Address: 220 South Oak Way, Lime Square, Green Park, Reading RG2 6UP

Telephone number: 0118 987 3702

Website: www.lsq2.co.uk

Date of visit: 7 May 2011

Approximate cost per head:  Up to £10 for a breakfast dish.

Comments on wine list/beer: Bottle beers. Peroni at £3.65 a bottle. Wine list is OK but nothing special and although an average bottle is around £25, it is still with around 300% mark up plus.

Previous Reviews: 22nd of May 2010 and 6th March 2011

Cuisine: Normal breakfast items

Opening times: weekdays only. They will also open up when there is a rugby or football match on at the Madjeski Stadium.

Summary:

On the last day of the Championship season (playoffs to come), I came with my friend M for breakfast at 11am as the game kicks off at 12.45. Unlike the Green Park branch, the LSQ2 in the Oracle serves breakfast every day.

There were only 3 tables occupied (the car park was full – it is free for diners). Apparently there is a sitting at 3pm for a late lunch.

The breakfast menu has the usual egg benedict etc. M and I both had the English breakfast £9.95 which came with fried bread, a large field mushroom, sausage, bacon, 2 fried eggs and baked beans. It was very enjoyable. We also downed nearly £30 worths of Peroni with our breakfast.

I have to admit that this is the first time I have had a drinks bill larger than the food bill when wine has not been involved. We must have been quite thirsty as it had been raining and I had my wet weather Rohans trousers on which made me sweat quite a bit.

E

May 2011

Address:  Constitution Dock, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia

Telephone number: (03) 6231 2121

Website: www.mures.com.au

Date of visit: 23 and 24 January 2011

Price guide: A$9.90 for a cooked breakfast at the Lower Deck. A$30 plus for a main course on the Upper Deck.

Comments on wine and beer: Normal Aussie list at normal mark-up (200-300%). Beers around A$7.

Cuisine: Lower Deck, all sorts incl sandwiches, cooked breakfast and various fish dishes. Upper Deck mainly fish (fried, grilled and deep fried), also couple of meat dishes.

Exchange rate: A$1 = £0.65

Summary:

Mures Lower Deck is open from 7.30 am for breakfast. At around $10, you get bacon, eggs and toasts. Tomatoes, bake beans and hash browns are available as side orders from around $3.

On the day I went, the eggs and toasts were great but I found the bacon a big fatty and they have not been cooked long enough for the fat to render but then the portions were big and the prices very reasonable. The location is also great as it is right on the water front.

Outside breakfast hours, they do sandwiches and various fish based dishes including sushi. Think supermarket sushi – however, the fish is very fresh.

Dinner at the Upper Deck was another story. The menu is nearly identical to that at the Drunken Admiral. The difference is the location and the views (Drunken Admiral has an internal view whilst this place offers an external view over the docks).

I had prawns and scallops in panko (a Japanese bread crumb) deep fried with chips ($35.9). The prawns were huge Australian Tiger Prawns and you get 6 on the plate. The scallops were smaller – about the size of a 10 pence coin (5 times as thick). However, they had roes with them. I asked the waitress why lobsters are not on the menu and the answer was that it was out of season and only frozen ones were available – they try not to use frozen fish. They also offer a huge fish platter for one ($110) which include a bit of everything off the deep fried menu.

Well, my conclusion was that this place was just like the Drunken Admiral. The menu is similar – I even had the same wine a bottle of NV 42 degrees sparkling ($38) – fast becoming my favourite Tasmanian sparkling. They are good at what they do but it is just an up market fish fryer!

E

PS They have their own fishing fleet. Most of the fish they sell are from their own catch. They also have a fish retail area at the back.

Web site: within review

Telephone number: Cafe Monde (01962 877 177), The Cornerhouse (01962 827 779), Hotel du Vin(01962 841 414)

Date of visit: November 2009

Approx. cost per head: within review

Comments on wine list/beer: N/A

Review:

