Breakfast at the Northside Grill

Lately, New Yorkers have reported an unusual sweet smell, resembling maple syrup, permeating the air in various neighborhoods in Manhattan and in the boroughs. While no one knows where the aroma is coming from (many suspect it's from NJ, but than again, that's not surprising, is it?), the sightings, rather the smellings, are becoming more frequent. I haven't actually smelled yet, but this story has affected me in a very profound level: It makes me think of breakfast. And thinking of breakfast makes me think of the Northside Grill, which is roughly 631 miles away (give or take a wrong turn or two), tucked away in what one may sorta call the north side of Ann Arbor, MI. The place is not really a grill, per se; it's more like a temple of comfort food. You haven't experienced the real meaning of breakfast until you've eaten there. Sure lots of hoity-toidy nicely decorated food establishments in New York specialize in the art of comfort food, but they are no Northside Grill, with its green booths, wood paneling and Billie Holiday playing in the background. Rumor has it that the Northside's proprietor is from New York, yet the place is as un-New York as it can possibly be.

Since moving to the east coast, we have yet to find a good breakfast joint. Not brunch. Not a place where Mimosas are an option. Simply a place where you can get a good pair of eggs, and where the wait staff pretty much knows what you are going to order before you open your mouth. And where sometimes you get that one waitress who seems to be one order away from a complete meltdown.

An article in the January 12-18 issue of Time Out New York proudly announced (and I'm not making this up): "Breakfast is the new brunch." Maybe it's time for Mimosas to be on the out and coffee on the in. And I don't care what anyone says: a two-egg breakfast (over easy) with rye toast is possibly the most perfect breakfast one can ever ask for. And at the Northside, if you go there often enough, you don't even have to ask...