Best Breakfast in Williamsburg
Posted: 07/10/2010 Filed under: Food + Drink, Photography, Stories | Tags: Art Cafe 26, breakfast, brunch, cafe, European, gallery, healthy, healthy breakfast, healthy breakfast option, hip, Sibilla Dengs, Virginia, Williamsburg 1 Comment »
“We are out of eggs!” These were the first words I uttered upon waking, and in our household, they signal a dire situation. Eggs are a breakfast requisite around here. Over the course of the week, we’d let our grocery supply dwindle to a comically meager state. (Last night, we had oranges, hummus with celery, and potato chips for dinner.) Too hungry to go shopping before we ate, we decided there was only one option for us this Saturday morning: breakfast out.
Breakfast is my favorite meal to head out for. Morning is such a cheerful time of day, and at the right place, breakfast is an experience in loveliness. Sunshine, streaming through big windows. Heavy white café mugs steaming with good coffee and tea. Charming little pitchers of cream to match. Bright glasses of fresh-squeezed juice. Savory omelettes embellished with veggies, fine cheeses, herbs. Fruit plates studded with berries and melon. Tasty, hearty breads spread with real butter. Homemade Belgian waffles and rich, flaky pastries. The sound of laughter and happy eaters and softly clinking cutlery.
We had thought that Williamsburg hosted no such place — until this morning, when we found it, completely by chance! We’d resigned ourselves to breakfast at the nearest greasy spoon, but it was packed. So we drove on, hopeful that a hip lunch spot we liked would be open for breakfast. It wasn’t. But just down the street, Art Café 26 was. ”Let’s go in!” Matt said. And so, we did.
Art Café 26 is a European-style eatery and gallery that has intrigued us for awhile. It consistently wins rave reviews and is owned and run by a warm and lovely chef and art historian. It is out of our price range for dinner, but not, we discovered, for breakfast! Matt had the Lotti Adaimi Omelette (goat cheese, olives, tomatoes, and spinach) and multigrain toast. I had scrambled eggs with a organic green salad (hooray — greens for breakfast!) and roasted potatoes.
It was all delicious. And it made us very, very happy.
What a glorious Saturday surprise! Sometimes, it pays to slack off on the grocery shopping.
I remember being shocked at the number of pancake houses lining Richmond Road! I never frequented many of them as an undergrad except the IHOP, since it was open all night. . . and when you’re an undergrad you definitely need pancakes and ice cream at 3 AM! I once had a very pleasant, hearty breakfast of pancakes, grits, and fried eggs at Mama Steve’s, but I’m afraid it may qualify more as a greasy spoon than anything else. The bread was definitely not whole grain, and if they had a salad bar open, I didn’t pay any attention to it!