"Piggy Special" (french toast, sausage, and eggs)

Restaurant: Pork Store Cafe (Valencia St, San Francisco)
Food description: Two fried eggs (over-medium) with french toast and chicken apple sausage links
Food rating: 8 out of 10
Times ordered: 4

Theres a reason I keep coming back to Pork Store Cafe. Cuz the food is damn good! For a kick ass American home cookin no-nonsense breakfast (or, if you are like me and can't get out of bed - brunch), I really have trouble eating at other places, because they always seem to come up a bit short. The chicken apple links still taste like links, not the froo-froo chicken apple stuff you might get somewhere else (good, but not breakfast!), and the french toast is like Mom made. Honestly, its not on some weird bread trying to be something that it's not, it's got just the right egginess to have given it that light and fluffy texture you crave in french toast. Top it with some maple syrup and you're off. Please realize that I'm not comparing this breakfast to some gourmet, can't pronounce the crap on the menu place, I'm comparing it to other good eggs, sausage, french toast, bacon, pancake type joints, like Kate's for instance, or maybe Top's. Actually, that gives me a good idea. I will go and get the exact same thing (or as close as I can get) at Kate's and Top's and I'll throw Home in the mix and I will repost each review with links to the others so we can have a little competitive side-by-side analysis. Let's see who will win the b-fast challenge? To be continued....

Food review: French toast Tahiti

Restaurant: Zazie (San Francisco)
Food description: French toast stuffed with caramelized bananas and walnuts served with butter, powdered sugar and maple syrup
Food rating: 8 out of 10
Times ordered: 3

This is my favorite french toast in the city. Possibly the world. Well of all the french toasts I've tried anyway. Zazie serves up a great brunch and while I'm very much an eggs and bacon kind of girl once in a while I crave some eggy, bready sweetness and so I head over to Zazie. This french toast is amazing, the bread they use is really good quality, light and delicious and soaks up all that egg wonderfully. They cook the toast part just right here, to a perfect golden crisp without burning it or leaving it undone in the middle (I hate soggy bread.) And to make this french toast even better, they stuff it with caramelized bananas and walnut. If you've never had french toast like this you must try it, the bananas and walnuts are the perfect pairing with the rich custardy bread, they add just enough natural sweetness and the walnuts round out the flavors with their hearty earthiness. A light dusting of powdered sugar and this dish is perfect. I barely used my maple syrup. One of my favorite breakfasts in the city.

Food review: French toast

Restaurant: Absinthe (San Francisco)
Food description: Pain de mie with orange-ricotta filling, poached pineapple, whipped cream, and maple syrup
Food rating: 9 out of 10
Times ordered: 1

I'm an idiot for not going to Absinthe for brunch sooner. It's a block away from my place so I figured "I can go there anytime!" A completely ridiculous excuse, now that I realize I've been missing out some amazing food. I ordered the french toast because I figured a French restaurant would know how to make real french toast. I figured right, because it was exquisite. The dish had the effect of transporting me to a Parisian cafe while I exclaimed "Oh la la!" after every bite. Every slice was a slice of heaven. The bread was awesome and cut thick to hold the rich cheesecake-like filling. It was cooked to perfection, to a lovely golden brown and had a thin crust all around the outside, while remaining light and airy on the inside. Though the french toast could hold its own without the filling, the sweet ricotta with a touch of orange zest added some flair and extra creaminess which was a bonus. The syrup was very sweet and concentrated, so I liked having it served on the side so I could control the intensity. In terms of flavor, well, I didn't know french toast could be this good until now. It had just the right ratio of cinnamon, sugar, egg, vanilla, orange, ricotta, and bread, and if you wanted to splurge, you could add a dollop of crème Chantilly to the mix (vanilla whipped cream).

The french toast was near perfect, so why not give it a 10? To put it simply, the pineapple. It just didn't work for me at all. It was heavily dowsed in syrup, making it too sweet to eat alone. When I tried pairing it with the french toast to tone it down, the pineapple clashed with the orange zest. I wouldn't know the difference if I never had this pineapple again. So to sum things up, french toast: amazing, pineapple: not so amazing. I'll let you be the judge, but seriously, for only $9.75, you're never going to find french toast of this quality anywhere in SF.