Lunch at Egghead

 30 November 2021

                                                          

EGGHEAD

34 Kloof Street, Cape Town

 

The elder goddaughter squealed with unmitigated delight after her first bite of her Porkey Bun. It was a happy sound from a happy place.

 

“This is so good!” she said, “It’s one of the best burgers I’ve ever eaten, definitely in the top three!”

 

Just wow, eh?

 

Last year the wife found the dark kitchen version of Egghead online. We love their scrumptious breakfast bun (the “Egghead”), and we were both pleased that the dark kitchen had morphed into a venture in the public light. It went onto the bucket list.

 

This joint is one of those places where my mood lifts, and I was feeling pretty perky already, when I enter because it looks so damn fine with its sleek, modern take on an old-school diner, with booths on the right-hand side and a long service counter with shelves up to the ceiling to maximise use of the space on the left. Amongst other things, I saw three or four old-fashioned (or contemporary remakes) Bakelite radios displayed on the shelves, a quirky reminder of those far-flung days when diners reigned supreme. The open kitchen is partially obscured by the service counter, but one does catch glimpses of the serene bustle of activity back there. 

 

There is counter seating at the front and four small tables outside. If the weather is good, that’d be the spot to hang out for people watching. Kloof Street is a prime site for gawking at the hipsters, tourists (when they’re in town) and bohemians of the inner city. 

 

The menu is diner simplicity with, as the goddaughter aptly put it, things on buns, those delightful brioche buns we know so well from the breakfast bun.

 

Apart from the Egghead and the Porkey Bun, there are the Beefhead (a rare roast beef yumfest), All of a Salmon, the Scramble, the Hothead (fiery scrambled eggs), three salads, three burgers (one plant-based), a few breakfast dishes (including their take on eggs Benedict), steak, egg and chips and lamb chops, egg and chips. At respectively R245 an R190 a pop, the latter dishes are by far the most expensive items on the menu, which otherwise seems reasonably priced to me, with the caveat that most dishes can be upscaled by adding extras that could quickly escalate the total cost.

 

The goddaughter drank some bespoke apple juice (R35) and ate the Porkey bun (R85.)

 

She absolutely loved the contrast between the perfect, soft brioche bun and the sweet and sour elements of the honey and miso pork patty, fried egg, Cheddar cheese, caramelised onion and honey mustard aioli.  (Damn, I’m salivating when I type this.)

 

For full disclosure, I should point out that the Porkey Bun  arrives with a friend: a humongous slice of gherkin. suspiciously separate on the plate. Why?

 

I drank the craft ginger beer (for craft, read: as mom used to make) with a fiery ginger snap (R32) and ate the huevos rancheros (R95), a dish that’s lost some of its cachet on restaurant menus. You don’t see it much anymore.

 

What I got was a cheeky twist on the dish I knew, with the elements (creamy eggs, black beans, spicy sausage and Cheddar cheese) neatly wrapped in a tortilla, burrito style, covered by a roast jalapeno salsa and resting on a zig zag of sour cream and with gaucamole(sic) on the side.

 

This is possibly the best huevos rancheros type dish I’ve ever had. Mouthful after mouthful pleasured my pleased palate.

 

We finished off with, respectively, a pecan tartlet

and an apple tartlet

(R48 each). The apple tartlet is a gloriously perfect crumble redolent of apple and not overly sweet. I hardly ever order pecan pie at restaurants anymore because they tend to be cloyingly sweet but the morsel I tasted restored my faith in humanity and reminded me why I like pecan pie. The tartlet has perfect pastry, a chewy filling and subtle sweetness.

 

I took two pasteis de nata home and they were fabulous too with that trademark flaky pastry case and the creamiest of unctuous custard filling. Sublime.

 

The bill, for all the drinks and comestibles, came to R403,00.

 

Egghead is one of those joints one wants to sing its praises of to all and sundry, well, I do, because I felt an enormous sense of well-being just being there, the food is scrumptious and, to me, well-priced, the service is friendly and efficient, and the waitress chortled when I shared my story of a bottle of home-made ginger beer exploding in my face at some other establishment where I foolishly opened it with no regard for personal safety.

 

Highly recommended.

 

(Incidentally, it’s separated by one shopfront from the expanded Conscious Kitchen, another favourite of mine.)