As rent continues to climb in SoHo many well-established restaurants are moving out, giving out rare yet expensive opportunities for some new daring, high-spirited restaurateurs to shake things up. The owner of this new joint certainly took a chance by serving waffles as the main draw, along with a selection of classic North American diner fare – both in portion size and style.
The first thing that caught my attention was the choice of waffles on the menu. You can choose from “green” (pandan), wholewheat (gluten-free) or buckwheat waffles ($25) with the option of fruit, pecan or chocolate chip toppings (+$12). The highlight was definitely the chocolate chip waffle, which was crisp on the outside yet airy and soft on the inside.
For those with bigger appetites there is the “Lumberjack's Breakfast” ($75). It certainly is not for the faint-hearted, with three eggs, home fries, bacon, sausages, toast and a waffle of your choice. While the poached eggs were cooked just right, we wouldn’t have minded the bacon and sausages being hotter.
Looking further down the menu, we saw the “Fried Chicken Meal” ($69), which came with three huge drumsticks and kick-started our imaginary second stomachs into full gear. The batter was thin and crunchy, and full of rich peppery flavours. While the meat was very tender and moist, it somehow lacked the strong flavour of the crunchy skin, possibly due to the lack of marinating. We overcame this issue with big bites to ensure both skin and meat was included in every mouthful. The accompanying mash potato lacked the buttery flavour we hoped for but the gravy made up for the shortfall.
To further indulge ourselves in the land of waffles, we ordered the “Apple Ginger Compote Waffle” ($49) with Movenpick’s vanilla chocolate chip ice cream upgrade (+$15). The flavour was rather too gingery, but fared quite well together with the ice cream and waffles.
We will be back soon to tackle some of the other hearty choices on the menu, and prepare ourselves for another affair with chicken drumsticks.
Author: Jason Bon Vivant
Meal for two: around $220.