couple other out-of-towners, and later there was an obvious regular shocked at how quiet it was.

My food was delivered pretty quickly, two football-long heavy plates, one filled with the face-sized hot cakes, and the other overflowing with hash browns. The 'cakes were great; big fluffy suns. The hash browns were slick with a layer of delicious, artery-clogging grease. I was able to get about halfway down the plate before admitting defeat. It was definitely the gut-filling breakfast I'd been promised! From there, it was a simple busride into town before I got started on an adventure-filled day!


Atmosphere: 6/13
Clean: 1/3
Structural: 2/3
Decor: 0/3
Signage 2/2
Service: 1/2

Menu: 5/8
Variety: 1/2
Size: 1/2
Beverages: 1/2
Prices: 2/2

Food: 7/9 pts
Presentation: 1/3
Portion: 3/3
Taste: 3/3

Bathroom: 1/5 pts.
Clean: 1/2
Structural: 0/1
Decor: 0/2

Overall: 19/35

Waiting In The Garage

Ladies And Gentleman (I'm assuming there's only one one true gentleman reading this, at most), today is a special two-for-one. That's right, two reviews of the same place! And that place? Capitol Garage!

Why is this a twofer today? Well, partially just because I'm lazy. You see, last week a splitting headache (after a killer ICUP show) kept me in bed instead of journeying out to a tasty new destination on Saturday, so I went out on Sunday. I decided I'd return to a place I knew would be tasty, and since I thought I'd be travelling with posse, I chose Capitol Garage. So, obviously, full disclosure here; I like Capitol Garage. It's tasty, it has a huge menu, I have a dear friend who worked there, it has a (some might say controversial) Skinner painting on every goddamn wall. What's not to love? Also, it serves brunch until 2pm, which allows me to get my sleepy on a little longer. So there it is.

I made it down there last week at the heart of Brunchtime, and the place was superpacked. I sat at the bar, next to the Cambros of coffee and across the bar from a literal bucket of mimosa. And here's where the pros start to blur with the cons. They do offer a bottomless mimosa deal for about nine bucks, which is pretty tasty and definitely bottomless, and been particularly entertaining on many a grey Sunday. However, they're a little less appealing when you see them poured from a gigantic pre-mixed bucket. Also, (and perhaps this is the coffee-snob in me) the idea of all of the coffee coming from a cambro is a little disheartening, too. Now, honestly, the coffee isn't too bad, and it makes practical sense, given how busy they are. But still, a little less than ideal. Also less than ideal was that sitting next to the cash register and bartender, when the servers were places orders and ringing customers up allowed me to overhear some of their shit-talking the same customers. Now, granted, I don't expect this to not happen. But just because those PARTICULAR customers can't hear you doesn't mean that NONE of the customers can't hear you. For instance, your plucky breakfast protagonist.

Now, on this visit the bartender took my order, and I decided to nerd it up with Peter Parker's favorite breakfast dish, (Buck)Wheat (Pan)Cakes! As well as a green tea of some sort the bartender picked for me. The meal arrived, and was pretty damn delicious! It came with a small side of blueberries, which paired well with the wheat, but I remember explicitly thinking that there would not be enough blueberries to go with every bite, and that the cakes might get a little dry without them.

But then, to my delight, it turns out the cook had thought to mash blueberries into the bottom of every pancake! Which is pretty brilliant, if you ask me. Also, you can see there's a side of the Garage potatoes, which are far more delicious than that name would imply. What I like about these taters in particular is that they don't go the traditional route, and have a very unique flavor all their own (is it basil? Perhaps in a few months of gastronomy, I'll be able to tell). Although, for the record, I do prefer a garnish I can eat.

But, overall, it was a damn tasty meal. It was, honestly, a little awkward being by myself in such a bustling busy atmosphere (especially when the girl that dropped off my food may or may not have mocked me for reading during my wait). As I mentioned, Cap Gar has a pretty cool visual identity, and I love that they've imported their enormous sign from the last location. That being said, their bathrooms are really boring. The hallways leading to the bathroom have murals so cool I stopped traffic looking at them, but the bathrooms themselves could be mistaken for a rest stop.

And yes, I will explain why the structural design of the bathrooms is given its own point system. Just not now.

So, feeling that I ought to go back with some friends in tow to fully appreciate the experience, I conned some friends into joining me, not telling them about this blog until after we ordered, and mostly just so they wouldn't think I'm a huge freak when I started snapping photos of my food. But first;

We got there, requested a table for three, and asked if we'd like to sit inside or outside, all of which is completely reasonable and, y'know, normal. We said "outside" because it was a stunning, sunshiney morning. This is when it starts to get weird. I thought she responded with "I can only seat two of you outside," which seemed totally ridiculous, while one of my compatriots said she said "I can't seat you outside," and she claims the less-sensical "I can only seat you outside." Which is fine, because that's, y'know, what we requested. So we go out to wait, and see am empty table. When I go to point this out to her, she repeats herself/lies (whichever), and seats us. We order from a server that I've met roughly three dozen times, but never remembers me. Seriously, We've played shows together in basements and art galleries, I've been to his house on Halloween, and know a bunch of the same people. Not to mention me visiting his place of business about a dozen times. Anyway. My friends and I talk about literature for a while (including how Chuck Palahniuk should give up the ghost, and the merits of Piers Anthony, John Grisham, and China Mieville). We get our delicious little fruitplates (which I didn't get when I was at the bar. What gives?), and we talk about... other stuff. For a while. Eventually, we start talking about where the hell our food is. We joke that my presence is such a memory-eraser to our server he forgot we'd ordered. I stop drinking my Kahlua and Coffee so I can have some left in the increasingly unlikely seeming occurrence our food actually arrives. By the time we got it, (without apology), I was so hungry I forgot to take a picture until I was already digging in.

I ordered the Country Benedict (Which I'm categorizing under omelettes, because, c'mon people. Let's not get too picky). It was a damn tasty meal. Biscuits and gravy with poached eggs, Tillamook cheese, and chicken apple sausage. My friend who ordered the simple biscuits and gravy declared it a little too fancy for her tastes ("I'm a Denny's kind of girl,") but I love the Garage's strangely upscale breakfast menu. Their menu shifts at least seasonally, which means that sometimes your favorites won't be there (The Strawberries and Cream is ridiculous!), but there's time to find new favorites, right? Plenty of time. Between when you order and your food arrives. And while our unnamed-server (yes, I know his name) was very nice -- although he could have apologized for the wait -- who knows what he said about us at the register?

And now, an unrelated piece of grafitti;

Atmosphere: 7/13
Clean: 1/3
Structural: 2/3
Decor: 3/3
Signage 0/2
Service: 1/2

Menu: 7/8
Variety: 2/2 (bumped up a little because of the rotating menu)
Size: 2/2 (See above)
Beverages: 2/2
Prices: 1/2

Food: 7/9 pts
Presentation: 2/3
Portion: 2/3
Taste: 3/3

Bathroom: 1/5 pts.
Clean: 1/2
Structural: 0/1
Decor: 0/2

Overall: 22/35