“Surprise” is the first word that came to my mind when thinking of what to write about my experience in Midlothian at the Brick House Diner. “Value” was the second word. “I’ll be back”, well that’s… a catchy line in an old 80’s movie. But I may be soon.
Similar to last Sunday I decided to just get in the car and drive this morning. Not having spent too much time around Midlothian was the only reason I headed that way. I needed today’s Washington Post and hit a Wawa. I asked for a reference to a local breakfast place and clarified my question with “locally owned, small” after being pointed to Denny’s. I thought briefly – a hundredth of a second – about how the big media-driven corporation is ruining American culture then hopped back in the car…
Not more than a mile down the road was a brick house with a parking lot full of cars. I caught the word “Diner” on a sign and threw on the brakes, parked, and paused my iPod (mid-way through DMB’s Charlottesville show from April 18, 2009). It was a short stroll into the diner on a lovely morning.
Turns out the diner is a locally owned family run business and has been open for about five years. It’s unassuming in appearance. The decor is conservative with a few womanly touches. It feels like New Jersey diner meets southern belle gone wild. One thing for sure, it was spotless!
The breakfast menu is simple, a feature I appreciate for a Sunday morning. Out of the corner of the dining room I heard from another table “big boy breakfast.” I took a quick glance and quickly deduced that would be way too much food for me and kept the order simple: “two-egg breakfast.” Home fries or grits and bacon or sausage were the choices. Seems the grits are instant so the potatoes were the easy pick with bacon.
The plate presented very clean. The eggs were perfectly over-easy and what I liked most was that they were two individual eggs not the customary two yolks in one white presentation. The bacon was not too crisp, totally bendable with the meat pulling away easily. The potatoes rocked! A great combination of seasoning and texture. The coffee was coffee. You know you’re local when there’s local advertising on the mug! It all worked great.
And fast too. It couldn’t have been more than 6-8 minutes from the time I ordered until my plate was arriving. I wasn’t even through the sports section when it arrived. I always read the sports first. I know, total guy.
The Brick House Diner is a family place so expect kids when you go. And it’s pretty small too. So young kids cranky on a Sunday morning can make for some noise. Be prepared. Luckily for me the paper didn’t have anything that wonderful today. I’m sure if I really wanted to get into it the small children belting out unpleasantness, the father openly reading the comics to his daughter, and the college aged kid explaining to his girlfriend they could make a lot of money with a web-cam would have totally distracted me.
All in all it was a nice experience and I am glad I went for the Sunday morning drive. Including gratuity the breakfast was an even $10. This may not be the perfect place as it relates to my previous post but the Brick House does the best with what it has, a value most other breakfast places lack in the Richmond area.
LAN Breakfast Rating: 4.25 out of 5 stars.
