single serving: breakfast sandwich....with a side of tots and fritters!

Sooner or later it seems, restaurants in SF make a play for breakfast or brunch, it's almost like a pre-requisite. Do a soft opening, get up an running full time and then after a few months, boom! Hours are add along with something that has eggs. In the grand scheme of things, you gotta do what ya' gotta do to run a restaurant in this town.

The latest spot to jump on the breakfast for office workers bandwagon is The Bird. I was already a fan as I think they do about the best fried chicken sandwich in town, amongst all the ones on offer. Now they have added biscuit breakfast sandwiches to the fray and seriously, how could I resist trying them?

The do offer one with their signature fried chicken, but since I'd already tried that, I decided to try one of their other options. Surprise! It wasn't the one with bacon either.

That's right, a sausage, egg and cheddar cheese biscuit. Made to order, you get a hot fried egg and sausage that allows you to get all that nice melty, gooey cheese. A nice juicy patty of sausage rest underneath an egg that normally comes sunny side up, but I asked for it fried a little hard to fit my tastes. And you do get plenty of cheddar cheese for some richness.

But ultimately, the basics of the fillings can live or die with the biscuit that houses them. They are made in house and for the most part, it is a nice little biscuit. When I bit into the one I had, the top shattered and crumbled into pieces. As a Southerner, I've been eating biscuits since birth and had more than enough to know the good from the bad. Plus, having a grandmother and mother who made them, you get to know some ins and outs. When a biscuit falls apart so easily usually it means there is either too much or too little lard in the mix. A conundrum for sure--which was it? If it was too much, the biscuit would have been more flat and hockey puck like. Since it did have some rise on it, I'm gonna say it had too little lard. Baking is like a science, exact measurements matter when reproducing something and if one thing is off, it can effect everything else. Much like it did here.

Also, it isn't the biggest biscuit either, more like a mini breakfast sandwich. But what helps that size is the fact it automatically comes with a side of tater tot rounds!!!

And all for the small sum of $4.50. That makes it a bargain breakfast in this town. What does this mean? Had the biscuit been better I'd have given a total thumbs up to trying this. Right now I'll say between the price and what you get, eh, it was good enough. It isn't going to break your wallet and outside the biscuit, the egg, cheese, sausage and tots here are tasty enough.

But The Bird isn't only making a play for my breakfast cash, they are trying to snag my sweet tooth too with some mini apple fritters! Diced Fuji apples in a deep fried cinnamon batter ball covered in a maple glaze. You get 3 for the small sum of $1.50, which sort of fits their small size.

These are one bite poppers and you do get all the flavors of apple, cinnamon and maple here. Mine were not hot out of the fryer (which would have been nice) but they were cooked through and not too doughy or chewy and just a little crisp on the outside. The maple also wasn't too sweet or cloying. Overall, a nice little sweet bite and you won't feel too guilty as if you had eaten a donut or a life size apple fritter like this one or even this one.

My takeaway is, for the price and what you get, it ain't a half bad breakfast. Granted there are better biscuits, but the other stuff that goes with it is good enough to temporarily look past an under larded biscuit. Though I would hope they eventually get the recipe corrected and this won't happen again. It's possible they may already have and I will mostly likely get by there again to try one. Maybe I'll see you there?