I arrived for brunch yesterday at the Downtown Blue Monkey about 10 minutes after it opened. Here are a few pics of the new place (click on images for full-sized view):
The entire gang showed up over the next hour, and enjoyed the Monkey’s brunch menu and happy hour prices (happy hour lasts from open until 7 on Sundays). The Nuh-Uh Girl ordered salad with ketchup as dressing. Gross! Then, even grosser, she wondered how pancakes would taste with ketchup:
The Nuh-Uh Girl and the Nuh-Uh Sister have this game they play called “Name a food that doesn’t go with either chocolate sauce or ketchup.” So far they’ve yet to name one food that (in their minds) doesn’t go with one or the other.
Then the Nuh-Uh Girl asked, “I wonder what ketchup ice cream would taste like?” What is wrong with that girl?
On the walk down to the Blue Monkey, I passed the Family Dollar store on Main. There was a poster on the window saying that FD now carries the Bugle Boy clothing line. Talk about a brand whose identity has gone down the proverbial crapper. In the late ’80s that was one of the hottest brands around. And now it’s being sold at Family Dollar? Sounds like Bugle Boy needs to fire its marketing department.
One of the brunch crew recently celebrated the 1-year anniversary of the day he met his fiancee. So he took her to Circa by John Bragg (who, I’ll mention one more time, was our BBQ sponsor). “I don’t even want to look at a menu,” my friend told John. “You pick what you want us to have,” he said. So the couple got a secluded back room at Circa and were served an elegant six-course meal, each course specially designed by the chef himself. They said it was one of their best meals ever. So if you want a custom meal designed for a special occasion, Circa would be a great place to do it.
We stayed at brunch until 2:15, longer than we’ve stayed at the Majestic or McGuinness in a long time. Everyone seemed to have a great time and I have a feeling we’ll be back there a lot. Majestic may be able to hold on to a place in the Sunday brunch rotation; McGuinness probably won’t. As much as we all like Amy, the mimosa and bloody mary prices just aren’t competitive with the Monkey and Majestic, and breakfast ends too early at McG (noon, compared with 2 at the Monkey and 3 at Majestic). I’ll try to include McG on my list of nighttime stops more than I have in the past to make up for it.
After brunch, we moved to the Saucer to shoot pool, then I wandered down to Big Foot for a couple of $2 34 oz. beer specials. That pretty much did me in… wandered to Sawaddii for Paul’s Drunkass Food (lettuce wraps = GOOD) then home.
Revising one of my online stores today, then heading out to eat (probably the Monkey) then to the Saucer for Pint Nite.