I liked how they had multiple carafes of coffee on the table for us; I didn’t like what was in them. We designated it “new low” coffee, which could be sold on the foreign market as NüLo, the bar café. It couldn’t even be put to the Campsie test because the Campsie’s was merely weak, this stuff just tasted bad. The fact that we were in a bar never escaped our attention; for instance, when orange juice was ordered, 5-alive was brought instead.

Our plates held food of varied quality. The hashbrowns were probably the best part of the meal, as they had the skin on and were mixed with onions. They were quite tasty, salty good. The rest of it though… some of it defies description. I indulged in the big breakfast as I am wont to do, and my meats all came burnt. The “kubi” (another one for our lexicon of garlic sausage) was decent, but the burnt-ness of it was disappointing. The bacon was small and crispy and the ham was okay. It was just thicker than luncheon meat ham. On the other side of the spectrum lay the “butterflied” sausage links. Absolutely inedible. I took one bite and couldn’t identify the awful taste in my mouth so I choked down the tiny bite and put the rest aside. At the end of the meal I decided to give it another chance, thinking that I must have blown it out of proportion earlier. Nope! They were terrible. They managed to not burn the eggs, but they could have burnt the toast a bit… mine looked like it had just leant against the side of the toaster, it was so soft and raw.

The ketchup was rancid. Did I mention that? Either that or it was ketchup substitute, just add water. I had only ever smelled that before at Woo’s Café, and I have to say, when a restaurant can’t offer anything better than Woo’s, that’s a problem. When I asked the server for hot sauce she literally had to stop in her tracks and repeat it back to me, “Hot sauce?” in disbelief. To my surprise, she came back with a small bowl of the red chili sauce from the bottle with a rooster on it. I called it “cock sauce” which some of my tablemates found absolutely hilarious, to my delight. (The hot sauce was actually black at the top of the container like when you leave an open can of peaches in the fridge too long. Like Melanoma. Leif )

We were not lacking for meal-time entertainment. Not only did we have a robust party of 11, but the early drinkers in the bar thought it prudent to start yelling across the room at each other about how drunk they were, whether they would get kicked out, and how they were dodging their kids. It was 11:30am.

Take a stroll five minutes in any direction and you’ll find better places to eat breakfast.

Eek!

September 20 2008

Tojo’s Coffee Shop

(In the Cambridge Hotel Restaurant)

1022 Pembina Highway

Hours of operation:

Mon-Fri    8:30 AM - 2 PM  

                 4 PM - 7 PM

Sat            8:30 AM - 2 PM 

                4 PM - 7 PM

Sun           Closed

Breakfast Special -

$4.47 before 10:30 AM

After 10:30 AM       $5.35

Tojo’s is the greasy spoon subtly nestled in the Cambridge Hotel, across the street from another noteworthy watering hole, The Pemby. If that means anything to you, then you know how this review is going to go.

We had a unique experience in Tojo’s. We didn’t get to eat in the restaurant because our party was too big. They were still able to accommodate us, but it meant that we ate in the bar. Yes, nothing says breakfast like the ringing noise of VLTs and watching lonely old men sulk over their early morning beers.

Our server was the bartender who exclaimed said she had to “remember how to do this” as she took our orders. She was cheerful but withered from working in a bar too long. She took our orders, assigning numerical values to our seats. Of course, this meant that whoever ordered first (me) got served last.

Click on menu to enlarge