It’s not very often that you come across a restaurant with a 95% approval rating on UrbanSpoon, so I was immediately intrigued when I heard about Chez Meme Baguette Bistro in the Willingdon Heights area in Burnaby. To make things even better, they serve breakfast and I love a good breakfast.
As its name implies, Chez Meme Baguette Bistro is best known for its baguette bread and that’s why people line up for their sandwiches. Well, we weren’t interested in lunch, so we partook in some French-inspired breakfast. Much like that other affordable French bistro, everything is reasonably priced at this bistro as well.
Chez Meme looks very unassuming from the outside and you really wouldn’t know how special it is from the inside either. There aren’t too many tables and there is only one server: a cheerful co-proprietor named Isabelle. She’s quick to greet you with a bonjour, but don’t expect the overall service to be particularly expedient. It’s also curious that they are only open one Saturday each month.
For my petit dejeuner, I selected the Baguette Willy. This is effectively their unique take on an Eggs Benedict, swapping the English muffin for a delicious open baguette. This is topped with scrambled eggs, black forest ham and cheese sauce. The eggs, ham, and cheese sauce didn’t wow me, but the baguette certainly did. Positively crisp on the outside without being too hard, the baguette was great and full of rich flavor. I prefer shredded hash browns, but the “chunky” style isn’t too bad either.
One of my dining guests took a more conventional route, opting for breakfast sausage and eggs. The over-easy eggs looked to be overcooked, but again, the baguette was great.
Next, we have the Sarladaise omelette. I’m not sure how this compares to the omelettes at Red Wagon Cafe, but it does go in a decidedly French direction by using duck confit, along with potatoes and onions. The duck was about as tender as could be and, yes, the baguette was very good too. The Sarladaise is the most expensive breakfast on the menu at $10.25.
And finally, here is the French Toast Brioche. You have your choice of warm banana maple syrup, caramelized apple-raisins or, in this case, fresh strawberries. I had a small sample and the French Toast has a rich buttery flavor and a doughy, almost chewy consistency which I like. It’s good that the whipped cream was placed on the side, because that’s a lot of whipped cream.
All in all, I was reasonably pleased with Chez Meme Baguette Bistro. I’m not sure I would agree with the 95% rating on UrbanSpoon, but there really isn’t a lot to dislike about this place aside from the slow service. On the bright side, Isabelle is a pleasure and their specialty coffees are quite inexpensive too. I accompanied by breakfast with a very large $2.95 latte, for instance.
Now I have to go back and have one of the baguette sandwiches. I was eyeing one at the other table and it looks to be a very good size too, accompanied with your choice of soup, salad, or fries. Prices for sandwiches range from $8.25 to $10.25. The Bourguignon (boneless beef short ribs) looks particularly popular.
All of the food looks great but the french toast has got my mouth watering right now. I love Breakfast.
Interesting idea, but I will always go back to a place where the food is so so, but the service is great. On the other hand, you can have the best food in the world and have slow or poor service and i will never darken that establishments door again.
To me service is everything and it seems that you didn’t get either good service or great food.
Well, that’s the thing. Service was friendly, but the food took a long time.
But, friendly is one part of my equation. The other is slow service. If it’s slow, but friendly that is unacceptable too. I can eat okay food that has friendly fast and accurate service, I can’t with slow, or inaccurate or unfriendly service.
So, it would be one visit here and never go back for me. It’s the same in my business, you can be the friendliest tech but take a long time and you won’t get called back because it was too much of a hassle for the customer.
Fair enough, but I think some people would argue that it’s worth the wait (in the case of good food, not necessarily in the case of good tech support).
Next time you go back you have to take a photo of Isabelle for us! I am intrigued for some reason, I guess its the name.
-Jean
I didn’t want to be *too* intrusive, but she is the one behind the coffee bar in the first picture. That’s the back of her head. Ha!
Understood man, theres a certain level of privacy/respect as well. And thanks for the headsup on the photo!
-Jean
Just to be devils advocate, what about the picture of the other people sitting their eating? What about being intrusive with them?
While out in public reasonable expectations of privacy have a blurred line in today’s society. But, in an establishment that you have sat down at an individual table inside there is more of a sense of privacy. Now, if I was at a Canucks game eating a counter or at a ballpark at a table I wouldn’t expect that privacy because that is a true public place. The same goes at Disney World, where no expectation of privacy should every be expected because it is a public vacation destination.
Ray: I guess my point was that I wasn’t going to ask her to “pose” for a picture, while the other diners I captured in a more “candid” moment.
Thats a good point Ray, it does appear that the line has been blurred, but at the same time people willingly accept it. I personally try to avoid the cameras whenever I see them though, but to each their own. I do agree with Michael though it was a rather candid scenario.
-Jean
Slow service beyond a certain point gets me a bit angry. I can accept that certain preparations can take a long time to do the dish justice but I have seen that sometimes, they try to prolong the wait if you happen to have ordered drinks before the meal, just to get you to order more since the drinks are usually the most overpriced items on the menu.
Add to the price of the drinks that the food cost on drinks is so small (pennies on the dollar) that they are making 1000% profit on each drink.
Oh absolutely, but it’s all about frame of reference. The same latte at a Starbucks (which isn’t a “restaurant”) would be about $4.50 or so and that’s without table service.
Right on. That is definitely their maximum profit maker. Even the fruit juice I drink in the morning during breakfast probably costs more to make than those drinks they serve.
If the food is marvelous than we forget about the time it to took to be served.
I disagree completely with that statement. The quality of the food is one minor part of the experience at a restaurant. I ran restaurants for 14 years and every class or training stressed that service was #1.
Also, from customer feedback, if the food was good and the service excellent they would come back over 90% of the time. On the other hand, if the food was excellent and the service just good or poor they would not come back 90% of the time and would 100% of the time tell their friends, associates and anyone else willing to listen about the poor experience that they had.
Somehow i agree with you ,,,but still the food quality is very much important…
you are always good in taking pics of food which looks even better on photos then in real
Thanks!
I wonder if they have Croque Monsieur, one of my all time fav French baguette lunches… delicious, c’est magnifique 🙂
Quel dommage! No croque monsieur here. As far as I understand, though, a croque monsieur (or croque madame and all the other varieties) is not typically prepared with a baguette. All the ones I saw in Paris were on regular sliced bread.
that’s strange, ’cause all the ones I ate (and there were many) if they weren’t specifically on a baguette, they were definitely on french bread. (crust all around the edges). Anyways… they are very good.
Yeah, they were on French (sliced) bread, but they weren’t baguettes. A baguette slice would be too small, no?
I guess maybe… I was too busy eating to notice 😉