We’d been enjoying the continental breakfast at our motel, but for our last breakfast in Moab we decided to have a lazy morning and check out nearby Jailhouse Cafe. It’s strictly a breakfast place. It’s in a cute little house and they have adorable landscaping outside.
This is the southwestern eggs florentine. It is comprised of two poached eggs with steamed spinach on toasted english muffin, covered wtih a southwestern hollandaise and topped with spicy chipotle chili. And don’t forget the heaping helping of country-fried potatoes! S enjoyed this quite a bit, and I was a huge fan of the potatoes. I love potatoes like this for breakfast, and there wasn’t an undercooked one in the bunch.
I had to go with what seems to be their specialty – the old fashioned ginger pancakes with dutch apple butter. Yes folks, it’s three huge ginger spiced pancakes with apple butter and butter and maple syrup. They’re fluffy, gingery, but not overly so, cooked well, and hot! I enjoyed theses quite a bit, and finished pretty much two of them. I even impressed myself. And the apple butter goes really well with them! Service was just fine and everyone in there seemed happy to be eating.

The lovely ladies at Philly Food Lovers invited me to Down Home Diner at Reading Terminal Market to have lunch. I made it a point to not go during the peak lunch hours, but it was still really crazy busy in there! We got a seat in one of their booths, but everything else was full! Jack McDavid servers up home style cooking with a southern twist here. He famously wears denim overalls and a red and white “Save the Farm” trucker’s cap and is super nice. I got a chance to meet him and he certainly serves up some great food. K got the fried catfish with mashed potatoes, broccoli, and philadelphia style pepper hash. This hash is amazing! It’s a sweet and sour slaw of cabbage and bell peper with just enough spice. It would go well with anything!
Here’s C’s Poached On A Biscuit… homemade buttermilk biscuit topped with salt-cured virginia ham, sliced tomato, and two poached eggs. There’s some stewed apples to go with those too. And she also got an order of cheesy grits. After she let the grits sit for awhile, they were just the way she liked them, not too mushy.
And here’s my Cast Iron Fried Chicken with mashed potatoes and collared greens. This is a whole lotta chicken that is super hot, super moist, and perfectly fried up. You know what goes really well with it? The philadelphia style pepper hash! And it was even better the next day as leftovers! The sweet potato fries were also amazing, and I think they are twice fried. But the real star of this plate was the collard greens. They are braised and are sweet and savory and not bitter at all. These are some of the best greens I’ve ever had! This was a fun and delicious lunch with some amazing women and tons of delicious food. I need to eat in the city more often!

For my one brunch in Portland, I met up with B and his wife in the Pearl at Byways Cafe. This is a very popular brunch spot, and they told me there’s usually long waits here. I hate long waits. Since I got there a bit early, I put our name in and wandered around the shops a bit. I was assured by the hostess that our name would not be taken off the list if we weren’t there at the time she called it. So once we were all there, we didn’t have a wait at all. It was glorious! On the weekends, they’re only open for brunch and you can only order from the breakfast menu. This wasn’t going to be a problem. It’s a pretty small place and it’s like a kitschy diner, but without the neon lights or waitresses in funny little uniforms. We got to sit in one of the booths and we promptly got to ordering.
B got a scramble special of the day with prosciutto, veggies, local cheese, potatoes, and all kinds of good stuff. Yes, it’s as much food as it looks!They’re a bit famous for their blue corn pancakes here, so I definitely had to get that. But they also had a ricotta pancake on special which also sounded damn good, so I had to get one too. I wanted to try several of the pancakes so I asked if I could pick three separate ones, and they said sure. So that’s how I ended up with a ricotta, blue corn, and blueberry pancake. They were served with an almond butter and genuine maple syrup. The almond butter is awesome! I also got some strips of super thick bacon and an egg of my choice because our server recommended the sunrise special. What a great deal! Three ginormous pancakes, bacon, and egg, with even a couple wedges of orange. Speaking of orange, I also had a little glass of some delicious fresh squeezed oj. The service was fine. The other plate of pancakes took a bit long coming out, well after B’s scramble and my plate of pancakes. But other than that, we had no complaints. I have to figure out how to make my own blue corn pancakes now!