Luxury breakfast tourism in Sea Point

 29 September 2023

 

SONNY AND IRENE

Kloof Road, Sea Point

 

Sonny and Irene is not for the budget conscious breakfaster but it’s also not for those who want only five mundane choices. The first impression of the menu is that the dishes are pricey and the second impression, once I started searching for the cheap options, was that it was very extensive and offered almost too much choice.   

 

I suppose we’ll have to live with that challenge, eh?

 

The space is spectacularly beautiful and reminds me of old-fashioned, luxurious hotel dining rooms, which is perhaps not coincidental as there is a hotel next door and a significant number of my fellow patrons were unmistakably tourists. The tables have polished marble tops, the chairs are bentwood, there is comfortable banquette seating against the sides of the room, the decorations are elegant and the vast glass frontage provides lots of natural light.  Even a local can feel like a tourist just for being there.

 

The menu offers ten variations on egg dishes,  four health options, two sweet breakfast dishes and what they call the classics: a fry up, eggs Benedict,  omelette, a smoked salmon trout bagel and “every day eggs.”  As I’ve mentioned, almost too much to compute.

 

There was a winter specialities breakfast menu of five items, all of which tempted me until I saw flatbread eggs (R105) on the main menu, which was not only kinder to my wallet than my original choice but equally enticing in description.

 

I got two fried eggs on a soft,  fluffy flatbread, with herb yoghurt, sun-dried tomato pesto, goat’s cheese and a lovely spicy butter.   Utterly delicious yet simple.

 

The coffee is by Illy, if one can go by what it says on the inside of the cups, and is very good, though also not cheap at R30 for a single espresso and R38 for a cappuccino.

 

It seems that the pastries are  mostly French styled tarts. I went for the blueberry tart (R85), with a veritable small mountain of berries heaped on crème Anglaise, or some such, in a perfect pastry shell that had some crunch but also melted in the mouth.  I love sweet things like these that make me feel righteous because there’s so much fresh fruit.

 

The bill came to R258,00 before tip.

 

The service was efficient (except for the usual drop off after I’d had my pastry and last coffee) and friendly, the atmosphere was hearty and my food was excellent.  Sonny and Irene is in odd, slightly downmarket  corner of Sea Point but once you’re inside the city fades away and you simply feel indulgent and indulged.