The server told me people waited well over a year for this restaurant to open. I casually mentioned I wasn’t one the people. He smiled, then walked away.

Truth be told, Twitter is the only reason why Street was chosen for brunch that day. The other underlying reason may be I’m an uber cheap alcoholic. Observe the Tweet:

Now do a bit of analysis. That’s right, this is the cheapest AYCD brunch booze in all of LA right now, barring Overland Cafe’s proffering. You can have Susan Feniger’s Street, or you have can a sad Westside diner full of alchi’s. It ain’t a choice at all.

With zero chance of ever greeting the obscenely annoying dinner menu ( $18 for Chinese stir fry noodles? $16 for Thai “style” masamum curry? $16 for pho? surely you jest?), we had a feeling brunch would pleasantly surprise. And it did. If you remove every mentions of various foreign lands in the brunch menu, it’d read something like this: sugar-stuffed paranthas, homemade muesli and yogurt, spicy tapioca, donuts with cardamon rose syrup, kaya toast, roasted chilaquiles, bagel & deli, beet & apple salad, spinach egg pilaf, beef potato hash, etc. While prices are still rocket high, at least I’m less offended. This could easily join Ammo, Jar, or even Campanile as the Sunday brunch line up.

And then there are the limitless bloody marys and nectarine bellini. Say no more.

The lovely SO is a sucker for smoked fish + bagels. It’s the brekkie combo she always insists when visiting a new brunch joint with a Jewish head chef. I, myself, prefer eggs benedict, but this was nowhere to be found. Instead, I settled for a carb dish (fried donut holes, but with lamb sausage!), she ordered the bagel + deli platter AND the muesli + yogurt. $8 for granola + house made yogurt. F**kMyWallet.

The Turkish donuts tasted like.. bad jalebi, but the cool sour cream + roasted jam accoutrement really lit up my tongue on that hot Sunday. What really attracted me to the dish was the “lamb sausage”. These turned out to be small minced lamb patties served in a separate metal saucer. Alternating bites of the spiced lamb burger and the refreshing sour cream with deep notes of cucumber really made my morning. It didn’t matter the sausage was unconventional and had no casing at all.

Muesli is muesli is muesli. It’s the steel cut granola of 2009. It’s fancy breakfast cereal. If you were to order this, please eat it before the main plats arrive. The donut + lamb patties just overwhelmed the yogurt/muesli combo.

Finally, there was the bagel with the deli. This platter, featuring half a dozen goodies, including smoked white fish, was downright affordable. Unfortunately, the bagel would make Infinite Fress cringe. It was straight baked, but much smaller than a bialy. The cornichon pickles were fantasic, as were the mixed greens with apples and the “new potato salad”. It all reminds me of the wonderful pickled onions we had at Zuni couple of months back.

But really, 1 more time. It was about the muddled fresh nectarines splashed with plenty of champagne. What they really should provide, are boba-compatible straws so one may suck up the nectarines with grace. It ain’t a real “B”ellini with white peaches, but Hollywood ain’t Venezia so we’re still all kosher.

Susan Feniger’s Street

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