Eating is an important part of travel. Although the breakfast provided by the hotel is convenient, if your schedule is not so busy, you might as well find a day to slow down and enjoy an authentic American breakfast under the warm sunshine. Isn’t it often said that breakfast should be eaten like a king?
In North America, there is a type of restaurant that specializes in breakfast. Not only do they have many varieties, but many of the dishes can be customized according to customer requirements. It’s hard to say whether you eat like a king or not. This kind of restaurant often has a family-like friendly atmosphere. Whether the waiters are neighborhood aunts or girls next door, they always have concerned eyes, kind smiles and exaggerated expressions. Unlike the waiters in the grand restaurants who fly around your table to sell drinks and try to earn more tips, the aunts, aunts and ladies in the breakfast shop all look very busy, moving quickly and speaking in a crackling voice, which makes you feel uncomfortable. You lament that they seem to be possessed by "Aunt Chaoyang", coming across the ocean with enthusiasm.
1. Coffee drinks
All restaurants are like this. The waiter who leads you will bring you a menu after you sit down. , and then immediately retreated. The waiter responsible for your table is immediately dedicated, and the first question is often what to drink. Order something delicious and the waiter will prepare it while you slowly study the menu. Interestingly, almost every restaurant's drink list is on the last page of the menu, although every restaurant asks guests to order drinks first. If you don't have time to see it, you can ask the waiter, or you can ask the waiter to fill the water first and give yourself some time to think about it. Water defaults to ice water. If you don't want ice, you can declare "no ice". If you like to drink hot food, you can ask for "hot water". In general restaurants, both hot and cold water are free.
When I enter a breakfast shop, the first thing I can order immediately after sitting down is Coffee. Unlike coffee shops, most breakfast shops only have one choice of coffee. A cup of freshly brewed black coffee is served on the table. Sugar and milk are placed on the table. You can add it yourself. In addition to ordinary sugar, there is also sweetener, which is a low-calorie condiment that does not contain sugar. However, it is usually a chemical preparation. Although it has fewer calories, whether it is really healthy or not is a matter of opinion. Milk is usually packed in thumb-sized boxes, with only a few grams per box. You can add one or two according to your own taste, and of course you can add more, but few people add more than three. It is divided into cream (cream) with a fat content of 10 and milk (fresh milk) with a fat content of 0 to 3. The fat content will be marked on the box. The powdered coffee mate and non-dairy creamer that are common in China are rare.
In addition to coffee, hot drinks include tea and hot chocolate. There is not much choice in hot chocolate, but there are more choices in tea. The common ones are red tea (black tea) and green tea (green tea). There are also some specialty teas (special tea), which are usually tea mixed with some spices.
Cold drinks are mainly juice (juice) and soft drink (soft drink). The most common juices include orange juice, apple juice, grapefruit juice, etc. Soft drinks are Coke or something. The official name of Coca-Cola is cola, but few people say this. It is usually called coke in spoken language, which is actually Coca-Cola. If this restaurant sells Pepsi-Cola, when you order coke, the waiter will ask "Is Pepsi ok?" (Is Pepsi-Cola OK?) Almost no restaurants stock both red and blue. Ice tea is also a common soft drink.
The coffee in almost all breakfast shops is free refill.
As soon as the waiter is free, he will walk around with freshly brewed coffee. When he sees your cup is almost empty, he will come over and ask "More coffee?" (Do you want more coffee?) Most soft drinks can also be refilled, but every restaurant different. Before ordering, you can ask "Does this come with free refill?"
Whether it is written on the menu or not, the breakfast shop will definitely have milk, don't worry Ask the waiter for it. Sometimes she would ask "white or chocolate?" (white or chocolate?) This is because chocolate milk is also very popular. The milk must be cold, straight from the refrigerator. If you want hot milk, you can ask the waiter "Can you warm it up for me?" (Can you warm it up for me?) Each restaurant has different operating procedures and hygiene standards, which may or may not work. Sometimes the waiter will say "Let me check with kitchen."
