Rosewood Foods
Warning: Stop just once at Rosewood Foods for the breakfast sandwich, and you will likely never be able to handle a drive-thru version of the portable morning meal ever again. Is it the chili jam, the generous chicken-sausage patty, or the house-made milk bun that makes the Rosewood Foods breakfast sandwich so gosh-darn awesome? This isn’t so much an amped-up version of the breakfast sandwich as it is a reinvention of the breakfast sandwich. And, don’t forget the side of the home-fried potatoes. Sure, you can take this one and eat it while you’re in the car, but my advice is to sit down and take a few minutes to really enjoy this one. After all, it’s the most important meal of the day. — Steven Sandor
101, 10150 100 St., NW, 780-757-8030, RosewoodFoods.com
Brown Butter Café
There are a couple things that any respectable sandwich, eaten at any time of day, must be: filling, and made of quality bread. Heena and Michael Mak, who started Brown Butter Café after meeting in culinary arts school, know this. Having a nice start to my day, I was tempted to try their Good Morning Bunwich, with avocado and spicy mayo, but I’m a sucker for a BLT, because it’s a good way to judge a place (many treat it as an afterthought), and also…bacon. I don’t know what the daily recommended dose of bacon is, but this BLT (with Swiss cheese) probably has you covered for the week. More importantly, it’s cooked perfectly for a sandwich: not chewy, but not so crispy that it flakes with every bite, making it a delicious-if-unwieldy sandwich on bread baked in house that day. With all the fast-food chain places littering Ellerslie Road, it’s well worth a one-minute detour south on Parsons Road to start your day right. – Cory Schachtel
1528 91 St., SW, 780-752-9900, BrownButterCafe.com