Top five brunches in Victoria

I'll admit it, I have had this posting on hold for a while for the week where I just don't have anything new to post and write about.  I just can't keep it back any longer, but in no particular order, here's my list of top brunch spots in Victoria:

1) The Fernwood Inn.  The two egg breakfast is a great deal, but  the steak and eggs skillet is fantastic.  Eat here on a hot summer's day, on the patio. Enjoy the parsnips muddled up into the breakfast potatoes, the big meaty pork sausages or the apricot toast.  Prices are a little high, but you pay for the quality.

2) Glo.  The beef short rib hash has all the right combinations for a meat eater's breakfast: potatoes are done with plenty of flavour and starch to fill you up, protein exuding a rich, savoury flavour and eggs letting out a golden yoke to add richness to the piles of veggies hash underneath.  You can get a wind-shaded spot outside, or enjoy the quiet indoors any time of the year.  Why this place is not rocking every Sunday is probably due to the location out of the down core.

3) The Blue Fox. If it just was as quiet as Glo, I'd probably not have anything else to write about, as I'd just go there all the time, and this blog would merely be 52 weeks of eating at the Blue Fox.  However, this isn't the Worst Idea of All Time (and anyways that would involve eating at Cora's every Sunday for a year).  Instead, it's a rare treat that remind me how good the basics of food can be done.

4) The Guild.  The full works breakfast at the Guild is a heart attack on a plate.  If you ate it every day, never exercised and washed it down with a pint of melted ice cream.  As the start to set yourself up for a long day's hike/renovations/moving a friend out of their fifth-floor walk-up apartment after a relationship-ending fight, it's a grand start.  I love the mix of west-coast and English-style gastropub at the Guild.  And the fact it's never too busy.

5) Spoons.  Only if you can catch it when it's just busy enough to be good for people watching, and not so busy the wait is half a day.  They do traditional breakfast here with plenty of everything. Or they twist it up a notch or five with a some extra combination, like breakfast fajitas or a massive side of poutine with your pulled pork benny.  Go for a diner style experience, and you'll be more than happy.

I think that's my top five.  Other favourites include Avalon, Picnic Too and Ferris's upstairs.  It's a hard list to confine to just five in Victoria.  And indicates the high bar you have to clear here to be notable.

EDIT: Uptairs at Ferris's no longer does a brunch menu, I am reliably informed. No more Weekend Crossword...