Weekday Brunch: Versailles Cafe

We’ve come to associate brunch with the weekends. French toast, bennies and fancy omelettes are the stuff of Saturdays and Sundays. Heck, most restaurants only serve fancy brunches on the weekends.

But, it’s not fair. What if you’ve had a terrible morning meeting at the office and want to cry into a couple of berry-covered pieces of French toast? What if you work on Saturdays and Sundays, and your “weekend” is Monday and Tuesday?

Versailles Cafe has stepped into the breach. Last month, it launched a lunch and brunch menu, featuring omelettes, French toast and croissants that are baked in the shop. This High Street cafe is located in what used to be a Starbucks, but, when you walk in, you’d never know the Seattle chain once had a franchise, here. Chandeliers hang from the wall. Euro-disco plays on the sound system. The glass display cases contain croissants, macarons, tarts and quiches. I’ve been here quite a few times, but, I have to say, in the last few months, this place has really picked it up a notch. I’d now rate it as one of the go-to cafes in the city.

But, brunch, on a weekday? Sure!

I ordered the salmon omelette, which comes with a green salad, potato salad, brioche toast and a side of fruit. This is a three-egg omelette, so it’s hefty. Mine came perfectly done, with the salmon, red onions and capers rolled in. It was decadent, and stands up against any of the better brunch offerings you’ll find in the city. The potato salad was all-in with the dill, which offered a tangy foil to the eggs and salmon. Capers were aplenty, here, and that’s a good thing — those little sour nuggets of goodness are, well, sour nuggets of goodness. And the brioche toast was the add-on you didn’t know you need to have. It was like the Versailles Cafe was thinking, how do we throw down the gauntlet? What do we do to let the world know that weekday brunch is alive and well?

Let’s finish off the dish with toast that is like an ingestion of pure butter!