Winchester breakfasts
We all know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and also the most literally named. The first food that our body welcomes upon return from the land of nod does indeed break the fast of the night before.
All too often these days breakfast is a hastily conjured affair, a bowl of salt and sugar-laden cereal with suspect milk or perhaps a guilty purchase on the station platform. In my opinion however there remains no finer alternative than a brilliantly prepared and properly savoured Full English Breakfast, particularly now that the nights are drawing in and our bodies need that extra morning fuel to get us through the day.
Happily, Winchester is blessed with a wide, if variable variety of places that serve a Full English, at last count more than twenty different establishments. Apart from being a soul-warming start to the day, (and, if prepared from good quality ingredients thoughtfully cooked, not nearly as unhealthy an option as we are led to believe), a leisurely breakfast can also be an excellent platform for a business meeting, or mentally preparing oneself for an important day ahead.
So where to go? Over thirteen years of extensive research I have come to frequent three places which are attractive for different reasons but which each offer an interpretation of the FEB that are well worth experiencing.
Cafe Monde
Walking along Winchester High Street you will come across the Buttercross, a large ornate sandstone monument which fell from the sky in the early 18th century narrowly missing the beautiful half-timbered buildings nearby. Walk through the archway nearby and Cafe Monde is on your left.
Monde is probably a modern trendy sort of a place with ferny wallpaper and lime green bits, service is provided by attractive student types dressed in black, they are always polite and friendly and reasonably quick. You can sit either outside or in one of three cosy indoor areas. There are complimentary newspapers and some unobtrusive piped music.
The full English at Monde is a play-off between generosity of portion and quality of ingredients and cooking; the quality can be variable compared to the reviews to follow, but it is rare to see a plate return to the kitchen unfinished. The bacon is decent back bacon, by which I mean there is more meat than fat, although this has been cooked in bulk rather than individually. Sausages are of average quality pork which has been cooked and then finished on the griddle; satisfactory if not inspired, but the scrambled egg, tomato and toast are all first rate and very fresh. Mushrooms are not a strength at Monde, and they are often of the overcooked boiled variety, beans arrive as part of the package but are generally well positioned on the plate. Order a large cappuccino and some extra toast and you have a great start to the day that will leave you feeling full until well into the afternoon without the need for that 2pm pretend to stare at your monitor snooze that so often follows a heavy lunch. The food at Monde is well cooked and never greasy, so on the coronary stakes this only starts to really score points if you use both packets of butter on your toast. Which is needless to say highly recommended as nothing tastes better than a mouthful of scrambled egg on buttered toast at 8am on a Friday after a heavy Thursday night.
So visit Cafe Monde for a reliable, entry level sort of a breakfast, you won’t be disappointed but you also might not be tempted to write a review about it, erm.
£8-£10 including coffee

The Cornerhouse, corner of Parchment Street & North Walls
The second venue I have chosen is also the most recent arrival on the scene. The Cornerhouse breakfast is like a Cheryl Cole debut single, coming straight in at the top of the charts. Whether the Cornerhouse is married to a dodgy footballer I can’t comment, but I’m certain that this restaurant would stand its ground against Simon Cowell just like our Cheryl. The venue is great, it’s like a modern version of your favourite barmy aunts living room with big plants, standard lamps, rugs and comfy cushions. The breakfast menu is superb with a wide variety of things involving salmon and poached eggs that I’m sure are great if you aren’t a die-hard traditionalist like myself. The full English here takes a little longer to arrive than at Monde, but this is because the cook in the kitchen is taking fresh cold sausages and bacon from the fridge and cooking these to order, you can tell, the local produced pork is a taste sensation and accompanied by properly seasoned mushrooms, excellent scrambled eggs, beans and black pudding. I always think one measure of the quality of the ingredients of an FEB is how much brown sauce you see people using… at Cornerhouse the HP bottles will last a long time. The only negative here would be that toast is extra, but that’s a minor niggle, there are papers galore and from a wide spectrum of political persuasions, and the coffee is freshly ground and brewed. Booking is highly recommended especially at weekends when Cornerhouse is rammed with disciples of the sausage.
Breakfast & toast & coffee £10-13
Hotel du Vin
Now please don’t think I’m cheating, yes the Hotel du Vin is a hotel, but it is also a popular bar and restaurant and anyone is free to turn up to eat. In my experience it has always been possible to get a table at the spare of the moment for breakfast, but if too many of you start doing the same then this will of course change, so book anyway.
The simplest way to explain a breakfast at du Vin is that if the sausages at Monde are pre-cooked and then griddled, the sausages at Cornerhouse are proper bangers cooked well to order, then the sausages at du Vin have to fill in an application form, audition and be interviewed to be allowed in the building. These are seriously tasty bangers which you won’t want to offend with brown sauce, although this is available on request (and kept out of sight of the chef). Quite simply the breakfast here is flawless, two rashers of smoked back butchers bacon properly grilled, Bury black pudding, a confit tomato, a whole field mushroom seasoned and fried, and scrambled eggs which are finished with cream. You can have as much toast as you like, and the service is of course impeccable in the comfortable and peaceful surroundings of the bistro. This breakfast is a well kept secret and, at £14 all-in including freshly brewed coffee the ultimate start to a weekend or working day. Think of it as going to worship at the church de la petit dejeuner. Breakfast du vin £14 Southgate street.