When I am in Canada, brunch on a Sunday morning is a must. Whether it be Butler's Pantry on Queen West in Toronto, or The Manx/The Mayfair/etc. on Elgin in Ottawa, I like my brunch, especially when eggs benedict is on the menu.
Since coming to Hong Kong, western brunch has been a rarity (aka: non-existent) because dim sum with the family became the norm. However, I miss my eggs benedict and pot of English Breakfast. So, I've been keeping my eyes on brunch places in Hong Kong to try.
A few weeks ago, I decided to try Simplylife Bakery Cafe in Taikoo City Plaza. I've passed by it a few times and it always looked interesting. In addition to a seating area inside the restaurant, they also have a faux patio in the middle of the mall. Anyways, we arrived right when it opened at 11:00am and ended up sitting inside the restaurant in a corner booth close to the open kitchen which I always like because I like seeing cooking in action.
The brunch price was $98 (or $88...sorry, I forgot!) + 10%. This included a soup, a tea and a main course, which I chose eggs benedict. Even though the price is more expensive than the average HK meal (well, I guess that depends on where you go...the price range of food in HK really varies!) and a minor complaint about one component of the eggs benedict, I really enjoyed the flavours of the food and the atmosphere of the restaurant. I would definitely want to try this restaurant again.
To start, a nice pot of tea. Very nice tea cup.
The soup of the day was a creamy pumpkin soup. This was the highlight! Very smooth, perfectly seasoned.
My only complaint was the eggs benedict. The bacon and eggs were well cooked, the hollandise sauce was delicious and they had a really great grilled tomato on the side. BUT, I don't understand why they served the eggs on such thick and crusted bread. I understand that the restaurant bakes its own fresh bread loafs, but I usually like the thick bread in a bread basket or for dipping in soup. It is really hard to eat such a thick chewy loaf when it is served as the base of eggs benedict because it was hard to cut and at its thickness it is hard to eat in one bite. I ended up having to eat the bacon and eggs separate from the bread...which...is not ideal.
If I go next time, I will definitely ask to have the eggs served on an english muffin. If they don't offer that, I would order something entirely different. While the other components were great, the bread simply made the dish too hard to eat. Nonetheless, as I said before, I would go back to eat again. There are definitely a lot of other items on the menu that I would love to try!
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