2. Classic breakfast
The most important thing in breakfast is eggs. The most common ones are eggs, bacon or sausage, plus toast (toasted toast) and home fries (home-style fried potato cubes) to form a Classic Breakfast (classic breakfast) set. For eggs, the menu often says "any style". The so-called any method generally includes hard-boiled eggs, fried eggs and scrambled eggs. Boiled eggs can be soft-boiled (soft-boiled eggs) or hard-boiled (fully cooked, older). Fried eggs are divided into several types according to how tender they are: one sided or sunny side up is fried on one side, double sided is fried on both sides, and over-easy or sunny side down is more complicated - double sided. Fry but fry very tenderly. After frying only one side, gently turn it over and fry the other side briefly. Scrambled is similar to Chinese scrambled eggs, but there is less oil. The egg liquid may not be fully beaten before putting it in the pot, and the finished eggs are more broken than Chinese scrambled eggs.
The most common meats in set meals are bacon and sausage. Breakfast sausage is thinner than regular sausage and grilled or fried. Most restaurants only have one type of sausage, so you have no choice. Another meat option is ham. Likewise, there is usually only one type of ham. Slightly more bacon options. There is a specialty bacon in Canada called peameal bacon, which is made from tenderloin instead of pork belly. Americans have never heard of it, but it is available in many breakfast restaurants in Canada. For those who don’t eat pork, you can also choose turkey bacon.
In addition, breakfast restaurants usually offer more exaggerated meat options, such as steak (steak) on top of the basic egg set meal. This kind of steak is not as particular about cuts and heat as steak restaurants, and the price is cheaper. The taste is more like the sizzling steak in a Hong Kong-style tea restaurant.
Potatoes are also indispensable, the most common one is home fries. This fried potato is different from French fries. The potato is usually boiled and cut into large pieces, and fried in a pan until the surface is crispy. Another common appearance of potatoes in breakfast is hash brown, which is diced potatoes or thick shredded potatoes, stirred together into a hash brown and fried. These items are also common in ordinary breakfast buffets, but the ones in the restaurant are made to order, fresh, and the method is more exquisite.
Bread is of course also standard.
When ordering, the waiter will usually ask you which kind of bread you want. The basic choice is "white or wheat" (white bread or whole wheat bread). The full name of whole wheat bread is whole wheat, which is often shortened to wheat in the waiter's mouth. Some stores also offer multi-grain options, and even rye - this is a kind of black bread with a slightly fermented sour taste. If you have never tried it, be prepared that it may not be the bread you are familiar with. smell.
Sometimes there are two slices of cut fruit in the set meal. This is different from Chinese people’s eating habits. When we were children, if we ate fruit in the morning, the old people who saw it would definitely say that they couldn’t eat it because they were afraid of cooling their stomachs. In North America, eating fruit for breakfast is very common.
The side dishes in the set menu can often be changed. This is not just true for breakfast restaurants, but also for restaurants in general. For example, you can ask the waiter "Can I take x instead of y?" or "Is it possible to replace y with x?" (Can I replace y with x on the menu?) Some restaurants will indicate this on the menu. Some packages have no substitute.
3. Eggs
Since eggs are the protagonist of breakfast, they are definitely not just simple fried eggs. Any style mentioned in the package, poached is generally not included. Poached eggs look a bit like Chinese poached eggs, but they are served without soup and are usually placed on a piece of bread. If you sandwich ham slices (ham) between poached eggs and bread, sprinkle some pepper spices and cheese sauce melted by the heat, it becomes Egg Benedict (some restaurants call it Benny for short).
Nowadays, there are more and more varieties of Egg Benedict, and more sophisticated breakfast restaurants must have a variety of flavors to choose from. To constitute a qualified Benedict, in addition to poached egg, the basic elements must also include English muffin, meat and sauce. English muffin and the muffin mentioned earlier are two almost completely different things. This round bun is called muffin in the UK. In North America, muffin became a cake-like dessert, and the original muffin became English muffin. The sauce used by Benedict is hollandaise sauce, which is made with a lot of cheese. The meat sandwiched in the middle is traditionally ham (ham), but now the more recent ones include roast meat (barbecue), corn beef (a beef product similar to luncheon meat), etc. There is also a variant that does not add ham or other meat, but instead uses spinach (spinach), which is called Eggs Florentine.
I am taking the trouble to describe the combination of various ingredients here because it is customary for English menus to list the ingredients used in this dish in small letters under the dish name. Knowing these things, even if the restaurant introduces a new dish, you can understand the taste of the dish through its description.
