Eating: Art’s Cafe
Brunch is a legitimate hobby, a meticulously planned and momentous activity for some. Translate = it is what your weekend plans revolve around, it is expensive, there are several courses, and only wear your best, most hipster or trendy attire. At Art’s Cafe, you are better off if you don’t do any of the above. A small, 15-seat diner, all of the seats run along one long counter top with a perfect view of the various food prep and grill stations. Nothing hides in this restaurant; you are cozied up with your meal mates and other casual diners, and within arm’s reach of the cooks putting together your breakfast.
Postcards and pictures of patrons holding up “Art’s Cafe” signs around the world are sealed beneath the customer counter for browsing while you patiently sit and wait. The menu has all the standard breakfast diner dishes you would expect, but you are here for one thing and one thing only. Hash brown sandwich.
Art and his staff heat up a huge chef’s grill where they constantly frying several giant rectangles of shredded potatoes. With a weighted press, they apply pressure on top of the hash browns to make sure it’s evenly crisped together one one side before flipping it over to crisp the other. Then there is cheese. Freshly grated cheese melted right on to your open-face hash brown. Adding in your filling of choice and folding the hash brown layer in half, voila, you have your hash brown sandwich. Crunchy, cheesy, salty, supreme.
Did I mention this place is cheap as f****? I’m sorry, please tell me where you can get eggs, hash browns, toast and coffee for $24.00 in San Francisco — for two people. Yes, two. No reservations, wait this one out.
CRAVE: HASH. BROWN. SANDWICH.
Veggie hash brown sandwich with scrambled eggs and toast in the background
Hash browns fryin’ up
Hash brown sandwich with steak and sunny-side-up eggs
Learn more about Art’s Cafe on their website here.