Kansas City Food Blog

Grand Street's Monte Cristo looks like a serious sandwich.

​Grand Street Cafe launched its new breakfast menu on Monday with a number of sweet and savory options designed to lure in the Plaza corporate crowd. 

"We expect to have a strong business crowd, it's definitely going to be a big component," Chef Ian Hockenberger said when Fat City caught up with him in the dining room earlier this week.

The new menu grew out of an informal arrangement. Grand Street Cafe regularly hosts two to three breakfast parties a week; now it will be hosting breakfast on Monday to Saturday from 7 to 10 a.m. And brunch is still on from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sundays. 

Breakfast will feature staples of the traditional brunch -- Griddles (pancakes, belgian waffles, or french toast, $6) and Benedicts (three kinds, including the Tide Water with crab cakes, $10). But it will also have a few wrinkles, like the Monte Cristo (house-smoked turkey, ham and brie on brioche French toast, topped with cranberry chutney ($7), and huevos rancheros ($8). 

Huevos rancheros are one of the new dishes on the breakfast menu.

​"We have great huevos rancheros -- black beans and over easy eggs with chorizo sausage, avocado, salsa and creme fraiche on a fried corn tortilla," says Hockenberger.

If you're an egg lover, there will be three omelets ($8): the Veggy, Turkey Swiss and Denver. Those looking for lighter fare can opt for steel cut oatmeal ($5) or the South Beach Breakfast (half-cantaloupe, seasonal fruit, vanilla yogurt and a sprinkle of granola, $8). The melon might change depending on the season or what's fresh.

And then there's the Down Home ($7) because it's not breakfast in Kansas City if you don't have biscuits and sausage gravy with your scrambled eggs.

[Images courtesy of the Grand Street Cafe]