Another way to make eggs is Omelette (fried egg pancake), which Hong Kong people translate as "奄肖" in Cantonese phonetic. Beat the eggs, put oil in the pot, add the stuffing and stir-fry. When cooked, pour the egg liquid in, spread it out into a shape, turn it over, wrap it in cheese, fold it in half, and take it out of the pot. Some people also put the egg liquid into the pot first and then add the fillings. Omelettes in breakfast restaurants are all made to order. Generally, the menu will provide several well-matched options, and you can also choose the ingredients according to your own taste.
Common ingredients include bacon, ham, shrimp, green pepper, onion, green onion, tomato, mushroom, etc. Adding spinach has a special fragrance, which I like very much. For health reasons, many people do not eat egg yolk (egg yolk), so some restaurants now offer omelette made only with egg white (egg white), which I don’t think is delicious.
It is worth mentioning that the better breakfast buffets also provide made-to-order omelette (customized omelet). There is a table with various ingredients, tell the chef what you want, and the chef will cook it for you in front of you.
4. Pizza and French Toast
We have already talked about the waffles in the buffet breakfast. Moving to the restaurant, there is no essential difference, but it is made more beautiful. Some fresh strawberries and chocolate sauce, or ice cream are added to the plate. The color is attractive and the taste becomes sweeter.
French toast (French toast) is similar. The bread slices are wrapped in egg liquid and fried, and then poured with sugar sauce. Compared with the buffet restaurant, the variety that can be changed is mainly focused on the fruits used as toppings. In addition to strawberries, French toast is often served with a combination of banana and chocolate. There is a very popular chocolate spread in North America called Nutella. The marketing of this brand is very good. Many restaurants do not write chocolate on the menu, but directly write Nutella. It’s a chocolate spread mixed with almond butter. If you don’t like the taste of almonds, don’t worry, you won’t be able to eat them. This is because peanut butter is widely used in North America, and some people are allergic to peanuts. Therefore, some businesses have developed almond butter as a substitute, but deliberately masked the taste of almonds. Of course, French toast can also be paired with very special toppings. I once had wine poached pear poured on French toast, and it tasted good.
Compared with toast and waffles, pancakes occupy a more important position in breakfast restaurants. Although there may be pre-made pancakes in the breakfast buffet, these must be freshly cooked and eaten to be delicious, which leaves a huge space for the restaurant to develop. In fact, in North America, pancake is associated with memories of happy childhood, and many people cherish a certain scenario. Almost all breakfast restaurants claim to have their own secret pancake recipe. There is even a breakfast chain with more than 1,600 branches across the United States. When it was founded in 1958, it directly named itself IHOP - International House of Pancake (International House of Pancake). International House of Pancakes). Pancake is made by adding flour, water and eggs to make a very thin batter. You need to add a little baking powder to it and fry it in a pan with oil. The main difference between each company's methods lies in the ingredients added to the batter. Some will add buttermilk, which is a milk with a stronger flavor than ordinary milk. The resulting pancakes or other snacks will be crispier. In addition, chocolate chips or blueberries can be added to the batter. Add butter and syrup when eating. In Canada and the northeastern United States, better restaurants use maple syrup, which has a slightly more flavor than ordinary corn syrup.
5. Brunch
Interestingly, breakfast restaurants generally do not sell brunch (brunch), but those Restaurants that don't usually serve breakfast may offer special brunch on weekends or holidays. Since it's called brunch, it definitely won't open at 7 o'clock. It usually only starts serving at 10 or 11 o'clock. These options in breakfast are all as they should be in the title, and with the title of lunch, adding some meat is not a problem. It is more common to pair roast beef or roast turkey with the previous breakfast dishes in various names.
Smoked salmon (smoked salmon) is a relatively expensive ingredient that ordinary breakfast restaurants will not put on their daily menus, but they are often found in brunch. . For example, the Eggs Benedict mentioned earlier, if you use smoked salmon with sauce and eggs, it tastes great, and it can be regarded as a more exquisite brunch dish. This Eggs Benedict, which uses smoked salmon instead of ham, is also called Eggs Hemingway.
It is worth noting that breakfast restaurants generally do not have wine, but brunch will have wine. It is not beer or ordinary red wine, but a relatively light cocktail. . The most popular drink at brunch is mimosa (mimosa cocktail), which is made with champagne (champagne) and frozen orange juice. It is refreshing and refreshing. Most of the other common drinks are bright and light-colored, and are made with sparking wine instead of spirits.